Israel/Hamas War Superthread

[Dill]

(04-27-2024, 10:40 AM)StoneTheCrow Wrote: I’ve seen outlets refer to him as a leader of the protest.
https://www.newsweek.com/who-khymani-james-columbia-protest-organizers-remarks-spark-fury-1894488

She apparently has status enough to lead a presser.

There goes the right, ***noticing*** shit. Seizing, pouncing, etc.

I can't find that he leads any student organization,
and apparently the CUAD organizers have disavowed his rhetoric.

He's harming a cause I'm happy to support, but I still hope this
gets a lot of coverage so protestors will THINK MORE about
what they are saying and doing.

I'm betting most protestors see him as an outlier who doesn't represent
them. They are about to learn a lesson in media framing and the dangers of groupthink.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-27-2024, 08:07 PM)Dill Wrote: The challenge of responding to you is first and foremost sorting out the muddle of projection and misdirection.

First point to make: no one is arguing that no Hamas are in Palestinian jails. Again you are refuting an argument that doesn't exist. My argument is that advocating to free imprisoned Palestinians does not make protestors "advocates for Hamas" just because some Hamas might be imprisoned too. Protestors think the occupation is illegal and the thousands jailed under its military rule are illegally imprisoned. They are advocating for the human rights of those thousands of innocents. 

You asked "What children?" Since you weren't "informed" (as the protestors undoubtedly are) that Israel routinely arrests children, claps them in irons, and holds them for days, weeks and months without a hearing, all that "needs to be established" is that there are children, hundreds, in Israeli detention, and the IDF has been doing this for decades. I've established that.

Israeli law does not go by your definition of a child. It accepts the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which defines a "child" as anyone under 18. https://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/crc-c-opac-isr-co-1.pdf  Israel arrests and prosecutes children from age 12 up.

The boy detained in the picture accompanying this article is 10 years old.
880 Palestinian children detained by Israel this year: NGO
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20231120-880-palestinian-children-detained-by-israel-this-year-ngo/
https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/palestinian-children-israeli-military-detention-report-increasingly-violent-conditions

As far as "how many children are wrongfully imprisoned"? If you think the occupation and military courts are legal, then all of them are. But even
if you consider military rule and detention legal, there's still a problem. Thousands of Palestinians were detained before Oct. 7 and many have been 
held without charge for years. Israelis can extend detention without public explanation. There is no transparency. 
As of Sept. '23, 146 children were in custody. https://www.btselem.org/statistics/minors_in_custody. 
In the last 5 months that number has increased by hundreds.

Israel holds over 1,200 detainees without charge. That’s the most in 3 decades, a rights group says [99% Palestinian]
https://apnews.com/article/israel-detention-jails-palestinians-west-bank-793a3b2a1ce8439d08756da8c63e5435


So, not being informed that hundreds of children have been and continued to be imprisoned in Israel, under a system of military rule which does not accord them the same basic rights as Israeli or US citizens, you fill this vacuum of knowledge with speculation about Hamas training not-really-children to commit really heinous offenses of which they are certainly "guilty." THAT must be how so many get arrested. Like MS 13 (which I believe you have also accused me of "supporting").

But according to virtually every human rights organization monitoring the arrest of Palestinian children, they mostly land in jail for violating "military orders" which restrict what we call 1A rights. Also many are stonethrowers resisting occupation. Here's an eyewitness account of a 14 year-olds arrest from a Time reporter in 2012 https://time.com/6366734/palestinian-child-detainees/

Here's a report from 2018.  Israel/OPT: Ahed Tamimi release a bittersweet moment as other Palestinian children languish in Israeli jails
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/07/ahed-tamimi-release-a-bittersweet-moment-as-other-palestinian-children-languish-in-israeli-jails/
The Israeli army prosecutes hundreds of Palestinian children in military courts every year, often after arresting them in night raids and systematically subjecting them to ill-treatment, including blindfolding, threats, harsh interrogations without the presence of their lawyers or families, solitary confinement and in some cases physical violence.

