When Israel re-arrested Palestinian men in the occupied West Bank town of Dura, the detainees faced familiar treatment.
They were blindfolded, handcuffed, insulted and kept in inhumane conditions. More unusual was that each man had a number written on his forehead.
Osama Shaheen, who was released in August after 10 months of administrative detention, told Middle East Eye that soldiers brutally stormed his house, smashing his furniture.
“The soldiers turned us from names into numbers, and every detainee had a number that they used to provoke him during his arrest and call him by number instead of name. To them, we are just numbers.”
You can’t make this shit up
The right-wing religious nutters in Israel read plenty of NKVD and SS manuals.
… branding detainees with numbers, check… now, what’s next on Hitler’s to do list?
—Bibi, apparently
It’s not a brand. It’s a mark with a marker. And I think even Bibi and his legions of assholes might be sensitive about tattoos and actual brands.
wow what a distinction.
first of all Bibi is a Hitler apologist. the only thing he’s sensitive about is the existence of brown people.
second of all it’s the same exact shit. the point isn’t the method, it’s the dehumanization.
Numbers are so 1940’s, I thought they might have moved to QR codes by now.
Harder to draw quickly, gotta have them pre printed and then there is the ink costs and where on earth could Israel get the money for that?
Yellow star was already patented
The headline says “brands Palestinians”. The article doesn’t mention branding. They had numbers written on their foreheads. Most prisons identify prisoners by numbers. Probably not a great idea to just write it on their foreheads but if you have limited ways of marking prisoners it makes sense.
Israels soldiers are shit but how about we use accurate language to describe what they are doing. Lying helps no one.
What they are doing is genocide and straight from the Nazi playbook
I agree with your take. Shitty headline. When I think of “branding” , I think of hot iron burnt into flesh.
i would strongly urge you to familiarise yourself with figures of speech lest you’re – you know – branded as an ignorant person.
Yes, but I think it’s also intentional to mislead for clicks.
Maybe the website should learn not to use language that is ambiguous in order to push an agenda. Looking at these comments there are already a bunch of people who are assuming brand to mean scarification by burning since they evidently only read the headline.
… there are already a bunch of people who are assuming brand to mean scarification by burning since they evidently only read the headline.
anyone who actually thinks that that headline means literal branding is an illiterate dumbass who needs to read more.
anyone who’s trying to sidestep the dehumanisation of prisoners mentioned in the article by throwing focus solely on the literal meaning of the word brand is an amoral dumbass who needs to understand humanity and history more.
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I will admit that my first thought was literal branding. This is the IDF we’re talking about.
I think they’re almost certainly deliberately using ambiguous language to push an agenda. (Either that or both the author and the editor are incompetent.) And I would add that the language isn’t even actually ambiguous. It’s simply deceptive. “Brand” in this context would be interpreted literally by a normal reader and claiming it’s a metaphor is disingenuous.
Hmm
Branded with a yellow star: the Jewish houses marked for death by the Nazis
Just as an aside, even the Nazis had the decency to not tattoo the numbers on people’s foreheads.
Pretending there’s no dehumanisation or othering going on here is disingenuous.
https://museeholocauste.ca/en/resources-training/the-process-of-othering/
What is Othering?
Othering is a process whereby a group of people is made to seem fundamentally different, even to the point of making that group seem less than human. This process can trigger instinctive emotional reactions towards members of that group. In many instances, othering has been used to degrade, isolate, and render possible the discrimination, abuse, or persecution of a group.
A house can’t literally be branded, so the use of “brand” in that context must be metaphorical. People, however, can and historically often have been branded quite literally.
As for othering: it is irrelevant to the point I was making, so your reference to it here is a good example of how people make a false and inflammatory statement, and then when challenged about it, those people retreat to a much weaker, uncontroversial claim. Meanwhile the public has seen the original, false, and inflammatory statement but not the challenge or the retreat.
