Summary
Trump plans to lift the Biden administration’s freeze on supplying 2,000-pound bombs to Israel and reverse sanctions against Israeli settlers.
I was under the impression that:
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the US accounted for 69% of Israel’s imports of major conventional arms between 2019 and 2023.
And that:
In May 2024, the US confirmed it had paused a single consignment of 2,000lb and 500lb bombs over concerns Israel was going ahead with a major ground operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. But Biden immediately faced a backlash from Republicans in Washington and from Netanyahu who appeared to compare it to an “arms embargo”. Biden has since partially lifted the suspension and not repeated it.
From Biden plans to send $8bn arms shipment to Israel - BBC - 4 January 2025
Yet the memes, jokes and everything that gets through to the non politics junkies was about Elon’s salute.
Almost like it was a perfect distraction for people to get enraged by while ignoring the serious issues.
As it turns out, there are about 2,000 pounds of difference between Republicans and Democrats.
This is great!
Because now we can detonate those bombs in Israel.
hey pro-Palestinian lemmings! where y’all at?
this is why you wouldn’t vote for Harris, right? when does he stop the killing again?
#when does it stop??
Hilarious how the comments are blaming the group that wants to abstain or be central in their belief when the play was already set in place regardless of the outcome. Class war yet we bite at each other.
I thought he paused all foreign support for 90 days? Oh wait….
Yea but at least we don’t have GeNOCiDe JoE and that damn BlUemAgA in power!!!/S
Gaza: fucked.
Immigrants: fucked.
LGBT: fucked.
Democracy: fucked to death.
Totally real internet “leftists”: совершенство
Not to beat the dead horse but… Those who said “I won’t vote Democratic because Gaza” were either lying or delusional.
In 2028 there won’t be any Gaza, what will be the next line?
They’ve already made inroads into the West Bank, Syria, and Lebanon, right?
I think most of them were state sponsored psyops or really shit trolls. I don’t think most actual real marginally rational thinking people would have such a dumb af take.
You would think, and yet they’re still around parrotting the same narrative. Hell, there’s at least one in the comments of this very post.
Assuming that anyone with a contrary opinion, no matter how ridiculous you might feel it is, is being disingenuous is an easy way to underestimate them.
As if you need any additional evidence how .ml and their spinoffs are funded
I don’t think most Americans care enough about Gaza for it to affect their vote (or for it to cause them to choose not to vote). Some, certainly, but not enough to have made a difference. This was about groceries being expensive.
The numbers seem to tell a different story, actually. Mind you, this is one poll and it’s among people who did not vote giving a reason for not voting after having not voted, but the numbers aren’t insignificant
It was a combined effort to suppress voter turnout. Provide every possible reason to tap into that bernie bro “the democrats deserve to lose because they betrayed me” mindset.
TBH the Dems deserved to lose, but Trump deserved to lose much, much, much, much harder.
The problem being that means too many people don’t show up, and only the fanatics get a say. And they have a lot more than us.
That’s exactly my point. People should go and vote against fascism, but apparently they won’t.
And Harris wasn’t inspiring enough to get them out to vote for her instead of just against him.
Your point seemed to be “She sucks, maybe not as much as the other guy, but still sucks”, which is not exactly inspiring in and of itself. maybe you should do less to try and discredit the currently most viable defense we have against people like Trump.
You have serious problems if you needs additional inspiration beyond literal fascism.
That fake “Bernie bro” mindset, you mean. No genuine Bernie bro failed to vote (D) in the general, by definition, because that’s what Bernie himself recommended.
I really tried to tell them, but the propaganda is insane.
This is the tragic truth.
The most frustrating part about it is that withholding votes was framed as a principled position. And I’m sorry, but that’s asinine. How many of those people who declared that they wouldn’t vote for the democratic ticket because of their action/inaction on Gaza actually did anything more than posting rants on social media? How many raised funds for aid? How many organized rallies, protests, or educational outreach? How many even so much as contacted their representatives?
It is either naivety or complacency to believe that national policy should change just because you and your friends sent around some memes. And it is callous indifference to base your vote on a single issue and then claim that you’re inhabiting the moral high ground.
If you yell into the void, you shouldn’t expect a response. And if you believe in an issue, either take action or acknowledge that it would be staggeringly arrogant to expect other people to put in work that you yourself won’t do.
I can’t find the will to make a leopards/faces joke about this. This is exactly what we told people who wouldn’t vote for Harris because of “gEnOcIdE jOe” bullshit.