Military courts prosecute Palestinians for violating military orders, many of which criminalize peaceful activities such as peaceful political expression or organizing and attending protests without prior permission from an Israeli military commander.

I'll reiterate, since you didn't answer.  How many actual children are in Israeli prison?  Please note that juvenile detention is not the same as adult detention, there are thousands of juveniles detained in the US as well.  A child is a person under fourteen years old, so again, please provide those numbers.  I don't think a sane person here would agree that a 17-year-old is a child.

Also, pleas note it is very apparent that you're trying to shift the conversation.  The college kids trying to free all Palestinian prisoners are not solely concerned with the prisoners under 18, they want all the Hamas terrorists freed.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-27-2024, 09:04 PM)Dill Wrote: I can't find that he leads any student organization,
and apparently the CUAD organizers have disavowed his rhetoric.

He's harming a cause I'm happy to support, but I still hope this
gets a lot of coverage so protestors will THINK MORE about
what they are saying and doing.

I'm betting most protestors see him as an outlier who doesn't represent
them. They are about to learn a lesson in media framing and the dangers of groupthink.

Omar and AOC don't seem to consider him unimportant or an outlier.  I'm sure their condemnation of this person is forthcoming. 

[StoneTheCrow]

(04-27-2024, 09:04 PM)Dill Wrote: I can't find that he leads any student organization,
and apparently the CUAD organizers have disavowed his rhetoric.

He's harming a cause I'm happy to support, but I still hope this
gets a lot of coverage so protestors will THINK MORE about
what they are saying and doing.

I'm betting most protestors see him as an outlier who doesn't represent
them. They are about to learn a lesson in media framing and the dangers of groupthink.

I’m betting you’d lose that bet.

[Dill]

(04-26-2024, 08:33 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Yes, they are uninformed bigots.  If you can support Hamas you are either a bigot or you are uninformed as to what they do.  There is no other option.
I don't think a factual point accurately stated is pompous.

Supporting Palestinian rights =/= "supporting Hamas."  Just as acknowledging Israeli war crimes is not "mitigating Hamas." 

The claim protestors are "bigots" is a value judgment, based on a claim of fact you've yet to establish. 
If it's only ok for you to call people "bigots," then again you except yourself from your own standards.

(04-26-2024, 08:33 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I haven't seen a lot of evidence that protestors are "with Hamas." They seem to be standing with
people illegally held under military occupation. That's why I asked you to supply evidence of Hamas advocacy.
Your evidence so far has been that they support Palestinians, and some Palestinians are Hamas.
Which I call, yes, bad reasoning, even if some Hamas are Palestinian. It is not a kind of reasoning
which can be aligned with the fundamentals of human rights law.

You're lying here and it would only take someone reading the last few posts to know it.  They advocate for freeing all Palestinian prisoners.  This includes a very large number of convicted Hamas murderers.  If the sign said free all non-Hamas prisoners you'd have a point.  It didn't, so you don't.  So this kid is either ignorant of the Hamas prisoners or they know and don't care, which which would them a bigoted terrorist supporter.

Anyone who knows how to follow arguments from evidence would know you are not arguing from evidence,
while calling me a "liar" for refusing to follow you beyond what the evidence allows.

The protestors want and end to the war inflicting mass casualties on civilians,
They want an end to the illegal occupation.
And they want people illegally imprisoned under the occupation to be freed. 

That's why their signs say "End the War," "End the Occupation" and "Free Palestinian prisoners." 

According to your logic, anyone with a sign advocating for Palestinian human rights is really advocating for Hamas' rights
--unless the sign says "Human rights for all non-Hamas Palestinians." 

Or "End the Occupation for non-Hamas Palestinians." 

[Dill]

(04-27-2024, 09:58 PM)StoneTheCrow Wrote: I’m betting you’d lose that bet.

Why do you suppose CUAD disavowed his statements, then? 

[Dill]

(04-27-2024, 09:37 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I'll reiterate, since you didn't answer.  How many actual children are in Israeli prison?  

I'll reiterate: Your original question was "what children are in prison?"  

I've answered with what you didn't know--Palestinian children. Hundreds of them. 

