Thought for the Day

[broncofan]

Maybe. Until then, stop reading posts on X, they are x-rated as a warning.

I agree and I regret my post though it wasn't meant as a rebuke to you. I have genuinely felt quite awful about Israel's bombing campaign in Gaza. I can't imagine having a loved one be killed in the kinds of carpet bombings Israel has engaged in and this has taken place for six brutal months. I'm not oblivious to the fact that there is nothing a person can say that could compare to having a limb amputated without anesthetic or disfigurement and pain that will afflict thousands of Palestinians for the rest of their lives. That's all still in my mind when I see these protesters and yet I am still agitated by some of them because frankly, some say things that are meant to threaten and intimidate people who do not have any sort of control over Israel's brutal conduct and haven't condoned it either. But I've actually avoided it for the most part and oddly it's people I know who have never been online who are panicking and sending me videos. It has a distorting effect because people use it as a sample of public perception when it can represent outliers.

When Israel ends its bombardment of Gaza, there will be thousands of innocent people without homes and with life-altering injuries there, among the tens of thousands dead (about half children). That the bombardment ends and soon is my most fervent hope.

[filghy2]

No doubt this war has brought out more anti-semitism (and Islamophobia), but I'm not sure how much what is happening on campus is really a reflection of anti-semitism rather than the sort of black-and-white 'anti-Western' posturing that has always been a feature of leftist student politics. It's difficult to assess this dispassionately when most of those complaining the loudest about anti-semitism seem to be doing so in bad faith - using it as a device to discredit and suppress opposition to Israel's conduct.