Biden made real efforts to prevent the Israeli government from committing genocide. They failed, but they tried. Now we’ve got an absolute monster in charge who is going to outright empower the genocide.
If you voted for Trump, voted for a third party, or refused to vote… FUCK YOU. You own this.
Biden made real efforts to prevent the Israeli government from committing genocide.
Okay I don’t have the energy to refute to this stuff anymore, so lemme just ask: Do you seriously believe the president of the united states, the single largest benefactor of Israeli regional hegemony, doesn’t have the ability to enforce its own laws and prevent violations of international law by its protectorate?
It’s a much, much more complicated situation than you’re presenting. Biden was trying to thread the needle between “deny Israel weaponry” (end result: Opportunistic invasion by Israel’s neighbors) and “give Netanyahu all the weapons he wants” (end result: what we’re about to see with these gigantic, city-block-destroying bombs).
How would you do it?
what we’re about to see with these gigantic, city-block-destroying bombs
About to see?
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-sent-israel-thousands-2000-pound-bombs-since-oct-7-2024-06-28/
Oh, it’s the “but what about the Jews” argument. You do realize Israel’s whole problem with its neighbors is their treatment of Palestinians, right? If Israel can’t stop its apartheid and make real.peace with their neighbors then they deserve to get invaded. Their apartheid state isn’t worth more than the at least 200 thousand Palestinians who died in Israel’s genocide. I’ll also point out that Israel has the most advanced military in the region, so the idea that Israel can’t resist an invasion is wrong.
Do you think Israel should be destroyed?
Yeah, why not? Again, apartheid states don’t deserve to exist. Also I’ll note that this is not the same as “should Israelis be all mercilessly slaughtered”, that’s a different question with a different answer.
Its not complicated at all when multiple international human rights organizations credibly found Isreal was committing war crimes and the US already has a law preventing the sale of arms to nation’s credibly accused of war crimes. Biden was the cheif executive all he had to do was execute a law that was already on the books. Neither the SC nor Congress would have had any say.
Stop carrying water for genocide financiers who had every opportunity to do something different.
That’s not an answer, and I’m not “carrying water for genocide financiers.” I never once excused or denied Israel’s behavior. Netanyahu responded to a horrendous terrorist attack by turning the dials on “horrendous” and “terror” up to 11. He’s a monster and a war criminal and should spend the rest of his life in prison.
Now then, how would you do it? Put yourself in the president’s shoes. You need to come up with a solution that allows Israel to continue to exist and not be destroyed by, say, Iran… AND allows the Palestinians to survive. Cut off all weapons, goodbye Israel. Give Israel a blank check, goodbye Palestine. What do you try to do?
I gave you the solution, it is an answer. Follow the law as written, Israel is not above the law. You keep jumping through hoops to say we can’t follow the law and then claim you don’t carry water for them? Fuck all the way out of here with that cognitive dissonance, you’re practically hasbara.
Well, thankfully the alternative is going to stop Israel on it’s tracks and… Oh wait a minute…
This is exactly what we told people who wouldn’t vote for Harris because of “gEnOcIdE jOe” bullshit.
What that things would continue on as they have been for well over a year now? Where is the “leopards ate my face” aspect of this?
Biden made real efforts to prevent the Israeli government from committing genocide. They failed, but they tried.
What efforts were those? Strongly worded phone calls and “red lines” that were constantly crossed and redrawn, while simultaneously standing alone in blocking UN and NATO resolutions against Israel?
who is going to outright empower the genocide.
Can you explain how a genocide that we’ve been actively supporting for the past 15 months is now being “empowered?”
Can you explain how a genocide that we’ve been actively supporting for the past 15 months is now being “empowered?”
It’s right there in the headline. We’re sending 2,000lb bombs that weren’t being sent before.
Well that’s what happens when you rely on headlines and literal two sentence long “articles” for information because that’s completely false. We’ve been sending them thousands of these bombs along with the jets to use them for quite some time now.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-sent-israel-thousands-2000-pound-bombs-since-oct-7-2024-06-28/
The article is literally stating that Trump is giving the green light to giving Israel more powerful bombs to genocide with, and also to give Israeli West Bank occupiers their access to US financial resources again.
He’s approving one shipment (Israel has been using 2000 pound bombs since October 7th and I haven’t heard anything about them stopping after that shipment was paused) and lifting sanctions on the four West Bank settlers Biden had sanctioned. This will only hurt Palestinians about as much as the original moves by Biden had helped them, which is to say: not at all.
