Current Affairs Israel is an apartheid state

[magicjuan]

I've middle fingered you because you're a racist sex pest who never answers questions. Hope that helps.

Racist sex pest is another band name, yay

 

[Bluerover]

The whole principle of a nation, any nation, having a God-given right is picked apart in Isaiah.

"Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing...

All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity... he maketh the princes and judges of the earth as vanity"

Excellent point.

When studying Scripture it is vital to understand the context:

Who is the author, what is the background before, during and after the text was written, who is the audience, what is the purpose that the author is trying to achieve.

Too often texts are cited completely out of context and wrongly applied to situations in modern times, very inappropriately.

1 Sam 15:3 is part of a narrative where Saul is the first King of a united kingdom of Israel. Samuel the prophet is his adviser..

Samuel tells Saul that he received a divine message for war against the Amalekites who had attacked the Israeli test on their exodus from Egypt. They had blocked their passage and ambushed the slower Isrealites who lagged behind Deut 25:17-19. This is why Amalek is to suffer.

However, later verses show that the Lord was not happy with Saul's kingship v15: 10, and He tells Samuel this vv17-31.

Saul's kingship is doomed vv 28-9 and the Lord has rejected him.


Now some context:

1 Samuel is part of a larger narrative known as the Deuteronomic History that told the story from the eve of conquest to the fall of the monarchy ,(in fact monarchies, as the United kingdom split into northern and southern kingdoms when the northern Ten Tribes rejected Solomon's successor Rehoboam) and the exiles - northern Kingdom in 721 BC and the Southern with the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the first Temple in 586 BC.

It sets to focus on power and justice and to make these political themes personal focusing on actions and motives of PARTICULAR people and events as the shape of Israel is being formed.

Scolars will say that the authors of these exts were creative in their appropriation of material making it difficult to discern the true historicity of a text.

Some say the Books of Samuel were written as late as the Hellenistic period when the Greeks conquered, and caused outrage by putting pagan statues in the Temple thus defiling it. This led to the Macccabean revolt against the Greeks and texts like this were desigto rally the Hebrews against the invaders (2nd century BC).

Others put them earlier when Assyria was threatening Jerusalem and the southern Kingdom, but before tg actual conquest and Exile (6 th century BC).

Either way, they are designed to rise the blood of the audience against a clear and present enemy by using a narrative that describes earlier conflict ( Saul and David lived around 1000 BC)


Sadly, Netanyahu and his Government are justifying wholesale slaughter of innocents by reference to ancient texts, that may even be pure fictions and myths.

The passage from Isaiah quoted by @PhilM above is very typical of how important it is to avoid using other texts out of context.

Ezekiel by contrast speaks of Godpromising:

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Sadly Netanyahu and co seem to still have hearts of stone.

I do not condone in any way any atrocities by Hamas on innocents. Israel has a right to defend itself but it must be proportionate and consistent with International Law.

Palestinians are also entitled to live in peace in a homeland of their own. The actions of extremists amongst settlers is very disturbing and clearly Netanyahu is egging them on with statements like this

 

[DrEFC]

It was ALWAYS about a land grab. This is west Bank.

 

[Bluerover]

Sorry about typos....Time has elapsed for editing but hopefully it is clear enough.

 

[Blue 1]

It was ALWAYS about a land grab. This is west Bank.

Spoke to my dad yesterday who's been in touch with friends in the WB. The settlers have been going absolutely nuts since October 7th, just doing what they want and nobody is going to do anything about it.

 

[coollino]

 

[Martin Alvito]

The whole principle of a nation, any nation, having a God-given right is picked apart in Isaiah.

"Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing...

All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity... he maketh the princes and judges of the earth as vanity"

I don't believe that, and I don't need to believe it to count what Israel is doing as wrong. All I need is Machiavelli, which is a very low bar to clear. The duty of a 'prince' is to take care of their citizens. It's to provide them with security, and protect them from dangers without and within. That is the entirety of their duty.

Right now, Israel is the TSA. They are engaging in tactics that appear to provide that security. Those tactics do not, but it looks like the same thing at a superficial level. Metal detectors, body scanners and confiscating the expensive caramel I bought for my ex in San Francisco look like security to the untrained eye. They are not.

What angers me so deeply about the whole thing is the hypocrisy. Netanyahu cannot possibly be as stupid as he is pretending to be. He has a long record that says he's not an idiot. He has almost two decades of governance that says he does not fall into traps like this one. It must be the case that he has chosen to walk through this door out of pure self-interest. I can't say that he's wrong, from his perspective. I can say that I deplore him for the sheer level of self-interest on display.

The Israeli hero is Ben-Gurion. This Ben is but a copy of a copy. The worst part is, he thinks he's Ben-Gurion in much the same way that Trump thinks he's Lincoln.

 

[ramacca]

Netanyahu's goal in the continued colonial occupation of Palestine, which will involve the forceful removal of Palestinians from Palestine. Basically his address at the UN in September.