"How many" was a follow up. And I explained why that was hard to determine,
given the lack of transparency in Israeli prisons. The number changes daily.
But still, I gave you valid numbers from different years. 

Now some new goalposts:

(04-27-2024, 09:37 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Please note that juvenile detention is not the same as adult detention, there are thousands of juveniles detained in the US as well.  A child is a person under fourteen years old, so again, please provide those numbers.  I don't think a sane person here would agree that a 17-year-old is a child.

Please note that the Israeli penal system is different from the US'.  So 

1. The crucial distinction here is between Israeli civilian courts and the military courts used to try Palestinians, not Juvenile vs Adult detention.

2. Under Israeli Law, persons under 18 are children, for reasons I've explained. Apparently plenty of "sane" people agree on this, or how could it be law in so many nations--including the US? But again you just say "A child is a person under fourteen years old," like a rule used for CA juvenile placement is some natural, cosmic law which transcends all nations.  

3. OOOF! I just figured it out. You are going to claim that prisoners 15 and older in Israeli military controlled prisons really aren't children. 
Ergo NO children in Israeli prisons-- another DILL LIE!  

Some added information anyway. Until 2009, children 12 and older were tried in the same military courts as adults. 16-year old Palestinians are tried and sentenced as adults, and can receive 20 year sentences for rock throwing. But Israeli children are not tried as adults until they are 18.. 

IMPRISONMENT OF CHILDREN December 2017
https://www.addameer.org/the_prisoners/children#:~:text=Many%20Palestinian%20children%20even%20serve,the%20same%20courts%20as%20adults.
In practice before the military court system, there are no special interrogation procedures for children detained by the Israeli military, nor are there provisions for an attorney or even a family member to be present when a child is questioned. The majority of children report being subjected to ill-treatment and having forced confessions extracted from them during interrogations. Forms of ill-treatment used by the Israeli soldiers during a child’s arrest and interrogation usually include slapping, beating, kicking and violent pushing. Palestinian children are also routinely verbally abused. Despite recommendations by the UN Committee against Torture in May 2009 that the interrogations should be video recorded, no provisions to this effect have yet been enacted.

Many Palestinian children even serve time in the same Israeli prisons and detention facilities as adults. Military Order 1644, issued on 29 July 2009, established a separate military court for Palestinian children and ended 42 years of trying children as young as 12 years of age in the same courts as adults. However, the order fails to correct many of the fair trial deficiencies in the military courts relating to children (including insufficient provisions regarding qualifications for the judges, no added protections during interrogations, and discretionary language granting the prosecutor broad authority to suspend protections for children), which indicate that Military Order 1644 will do little to improve the protection of Palestinian children before the Israeli military legal system.

(04-27-2024, 09:37 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Also, pleas note it is very apparent that you're trying to shift the conversation.  The college kids trying to free all Palestinian prisoners are not solely concerned with the prisoners under 18, they want all the Hamas terrorists freed.

What's "very apparent" is that you are trying to spin a protest about MASS CIVILIAN CASUALTIES,  OCCUPATION 
and its consequent UNLAWFUL DETENTION as "really" about Hamas. 
 
Yesterday you projected your own impressions onto a photograph full of signs about the war, occupation, and imprisonment--none about Hamas. Like it was a Rorschach blot--and "Plenty more where that came from!" Now you claim to know what is in the protestors' minds. That's partly understandable. They know about the occupation and its effects; you don't or don't care.  

So you've just decided the protests are about Hamas--

There are Hamas prisoners in there with the children. THAT's whom the protestors really want freed.

then all counter-evidence is dismissed as "trying to shift the conversation" from your still unfounded projection. 

[Dill]

(04-26-2024, 07:03 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: You got that I was quoting you, right? The accusation of uninformed bigotry originates with you.

I ask how YOU exempt YOURSELF from YOUR charge, when the students appear to
know more about the origins of the war and are defending Palestinian human rights.

Yeah, you asked how they're the bigot and not me?  That's an accusation of bigotry directed at me.  Poor Dill, little word games aren't working for you.
Feel it slipping away do you?  Don't worry, it's only going to get worse.