From Oct 7 2023 to Jun 28 2024 (the date of the reuters article that is being posted) we had shipped thousands of those bombs. We paused a shipment in May of 2024 (stated in that reuters articale), and here’s an article from July of 2024 saying we still had not shipped any of them
And I’ve found nothing indicating we have sent any more 2k pound bombs since May of 2024. So if we had, please provide a source reporting it.
Perhaps we should try to agree on what empowering means, though:
- Something that is empowering makes you more confident and makes you feel that you are in control of your life
- to give official authority or legal power to
Trump’s actions are empowering the genocide because they are clearly supportive of both Israel’s bombing and occupation.
And I’ve found nothing indicating we have sent any more 2k pound bombs since May of 2024. So if we had, please provide a source reporting it.
Apparently there haven’t been any shipments since may, so my bad there.
Trump’s actions are empowering the genocide because they are clearly supportive of both Israel’s bombing and occupation.
I mean the problem is that this doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. You either do things or you don’t, things like empowering or slamming or come to Jesus moments are all rhetoric and rhetoric only matters when it starts affecting the real world. We’ll have to see if the ceasefire holds; if it does then it makes sense (in US foreign policy terms, I of course hate it) for Trump to continue shipments, if not then we can start talking about leopards eating faces. The settler sanctions had zero effect on the real world, so they don’t matter no matter how “empowering” lifting them may be.
We’ve already been giving them these bombs.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-sent-israel-thousands-2000-pound-bombs-since-oct-7-2024-06-28/
Your link is published in June of 2024 and states:
The Biden administration has paused one shipment of the 2,000-pound bomb, citing concern over the impact it could have in densely populated areas in Gaza, but U.S. officials insist that all other arms deliveries continue as normal. One 2,000-pound bomb can rip through thick concrete and metal, creating a wide blast radius.
Here’s a link from July of 2024
The U.S. in May paused a shipment of 2,000-pound and 500-pound bombs due to concern over the impact they could have in Gaza
I can’t find anything saying we resumed shipment of 2,000 pound bombs in the remainder of 2024. So it seems to be true Trump is now reversing Biden’s [since May 2024] policy of withholding these bombs.
It also states that Biden sent over ten thousand 2,000lb bombs before pausing that single shipment. I don’t understand why you’re trying to split hairs here as if it makes any difference (irrespective of the 500lb bombs continuing to be shipped, the $20 billion shipment of fighter jets, bombs, and missles in August, and the $8 billion weapons shipment he approved two weeks ago).
I don’t understand why you’re trying to split hairs here as if it makes any difference
Because this comment thread is about whether Trump’s actions are empowering the Israelis. It’s apparent to me that most people are using a different definition of empowering than I am.
- to give official authority or legal power to
- Something that is empowering makes you more confident and makes you feel that you are in control of your life
Even though these actions don’t have a large practical impact on their military capability, or financial means, it does send the message that Trump isn’t interested in placing even performative restraint on Israel. Thus, he is empowering them to do even more.
Well if we’re splitting hairs, how does the ceasefire fall into your definition of empowering the Israelis? That’s not something we’ve seen at any point in the past 15 months of slaughter.
I don’t think Trump really deserves credit for it, but Biden surely doesn’t. Not only did he allow them to cross red line after red line while supplying them with money and weapons the entire time, but he also blocked numerous UN resolutions on the matter while standing alone with Israel.
The occupiers are the state of Israel. Biden had some very limited sanctions against specific extremists who weren’t also Americans, but no one in their right mind thought that was somehow stopping the occupation.
The occupiers are the state of Israel.
Yes, that what I said, though I can see how the ordering of my words could be ambiguous.
Biden had some very limited sanctions
And Trump is removing them. Therefor Trump is, in an objective and literal sense, empowering those people subjected to those sanctions by removing sanctions that Biden had put in place.
Those sanctions didn’t actually do anything about the occupation. It’d be like sanctioning some random ultra-Z Russians rather than their leadership or institutions and acting like it’s curbing the occupation of Crimea. A few specific Israelis couldn’t bank with the United States, but they can just route through American-Israelis in their ranks instead. Them specifically banking wasn’t in any way important to the occupation.
Lifting the sanctions by Trump is bad, but more on the symbolism than the impact.
Trump could have said hey this sanction isn’t working, we need to strengthen it so that it does. But he instead said get rid of this sanction entirely. I get that you’re saying “well it didn’t really work and they had access to it anyway.” I do. But by your own account they had to go through extra steps to get it and now they don’t. That’s empowering. Even if just in the psychological sense that they now get to think “hey Trump is doing things to make it easier for me to keep occupying this land.” They now know that Trump is aiding them, so that gives them a greater sense of purpose and power to continue. And now they get more of the bigger bombs with which to do it.