No one would care if the headline said “Israelis see Palestinians as fundamentally different from themselves” or even “Israelis sometimes don’t treat Palestinian prisoners with respect.” However, what the headline does say is that Israelis physically mutilate Palestinian prisoners. Here in the comments you make a pitiful argument that the claim of physical mutilation is in fact just a metaphor, although even then you try to sneak in a comparison between Jews and Nazis. Jews aren’t tattooing anything on anyone, but apparently they still have less decency than Nazis according to you.
Jews aren’t tattooing anything on anyone, but apparently they still have less decency than Nazis according to you.
You’re equating Israelis to all Jews. Not all Jews are Israeli. Zionist much?
You’re making a pitiful argument yourself. You’re genuinely, literally, explicitly claiming that the headline is “claiming Palestinians are being physically mutilated”. I could give you a long lecture on why that sort of asinine prescriptive interpretation is literally linguistically incorrect, but you’d just ignore it, just like you’re ignoring the genocide Israel is committing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription
But since you bring up the mutilation of Palestinians: https://euromedmonitor.org/en/article/6477/West-Bank:-Mutilation-of-Palestinian-dead-bodies-by-Israeli-soldiers-requires-international-investigation-and-accountability
But I guess mutilating dead bodies is just fine. Just like it’s fine to massively dehumanise people by drawing a massive number on their forehead. Any pitiful reasoning as to why the number can’t be on someone’s arm, for instance? Nothing to do with constantly reminding the people who are being dehumanised that they’re being dehumanised, surely. It’s not like Israel dehumanises Palestinians on a systematic level, right?
https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/12/1145132
Huh, that’s more than a year old.
UN rights chief warns of ‘dehumanization’ of Palestinians amid West Bank violence as Gaza crisis deepens
“Othering is completely irrelevant here” sure man. I’ve been through military service in my country btw, and we actually got taught what things would be warcrimes.
Benjamin Netanyahu, Yoav Gallant
On the basis of evidence collected and examined by my Office, I have reasonable grounds to believe that Benjamin NETANYAHU, the Prime Minister of Israel, and Yoav GALLANT, the Minister of Defence of Israel, bear criminal responsibility for the following war crimes and crimes against humanity committed on the territory of the State of Palestine (in the Gaza strip) from at least 8 October 2023:
Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Statute;
Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health contrary to article 8(2)(a)(iii), or cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)©(i);
Wilful killing contrary to article 8(2)(a)(i), or Murder as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)©(i);
Intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population as a war crime contrary to articles 8(2)(b)(i), or 8(2)(e)(i);
Extermination and/or murder contrary to articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, as a crime against humanity;
Persecution as a crime against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(h);
Other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(k).
My Office submits that the war crimes alleged in these applications were committed in the context of an international armed conflict between Israel and Palestine, and a non-international armed conflict between Israel and Hamas (together with other Palestinian Armed Groups) running in parallel. We submit that the crimes against humanity charged were committed as part of a widespread and systematic attack against the Palestinian civilian population pursuant to State policy. These crimes, in our assessment, continue to this day.
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This is still a heinous act of dehumanization,… When I hear of a human being marked as a “brand” I think of a hot iron. I opened the article fearing the worst. Thankfully this is not that.
If we’re comparing with established prison practice let’s also mention how prisoners also get human rights, habeas corpus, due process, equal treatment and stuff like that. Israel has none of that for Palestinians.
According to the article this is not standard practice at all. The number practice continued during their arrest while they were beaten and tortured
More unusual was that each man had a number written on his forehead.
“The soldiers turned us from names into numbers, and every detainee had a number that they used to provoke him during his arrest and call him by number instead of name. To them, we are just numbers.”
According to the PCHR, most detainees are beaten during these campaigns, and the Israeli army is trying new steps to intimidate them.
“Usually, a Palestinian is arrested and transferred to a known interrogation centre where he is interrogated. But the Israeli soldiers have replaced that with these humiliating measures, and they say that they have the right to detain any person for six hours without reporting him as a detainee to the Israeli army,” Abu Hawash said.
Here is an article about numbering of prisoners in the California penitentiary system. It’s been a system to identify prisoners for more than 100 years. Numbers are used to dehumanize all prisoners. It isn’t an israeli/palestinian thing.