I asked, and am asking again--how do YOU exempt YOURSELF from YOUR charges, when you yourself
appear to know very little about the war and occupation, and are not defending Palestinian human rights?

Either the charges are based on some identifiable criteria applied to some evidence which can be shown to meet the criteria,
in which case you could explain the application, especially if "fact" is supposed to exempt you from "pomposity." 

Or it's just more of your projecting impressions, rules, and indefensible accusations onto people you don't like, 
regarding issues you demonstrably don't understand. And then deflecting my question by calling it an accusation
---"Y-y-you called ME a bigot!" followed by three more impressions.

That's sure what it looks like when you keep repeating that the protestors support Hamas because they support 
Palestinians and Hamas are Palestinians too; and that is "the fact" which makes THEM ignorant bigots and supposedly 
exempts you from "pomposity." They don't SAY they support Hamas, but they support Palestinians so . . . 

That's like saying I support Republicans because I support the Steelers and some of the Steelers are Republicans. 
I'm cheering Republicans at a Steeler game unless I hold up a sign that says "Go Steelers, except the Republicans." 
People weasel up logic like that when they double down on something they just want to believe badly.

[StoneTheCrow]

(04-28-2024, 01:40 AM)Dill Wrote: Why do you suppose CUAD disavowed his statements, then? 

Not sure. I’d guess for the same reason Columbia kicked they out of school. Because the statements were actually exposed.

[GMDino]

Let's face it, there is a segment of Americans that don't like protests...of any kind...but especially when they go against the status quo.

Protests in favor of humanitarian needs or treatment of people get lumped in with "anti-american" "anti semite", etc.

There was a parade in Charleston WV yesterday of white supremacists.

Nary a complaint or a police officer (at least in uniform) to be seen.

But heaven forbid college students protest the treatment of civilians during a war.  tks, tsk.

Better get in there and bash some heads.

You kids can debate the why and the whare the worst of the groups.  I want to see an end to civilians being killed because leaders want war.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-28-2024, 01:45 AM)Dill Wrote: I'll reiterate: Your original question was "what children are in prison?"  

I've answered with what you didn't know--Palestinian children. Hundreds of them. 

"How many" was a follow up. And I explained why that was hard to determine,
given the lack of transparency in Israeli prisons. The number changes daily.
But still, I gave you valid numbers from different years. 

Now some new goalposts:


Please note that the Israeli penal system is different from the US'.  So 

1. The crucial distinction here is between Israeli civilian courts and the military courts used to try Palestinians, not Juvenile vs Adult detention.

2. Under Israeli Law, persons under 18 are children, for reasons I've explained. Apparently plenty of "sane" people agree on this, or how could it be law in so many nations--including the US? But again you just say "A child is a person under fourteen years old," like a rule used for CA juvenile placement is some natural, cosmic law which transcends all nations.  

3. OOOF! I just figured it out. You are going to claim that prisoners 15 and older in Israeli military controlled prisons really aren't children. 
Ergo NO children in Israeli prisons-- another DILL LIE!  

Some added information anyway. Until 2009, children 12 and older were tried in the same military courts as adults. 16-year old Palestinians are tried and sentenced as adults, and can receive 20 year sentences for rock throwing. But Israeli children are not tried as adults until they are 18.. 

IMPRISONMENT OF CHILDREN December 2017
https://www.addameer.org/the_prisoners/children#:~:text=Many%20Palestinian%20children%20even%20serve,the%20same%20courts%20as%20adults.
In practice before the military court system, there are no special interrogation procedures for children detained by the Israeli military, nor are there provisions for an attorney or even a family member to be present when a child is questioned. The majority of children report being subjected to ill-treatment and having forced confessions extracted from them during interrogations. Forms of ill-treatment used by the Israeli soldiers during a child’s arrest and interrogation usually include slapping, beating, kicking and violent pushing. Palestinian children are also routinely verbally abused. Despite recommendations by the UN Committee against Torture in May 2009 that the interrogations should be video recorded, no provisions to this effect have yet been enacted.

