Dec 31, 2023·edited Dec 31, 2023Liked by Bentham's Bulldog
EDIT: I just saw that you already mentioned this factor. That's what I get for not finishing the post before I comment. Mea maxima culpa.
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I think the duration of the conflict probably also has something to do with it. The occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has been going on since 1967, making it the longest military occupation in modern history, and giving various political factions plenty of time to stake out a position (pro-Palestinian views are an accepted staple of the socialist left, while support for Israel is non-negotiable for many mainstream right-wing groups). By contrast, the Saudi war in Yemen (which has gone on since 2015) hasn't had time to become a core issue for any particular faction. The war in Syria was a pretty high-profile issue for a few years, though this might simply be because people associated it with ISIS and other potential terrorist threats.
I think its a combination of factors 2 & 3. Its the severity of the atrocities (which also predate the current war) and also the fact that the USA has long participated in the suppression of Palestinians in a far deeper way than Nagorno-Karabakh or even the Saudi war on Yemen. On social media theres also an element of the shamelessness with which Israeli leaders have celebrated their crimes which promotes dramatic outrage. I try to stay cool headed about these things but some of the rhetoric I’ve seen has shocked me, as has the overwhelming support for these crimes in Israel, where polling from two months into the war suggested 81% of Israelis think little or no regard should be paid to Palestinian wellbeing in this conflict. Israel is supposed to be different from a third world theocracy like Saudi Arabia, which is the basis on which theyve received such an overwhelming amount of funding from the US.
I think you're missing an important aspect of the "Toxoplasma of Rage" post which applies to the conflict, namely, there's a rich enough body of "evidence," both recent and historical, that both sides can marshal for their own righteousness and the other's villainy that protracted, maybe even intractable disagreement is possible. And much of said evidence itself is often ambiguous to just the right extent that people can have protracted disagreement over that!
That said, I also think there's less charitable but still correct (partial) explanations. I believe leftists see Israel as an outgrowth of the West and pattern match it immediately to historical western colonialism subjugating the Global South, perhaps their primary bête noire. (Not necessarily saying they're wrong here, just trying to describe what I perceive their lens to be.) On the other hand, Muslims have a profound psychological connection to the Middle East in general and the Levant in particular for religio-historical reasons, and it's worse when those places are being occupied by an external group.
For both of those factions, my prediction is that they would care just as much (if not more) if you swapped out the Jewish population of Israel with a bunch of Italian Catholics who pursued identical policies, whereas they would care significantly less if you instead swapped out the Jews with Sunni Kurds who all had names like "Mohammed/Muhammad."
I think the second-to-last sentence should read "As a result, the discussion of Israel-Palestine outrages people more, and so discussion of it spreads." As you have it, I believe that the [inference from strong attachment to Israel to strong outrage] is not given enough attention in the sentence, making your logic hard to follow on the first read of the sentence.
While many people obviously overestimate the contribution of antisemitism to the anti-Israel sentiments prevalent in the west, your dismissal of it seems like begging the question to me: if we assume that antisemitism is rare, it follows that it can't be the reason.
But if someone was to believe that antisemitism is quite common (at least more than first apparent), it stands to reason to think it has a significant effect on the matter.
Bayesianly speaking, they will look at the anti-Israeli focus and see it as weak evidence for this explanation.
For example- this article, if correct, would make the structure of your argument substantially diminished in my opinion:
Personally I think that trying to understand any one belief of a group without seeing it as part of the entangled web of believes held by "team blue" vs "team yellow" will be unsuccessful.
You can predict this sentiment quite precisely from the group affiliation of most individuals, any explanation that doesn't take in to account the group level dynamics is probably missing the point.
EDIT: I just saw that you already mentioned this factor. That's what I get for not finishing the post before I comment. Mea maxima culpa.
***
I think the duration of the conflict probably also has something to do with it. The occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has been going on since 1967, making it the longest military occupation in modern history, and giving various political factions plenty of time to stake out a position (pro-Palestinian views are an accepted staple of the socialist left, while support for Israel is non-negotiable for many mainstream right-wing groups). By contrast, the Saudi war in Yemen (which has gone on since 2015) hasn't had time to become a core issue for any particular faction. The war in Syria was a pretty high-profile issue for a few years, though this might simply be because people associated it with ISIS and other potential terrorist threats.
I think its a combination of factors 2 & 3. Its the severity of the atrocities (which also predate the current war) and also the fact that the USA has long participated in the suppression of Palestinians in a far deeper way than Nagorno-Karabakh or even the Saudi war on Yemen. On social media theres also an element of the shamelessness with which Israeli leaders have celebrated their crimes which promotes dramatic outrage. I try to stay cool headed about these things but some of the rhetoric I’ve seen has shocked me, as has the overwhelming support for these crimes in Israel, where polling from two months into the war suggested 81% of Israelis think little or no regard should be paid to Palestinian wellbeing in this conflict. Israel is supposed to be different from a third world theocracy like Saudi Arabia, which is the basis on which theyve received such an overwhelming amount of funding from the US.
I think you're missing an important aspect of the "Toxoplasma of Rage" post which applies to the conflict, namely, there's a rich enough body of "evidence," both recent and historical, that both sides can marshal for their own righteousness and the other's villainy that protracted, maybe even intractable disagreement is possible. And much of said evidence itself is often ambiguous to just the right extent that people can have protracted disagreement over that!
That said, I also think there's less charitable but still correct (partial) explanations. I believe leftists see Israel as an outgrowth of the West and pattern match it immediately to historical western colonialism subjugating the Global South, perhaps their primary bête noire. (Not necessarily saying they're wrong here, just trying to describe what I perceive their lens to be.) On the other hand, Muslims have a profound psychological connection to the Middle East in general and the Levant in particular for religio-historical reasons, and it's worse when those places are being occupied by an external group.
For both of those factions, my prediction is that they would care just as much (if not more) if you swapped out the Jewish population of Israel with a bunch of Italian Catholics who pursued identical policies, whereas they would care significantly less if you instead swapped out the Jews with Sunni Kurds who all had names like "Mohammed/Muhammad."
I think the second-to-last sentence should read "As a result, the discussion of Israel-Palestine outrages people more, and so discussion of it spreads." As you have it, I believe that the [inference from strong attachment to Israel to strong outrage] is not given enough attention in the sentence, making your logic hard to follow on the first read of the sentence.
Hi, pleasure to read, as always.
While many people obviously overestimate the contribution of antisemitism to the anti-Israel sentiments prevalent in the west, your dismissal of it seems like begging the question to me: if we assume that antisemitism is rare, it follows that it can't be the reason.
But if someone was to believe that antisemitism is quite common (at least more than first apparent), it stands to reason to think it has a significant effect on the matter.
Bayesianly speaking, they will look at the anti-Israeli focus and see it as weak evidence for this explanation.
For example- this article, if correct, would make the structure of your argument substantially diminished in my opinion:
https://fortune.com/2023/01/11/hiring-jewish-people-antisemitism-workplace-study/
Personally I think that trying to understand any one belief of a group without seeing it as part of the entangled web of believes held by "team blue" vs "team yellow" will be unsuccessful.
You can predict this sentiment quite precisely from the group affiliation of most individuals, any explanation that doesn't take in to account the group level dynamics is probably missing the point.
I guess it's kind of the point you're making, but I think this conflict allows for two coherent positions, which most don't.