"Netanyahu Shows Map of 'New Middle East'—Without Palestine—to UN General Assembly" https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-map

For Netanyahu, they can join the 5 million Palestinians already in exile throughout the world.

The conflict is widening around Palestine and there is an ever increasing risk, that this could escalate further, by accident or design, nto a much wider conflict in the area.

A ceasefire now, and end the siege of Gaza, is quite an appropriate theme for the march today in Liverpool.

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

Hopefully there will be more of this, and all right minded people there join them.

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

 

[Noisy noise annoys]

The whole principle of a nation, any nation, having a God-given right is picked apart in Isaiah.

"Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing...

All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity... he maketh the princes and judges of the earth as vanity"

Excellent point.

When studying Scripture it is vital to understand the context:

Who is the author, what is the background before, during and after the text was written, who is the audience, what is the purpose that the author is trying to achieve.

Too often texts are cited completely out of context and wrongly applied to situations in modern times, very inappropriately.

1 Sam 15:3 is part of a narrative where Saul is the first King of a united kingdom of Israel. Samuel the prophet is his adviser..

Samuel tells Saul that he received a divine message for war against the Amalekites who had attacked the Israeli test on their exodus from Egypt. They had blocked their passage and ambushed the slower Isrealites who lagged behind Deut 25:17-19. This is why Amalek is to suffer.

However, later verses show that the Lord was not happy with Saul's kingship v15: 10, and He tells Samuel this vv17-31.

Saul's kingship is doomed vv 28-9 and the Lord has rejected him.


Now some context:

1 Samuel is part of a larger narrative known as the Deuteronomic History that told the story from the eve of conquest to the fall of the monarchy ,(in fact monarchies, as the United kingdom split into northern and southern kingdoms when the northern Ten Tribes rejected Solomon's successor Rehoboam) and the exiles - northern Kingdom in 721 BC and the Southern with the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the first Temple in 586 BC.

It sets to focus on power and justice and to make these political themes personal focusing on actions and motives of PARTICULAR people and events as the shape of Israel is being formed.

Scolars will say that the authors of these exts were creative in their appropriation of material making it difficult to discern the true historicity of a text.

Some say the Books of Samuel were written as late as the Hellenistic period when the Greeks conquered, and caused outrage by putting pagan statues in the Temple thus defiling it. This led to the Macccabean revolt against the Greeks and texts like this were desigto rally the Hebrews against the invaders (2nd century BC).

Others put them earlier when Assyria was threatening Jerusalem and the southern Kingdom, but before tg actual conquest and Exile (6 th century BC).

Either way, they are designed to rise the blood of the audience against a clear and present enemy by using a narrative that describes earlier conflict ( Saul and David lived around 1000 BC)


Sadly, Netanyahu and his Government are justifying wholesale slaughter of innocents by reference to ancient texts, that may even be pure fictions and myths.

The passage from Isaiah quoted by @PhilM above is very typical of how important it is to avoid using other texts out of context.

Ezekiel by contrast speaks of Godpromising:

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Sadly Netanyahu and co seem to still have hearts of stone.

I do not condone in any way any atrocities by Hamas on innocents. Israel has a right to defend itself but it must be proportionate and consistent with International Law.

Palestinians are also entitled to live in peace in a homeland of their own. The actions of extremists amongst settlers is very disturbing and clearly Netanyahu is egging them on with statements like this

This deserves a new thread!
Scriptures, I forgot they were even a thing since school. I’m obviously not a religious man, and would never judge someone who is, but why pay attention to them ? Aren’t they just 2000 year old, obsolete tales containing some highly controversial ideals?

I’m genuinely fascinated and clearly talking out of my depth on the subject

Anyway, as I said, should be in a new thread but intriguing to read about.

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

Hopefully there will be more of this, and all right minded people there join them.

A Sunday morning fingering from @Noisy noise annoys lol

 

[Noisy noise annoys]

A Sunday morning fingering from @Noisy noise annoys lol

Phew, I thought my wife had logged on for a minute

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

Phew, I thought my wife had logged on for a minute

 

[Milkman]

The bias in reporting shows sign of relenting. It's the smaller, deliberate misrepresentations that are really getting to me at the moment.

Listening to 5Live yesterday and during the 30 second segment on the protests in London, half it was devoted to how two(!!) people were arrested, one for assaulting a police officer. No mention of the cause, just the planting an act of violence in the ear of the listener. One person of an estimated half a million. It's not even news!

This morning, it was an interview with Yocheved Lifshitz's daughter on Radio 4. The interviewer asks about how she feels about the pro-Palestinian marches, in particular ONE MAN was reported to have been heard calling for a jihad. Again, from half a million people marching for an end to mass killing.

It's so depressing to hear and see journalists spreading this kind of dangerous and dishonest information every day. Worse that it's done by design.