Many Palestinian children even serve time in the same Israeli prisons and detention facilities as adults. Military Order 1644, issued on 29 July 2009, established a separate military court for Palestinian children and ended 42 years of trying children as young as 12 years of age in the same courts as adults. However, the order fails to correct many of the fair trial deficiencies in the military courts relating to children (including insufficient provisions regarding qualifications for the judges, no added protections during interrogations, and discretionary language granting the prosecutor broad authority to suspend protections for children), which indicate that Military Order 1644 will do little to improve the protection of Palestinian children before the Israeli military legal system.


What's "very apparent" is that you are trying to spin a protest about MASS CIVILIAN CASUALTIES,  OCCUPATION 
and its consequent UNLAWFUL DETENTION as "really" about Hamas. 
 
Yesterday you projected your own impressions onto a photograph full of signs about the war, occupation, and imprisonment--none about Hamas. Like it was a Rorschach blot--and "Plenty more where that came from!" Now you claim to know what is in the protestors' minds. That's partly understandable. They know about the occupation and its effects; you don't or don't care.  

So you've just decided the protests are about Hamas--

There are Hamas prisoners in there with the children. THAT's whom the protestors really want freed.

then all counter-evidence is dismissed as "trying to shift the conversation" from your still unfounded projection. 

I do have to give you credit.  You managed, briefly, to change the subject away from the students wanting to free Hamas protestors.  If you want to argue that Israel should release children, those under thirteen, that have not committed violent crimes then that's something I could possibly get behind.  What I wouldn't do is join a protest also attended by Hamas supporters and avowed bigots.

The problem for you here is that you cannot make a cogent argument that there aren't pro-Hamas or antisemitic people attending these protests.  You can only attempt to argue the percentage of the overall group composed of them.  Sorry, old boy, them's the facts. 

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-28-2024, 11:56 AM)GMDino Wrote: Let's face it, there is a segment of Americans that don't like protests...of any kind...but especially when they go against the status quo.

Protests in favor of humanitarian needs or treatment of people get lumped in with "anti-american" "anti semite", etc.

There was a parade in Charleston WV yesterday of white supremacists.

Nary a complaint or a police officer (at least in uniform) to be seen.

But heaven forbid college students protest the treatment of civilians during a war.  tks, tsk.

Better get in there and bash some heads.

You kids can debate the why and the whare the worst of the groups.  I want to see an end to civilians being killed because leaders want war.

Those "white supremacists" are Feds.  It could not be more obvious.  Every single guy in that group was physically fit.  Every single guy in that group had brand new pants and shirts. Every single guy had his face covered sans one.  But you know the easiest way to tell?  None of them have ever been exposed by the media.  Why don't we know the name of the one guy without a mask by now?  Twitter alone ID's protestors within a day based on nothing but their eyes.  So no, that was not a real group of "white supremacists."  Why aren't news organizations working diligently to expose these guys and publish their places of employment?  This isn't the first time this identical looking group has appeared, yet we don't know the identity of single one of them.  Odd that.

As to your last sentence, Hamas can end this war today if they surrender and release the three or four hostages they haven't already murdered.  But they won't, and they've stated they will continue to attack Israel as long as they exist.  Maybe protest in from of the Qatar embassy, you know the country that harbors and supports the leadership of Hamas.  Maybe protest in front of the Iranian embassy, you know the country that directly funds Hamas, trains them and provides them with weapons.  Because all I'm seeing from you and these kids is a condemnation of Israel and demands for them to stop fighting.  Rather an interestingly one-sided approach is it not?  It makes one wonder why.

[GMDino]

(04-28-2024, 01:12 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Those "white supremacists" are Feds.  It could not be more obvious.  Every single guy in that group was physically fit.  Every single guy in that group had brand new pants and shirts. Every single guy had his face covered sans one.  But you know the easiest way to tell?  None of them have ever been exposed by the media.  Why don't we know the name of the one guy without a mask by now?  Twitter alone ID's protestors within a day based on nothing but their eyes.  So no, that was not a real group of "white supremacists."  Why aren't news organizations working diligently to expose these guys and publish their places of employment?  This isn't the first time this identical looking group has appeared, yet we don't know the identity of single one of them.  Odd that.