This is just such a minimal impact it’s hard to get worked up about it. It’s wrong and it’s bad and it’s worse, but we have not lost a force for good in losing Bidenism. Bidenism with respect to Israel was evil. And Trump is eviler, but on this issue, there’s really not much worse it can get. On many many other issues Trump is incomparably worse, but no one should pretend Biden was in any way a bulwark against genocide and occupation.
This very story demonstrates it. In a raft of reversing Biden policies, the only things he could do for Israel was unrestricting a single bomb and removing some token sanctions. That’s the sum of Biden’s efforts to restrain Israel.
Biden did not try. Palestinians were doomed either way
Okay, so even if Biden didn’t try what good did voting for Trump or not voting at all due for our country and or Israel?
What? Biden didn’t try. You don’t have to vote for trump or not vote at all, to understand that.
This article is literally about one of Biden’s efforts to rein in the violence. He did try. Now go ahead and excuse Trump freeing up 2,000-pound bombs for Israel, and how that’s better for Palestine than it would be if Harris had won. Good luck.
He did not “try.” This is just a weak attempt at whitewashing recent history.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-sent-israel-thousands-2000-pound-bombs-since-oct-7-2024-06-28/
He also bypassed congress twice to give billions of aid to Israel. Nobody is excusing trump freeing 2000 pound of bomb to Israel
“We tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas” energy. It’s almost if Palestine was doomed either way. Heck of a lot cheaper to not send bombs to Israel
Lying about Biden trying “nothing” doesn’t make it OK that you carried water for Trump.
Now that is a lie, anyone who thinks Biden actually tried to stop the genocide is either not paying attention or flat out lying. Not everyone who opposes aiding an active genocide carried water for trump. Believe it or not you can be vocal about being against trump and genocide
This is a very simple trolley problem. Do nothing and the Trump train runs over a lot more people. Vote fore Biden and a lot less folks will day. Arguing for the Trump trolley (which you are doing) is foolish.
If you think that what I said was in support of trump, you are part of the reason trump is in office again. There is no trolley; there be only genocide or we’re sorry still genocide
The setup is correct, but calling the problem “very simple” just means you don’t understand the trolley problem.
Trump appears to have pushed Netanyahu to agree to a ceasefire, which Biden failed to do. I wouldn’t be surprised if the delivery of these bombs was part of the backroom deal between Trump and Netanyahu which led to the ceasefire.
I don’t know what will happen after this ceasefire expires, but until then it’s a little early for those who criticized Biden’s policy on Israel to criticize Trump’s.
No it fucking isn’t, what with Israel set to receive 2,000 pound bombs that can level a city block.
I love how now you’re arguing that supplying weapons to Israel is a grave sin. How do you feel about supplying 500 pound bombs that can simply level a building?
I wouldn’t be surprised if the delivery of these bombs was part of the backroom deal between Trump and Netanyahu which led to the ceasefire.
I can’t deny that when seeing the news and timing my first thought was of Reagan and the Iran hostage crisis.
I don’t think this is the same thing unless Trump told Netanyahu to delay the ceasefire, and I haven’t heard anyone claim that he did.
I am just here waiting for the “Free Palestine” folks to show us the way with some real radical activism.
Oh god is that all the ceasefire is? Chance to resupply? Trump is going to open the floodgates.
Hehe. As planned. Thanks to people who refused to vote for Kamala. Leopards don’t see political parties, all faces taste the same.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us-has-sent-israel-thousands-2000-pound-bombs-since-oct-7-2024-06-28/
Can you explain what’s changed?
What’s changed is all hope for cancelling weapons to Israel is gone. Kamala, while certainly not a great option, could at least be pressured.
You were foolish to have hope in the first place because if tens of thousands of innocent children getting blown into little pieces wasn’t enough to stop weapon sales, nothing is. Thinking that Harris “could be pressured” is just magical thinking because she, nor Biden, had any intention of stopping their aid to Israel to the point that they were willing to hand over control to the Republicans rather than even saying anything negative about Israel’s conduct and their participation in it.
Are you simply a troll? If everything is hopeless than why do you pretend to care?
I didn’t say “everything is hopeless” I said that Biden, Harris, and Trump were never going to do anything but aid in this genocide.
Well, you’re not wrong. But Trump will make things over there (and locally) significantly worse in the long run. Yes, worse than it is now. All the while talking about progress, and how much better things are.
In the end, all the land will be handed over to Israel, and developers will turn it into a resort town. Anyone left alive will be a servant to the wealthy.