I only have an issue with the use of “branding” in the headline. If you can’t link to a source that doesn’t use deceptive headlines then don’t post anything. You can’t really convert people in good faith to your cause if you’re lying to them with ambiguous language.
They do not write the numbers on their forehead from the pictures I see in that article
They wore clothing with numbers on it. The prisoners were numbered and only referred to by that number while they were in the system. Just because they had a number written on their forehead instead of on their clothing doesn’t really change the fact that they were numbered.
The only reason your article is getting upvotes is because people assume the palestinians are being branded with numbers (since that’s what the headline says). They aren’t being branded. Numbers written on someone are not the same as numbers branded on someone.
Again I think the israelis are a bunch of cunts and are dehumanizing the palestinians but you shouldn’t lie in a headline. That is unless you’re trying to be deceptive…
This user made a great analogy https://lemmy.world/comment/13210775
But besides that, there is a different level of dehumanization when writing directly on people. Especially when combined with beatings and torture.
The parallels are eerily similar, which was likely what the author was trying to evoke as well.
So once again you just ignore the “branding” issue. I’m blocking you since you obviously have some sort of agenda and don’t engage in good faith. Good day.
Once again you focus on irrelevant minutae to avoid acknowledging that it is a comparable dehumanization tactic.
Wow, what strong resolve you have for your side.
Brand
1): a mark made by burning with a hot iron to attest manufacture or quality or to designate ownership
(2): a printed mark made for similar purposes :
It mentions a printed mark. Read a dictionary next time you are
boardbored and want to defend the IDF.Edit: God I hate modern autocorrect and IDF bought people being wrong while pedantic
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Read a dictionary next time you are board
So ironic.
Yeah that one is a bit funny. Autocorrect can be a bitch. Doesn’t explain you demanding a different word because it has a definition you don’t like and ignoring it.
It’s not a trademark and it’s not a mark made with a hot iron, so atleast according to the definition that you tried to use as a gotcha, it’s not a brand.
Edit: After I had commented, the person edited out part of the 2nd definition so that the definition would fit their narrative. What was edited out: " (2) : a printed mark made for similar purposes : trademark".
From Miriam Webster: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/brand
They’re basically using the (edited) definition of trademark branding to claim that these written numbers are a branding.
Its an example of. It was tagged as see also. And it’s literally says “printed” what the hell.
I’m sorry I left in the direct dictionary text so it can be nitpicked as to how writing numbers on people isn’t “branding”
How is there this many people that can argue against a dictionary?
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A printed mark to designate ownership.
Wrote numbers on their forehead to dehumanize them.
Nope. Not even touching the comparison to concentration camps cause it doesn’t matter. They were branded. You not liking the word cause of your own connotations does not make it incorrect.
“A printed mark to designate ownership.” is about trademarks, intellectual property. You’re basically saying that Israel trademarked the skin of those prisoners.
Opening a dictionary and looking up a word is one thing, you still need some basic amount of reading comprehension to interpret what you are reading in that dictionary, which you’re clearly lacking.
A representative example is not the whole beginning and end of a definition my dude/ette.
They did mark ownership. Their prisoners. They marked them to show they are in ownership of the IDF and used numbers to easier organize. It’s a thing that’s pretty basic just not usually done on skin which is why people are upset and trying to cover for this.
My grandmother was an ilenglush teacher and would be really upset if you were in her class.
You get a C- for definitions and reading comprehension. Class dismissed.
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I just call that the correct way to write a seven
They have become that which they hated.
Treating Gaza like an open air extermination camp and even branding them the way prisoners were tattooed in German camps.
How disappointed the generation before them would be, having survived that same treatment only to become the monsters that they struggled to escape.
Israel wasn’t founded by holocaust survivors and treated them less than equal.
I’ll take history repeat for 1000.
“brands” by writing a number on the forehead with a pen
I think an arm tattoo would be better…
Israel: Yes, again.
History repeats itself
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That opinion is horrible.
If you can’t understand the difference between having your hand stamped at a concert and a fucking military writing “your” number on your forehead in permanent marker then I literally have nothing else to say to you.