As to your last sentence, Hamas can end this war today if they surrender and release the three or four hostages they haven't already murdered.  But they won't, and they've stated they will continue to attack Israel as long as they exist.  Maybe protest in from of the Qatar embassy, you know the country that harbors and supports the leadership of Hamas.  Maybe protest in front of the Iranian embassy, you know the country that directly funds Hamas, trains them and provides them with weapons.  Because all I'm seeing from you and these kids is a condemnation of Israel and demands for them to stop fighting.  Rather an interestingly one-sided approach is it not?  It makes one wonder why.

Are you saying the march was fake?

I've no doubt some of those marching are on the government dime in one way or another, but why would the "Feds" do that?

Also the identified a bunch of these guys in Charlottesville IIRC.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-28-2024, 03:18 PM)GMDino Wrote: Are you saying the march was fake?

Yes, this march was fake.  

Quote:I've no doubt some of those marching are on the government dime in one way or another, but why would the "Feds" do that?

Why would the government want to draw attention to the "number one threat in the US, white supremacy" during all these campus protests?  Give it a think and see what you can come up with.

Quote:Also the identified a bunch of these guys in Charlottesville IIRC.

Indeed, that's because Charlottesville was a real protest by some real white nationalists.  These guys show up, march for about an hour or so and then vanish into the ether.  I don't know how anyone doesn't find this just a little bit odd.  These guys are supposedly all from Texas, why would they drive to West Virginia and demonstrate against nothing specific to nobody in particular?  That's a long drive for a short protest about nothing.


Also, let's not act like this hasn't happened before.

https://news.yahoo.com/journalists-slam-lincoln-project-racial-154332922.html

[GMDino]

(04-28-2024, 03:41 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Yes, this march was fake.  



Why would the government want to draw attention to the "number one threat in the US, white supremacy" during all these campus protests?  Give it a think and see what you can come up with.


Indeed, that's because Charlottesville was a real protest by some real white nationalists.  These guys show up, march for about an hour or so and then vanish into the ether.  I don't know how anyone doesn't find this just a little bit odd.  These guys are supposedly all from Texas, why would they drive to West Virginia and demonstrate against nothing specific to nobody in particular?  That's a long drive for a short protest about nothing.


Also, let's not act like this hasn't happened before.

https://news.yahoo.com/journalists-slam-lincoln-project-racial-154332922.html

Yeah, they took credit for that.  They did it.

How many other of these groups and marches do you think are fake?  That's a very interesting and (to me at least) new take from you.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-28-2024, 03:51 PM)GMDino Wrote: Yeah, they took credit for that.  They did it.

How many other of these groups and marches do you think are fake?  That's a very interesting and (to me at least) new take from you.

I've made this point before, more than once.  There's way too much about this group and its activities that sets off alarm bells.  In the US, what do you think the odds of finding a white nationalist group, with over a hundred marchers, and not one of them has a belly?  All of them in shape?  Just that should strike one as odd. 

A sincere question to you, no gotcha of any kind here.  Do you think that crack cocaine was deliberately introduced to the inner cities by the US government?  Can you explain the severe sentencing disparities between rock and powdered cocaine possession?

[Belsnickel]

(04-28-2024, 01:12 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Those "white supremacists" are Feds.  It could not be more obvious.  Every single guy in that group was physically fit.  Every single guy in that group had brand new pants and shirts. Every single guy had his face covered sans one.  But you know the easiest way to tell?  None of them have ever been exposed by the media.  Why don't we know the name of the one guy without a mask by now?  Twitter alone ID's protestors within a day based on nothing but their eyes.  So no, that was not a real group of "white supremacists."  Why aren't news organizations working diligently to expose these guys and publish their places of employment?  This isn't the first time this identical looking group has appeared, yet we don't know the identity of single one of them.  Odd that.

Patriot Front is not all from Texas, they have members all over the country. I've also seen some that are pretty thick, just sayin'. There are of course members that don't hide their face. If this was a bunch of feds, wouldn't they have been exposed by now? The founder and leader of the group is a well known person, Thomas Rousseau.