And my hope was “could be pressured” as opposed to “no chance in hell.” We cut our nose of to spite our face.
A slightly bigger bomb won’t change anything materially on the ground in Gaza. The only significant change recently has been a cease fire. Whether it will hold or not is as yet unknown. But at least so far, Trump has somehow actually managed to be better on Gaza than Biden. Trump has shown a willingness to actually use the carrots and sticks of US foreign policy to produce outcomes. Biden offered unconditional support to Israel, while Trump seems to have forced them to come to the peace table by threatening to withhold support. In other words, Trump did what Biden’s base had been begging him to do for a year.
It’s possible all this falls apart. And it is possible that Trump will prove far worse, for example by allowing an annexation of the West Bank. But so far at least, Trump has actually been a lot better for the Palestinians than Biden. Biden and Harris fundamentally do not accept that Israel should ever be held accountable for anything.
I don’t think Trump did the cease fire out of moral concerns; I’m sure it was purely self-serving on his part. But he was actually willing to use the US’s various carrots and sticks to force through a cease fire agreement. That is something Biden never had the balls to do.
He sold the West Bank for 100m to Adelson. The genocide won’t stop their focus is just shifting temporarily. It’s not a win, Biden could’ve got them to agree on those terms too. Just like he could’ve ended the Ukraine war if he just told Ukraine to give up and concede a chunk of land.
Trump didn’t do anything. He has no control over Israel. He did nothing for this cease fire. I’m sure he would love to take credit one day and not the next.
[CITATION NEEDED]
He’s had people involved in backroom negotiations for months. Yes, it is a dirty tactic. This has a lot of undertones of Reagan’s deal with the Iranians. He didn’t have great intentions in negotiating a ceasefire, but he did manage to do it. And Trump has shown a willingness in the past to hold US military aid as a stick to change the behavior of allies. It’s reasonable to think he did the same thing here.
The US DOES have substantial control over Israel. Reagan for instance dramatically affected Israel’s behavior by withholding weapons. Biden was more permissive of Israel than Reagan was.
That is certainly possible, but any involvement from him would have been because he wanted to gain personal wealth or power. I’m sure you know this, but people need to remember that anything that Trump is doing to hold Israel in check has nothing to do with helping Gaza or the Palestinians. He doesn’t care. I do think that he’s very interested in developing on that land. If you recall, a while back there was something going around about Jared Kushner being involved with development in Gaza. I’m not sure what came of that and I don’t remember the exact details.
Wow, that’s surely going to both get the price of eggs down AND stop the genocide of Palestinians! How does he do it?
I mean there are two ways to stop the genocide. You can stop killing people or you can, how did he put it? “Finish the problem”
It’s probably the rapes that make him feel so young… Or maybe the felonies. I don’t know… There’s a lot to unpack here.
“it can’t get worse tho…”
See this thread for why D’s will never learn, and do not deserve to govern. Still blaming everyone they failed to motivate.
“You should have accepted the continuation of the slow D genocide. Now you’ll get the extra double R genocide, and it’s all your fault!”
This is why progressives abstained; to let Trump destroy the corporate-whore duopoly and charade of “democracy” in America. It wasn’t under some fantasy that R’s would be better for Gaza, America, or the planet. It was because the D’s are captured by the corporate oligarchy — thus will never offer meaningful change — and spent the last few decades helping the R’s sow the seeds for fascism, building the surveillance state and MIC, destroying the financial and housing security of the working class, etc.
Eventually some victims will stop accepting the abuse, and lash out at their abusers; even if it means much worse abuse or death.
Eventually some victims will stop accepting the abuse, and lash out at their abusers; even if it means much worse abuse or death.
Of course, if we wait for that to happen, we’ll already be well under the bootheel.
If you need a fully fledged fascist autocracy to happen before you get off your ass and do something… you’ve already failed.
Well it’s a good thing the genocide was stopped. Because it would be awfully embarrassing to grandstand on that single issue and have no result while simultaneously making the lives of thousands of others worse.
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I said either side resulted in genocide, and the R’s would be worse, but I’m guessing you are reactionary without reading my comment… Nice strawman though.
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I’m not American, and I would’ve voted for the lesser of two evils if I were, so you’re preaching to the choir. I’m just a messenger.
But do continue complaining about the left and proving that you’ve learned nothing, because that’s worked out well for you so far. The proof is in the fascist dictatorship!
I’m not American, and I would’ve voted for the lesser of two evils if I were, so you’re preaching to the choir. I’m just a messenger.
That’s fair - comment retracted.
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