I am not going to lie, man, I think you're drinking a little too much of the Kool-Aid these days.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(04-28-2024, 04:58 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: Patriot Front is not all from Texas, they have members all over the country. I've also seen some that are pretty thick, just sayin'. There are of course members that don't hide their face. If this was a bunch of feds, wouldn't they have been exposed by now? The founder and leader of the group is a well known person, Thomas Rousseau.

I am not going to lie, man, I think you're drinking a little too much of the Kool-Aid these days.

Eh, just highly skeptical of how and when these dudes show up and then disappear from the news cycle entirely for months.  I guess this is one of the areas where I'm more cynical than you.  I am aware of similar things done here, obviously not on the same scale, so please forgive my indulging in this.  It wasn't that long ago that espousing the lab leak theory for Covid was considered a tin foil hate conspiracy.

[Dill]

(04-28-2024, 12:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: So you've just decided the protests are about Hamas--
There are Hamas prisoners in there with the children. THAT's whom the protestors really want freed.
then all counter-evidence is dismissed as "trying to shift the conversation" from your still unfounded projection. 

I do have to give you credit.  You managed, briefly, to change the subject away from the students wanting to free Hamas protestors.  If you want to argue that Israel should release children, those under thirteen, that have not committed violent crimes then that's something I could possibly get behind.  What I wouldn't do is join a protest also attended by Hamas supporters and avowed bigots.

The problem for you here is that you cannot make a cogent argument that there aren't pro-Hamas or antisemitic people attending these protests.  You can only attempt to argue the percentage of the overall group composed of them.  Sorry, old boy, them's the facts. 

Students want to free Hamas "protestors"?

Again, you are addressing argument I have not made and don't have to make.

I don't deny the possibility there could be  pro-Hamas protestor, or some accelerationist claiming to be one, at any of these protests
(though as yet, you've produced no evidence of such). And don't have to, to refute any claim the protests are "pro-Hamas."

The is issue is whether the protests were organized to protest civilian slaughter, the occupation, and people illegally imprisoned.
The protestors say that's what they are doing, as do the signs in your photographic "evidence."  THEM's the facts. 
But you call sticking to those facts "changing the subject," which is, somehow, Hamas--like THAT's what's moving the protests, not tens of thousands
of unnecessary civilian casualties.

In the past you've argued that MTG and the Capitol rioters were not representative of the GOP. Now you have reversed that vector, taking a 
small group, whose actual presence at the protests you have yet to establish, and insisting they define the anti-war protests. Why do you
give them this power?

Or I may have moved you a bit on this, since now you are speaking of protests only "attended" by Hamas supporters. And you could get behind
protesting the IDF jailing of children under 14.  What about that 14 year old in the Time link I gave you, who was snatched on his way to school,
breaking no laws?  Leave that guy in? Still a crime to protest the occupation though? The mistreatment of children, or prisoners of any age
locked up under military rule?  

This general injustice has always been the focus of the protests. You are not ready to protest that yet, especially if there are "bigots" also in attendance.

[Belsnickel]

(04-28-2024, 05:33 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Eh, just highly skeptical of how and when these dudes show up and then disappear from the news cycle entirely for months.  I guess this is one of the areas where I'm more cynical than you.  I am aware of similar things done here, obviously not on the same scale, so please forgive my indulging in this.  It wasn't that long ago that espousing the lab leak theory for Covid was considered a tin foil hate conspiracy.

I just don't tolerate conspiracy theories all that well. I know the way things spread around Washington; I know way too many staffers and bureaucrats in DC and have heard far too many things. Something at the level you are suggesting for Patriot Front to be a false flag operation would require way more people to be read in than would be critical mass for it to be contained. Really, when you think about it, my disbelief in conspiracy theories really boils down to my cynicism towards our government. I just don't believe them capable of pulling something like that off and keeping it quiet.

As for the lab leak theory, I always found that weird. I was actually brining that possibility up before anyone else was. It was in the earliest days when I laid out my reasoning for why I thought it came from a lab.