House Balstroko

That was the article I had originally read. Wanted to make sure whether the report was accurate.

Apparently in China he is quite popular that social media was overflowing with condolences (not sure if that’s accurate). He should have been extradited to Chile to faces charges there. One thing that I found kinda funny was that a few months back during the Titan submersible saga, you said that you would be ecstatic about his death. A few months later and here we are. Impeccable timing.

When I first heard the news, I immediately thought of @Conflicting Thought. Fuck that asshole.

Not directly related to the actual conflict, but I’m curious as to why the concert organisers thought it was a good idea to have the event take place so close to Gaza. Even if the October 7th attack had not taken place, there was always the possibility of random missiles making it past the Iron Dome and hitting the venue and surrounding. Maybe, it would have been better if it had taken place around Eilat.

I figured as much. That would be an even wilder take than going for the one in Portugal. Maybe Russians will take an interest in St Petersburg, Florida or Moscow, Idaho. P.S. Don’t tell Serbs about Belgrade, Montana. The Brazilian variant occasionally comes across as such.

I had to double check to make sure there was no other city called Lisbon they had in mind.

The Grayzone is very much left wing. Left wing extremism is just as bad as it’s right wing variant. It doesn’t get as much coverage due to the fact that there are very few places where the far left actually holds power.

The Grayzone is utter trash when it comes to journalism. They actively support Russia in its invasion of Ukraine. I wouldn’t say that these are your typical left wing individuals/organisations. These are part of the far-left (tankies). They operate on the principle that everything that opposes the West needs to be supported at all costs.

That’s frightening on so many levels. At the same time, I’m glad that Bolsonaro got defeated, even if only barely, and is barred from holding public office for the next decade in Brazil.

A lot of that stuff is outright insane. Hopefully, those more extreme tendencies can be reined in.

Do you think this will have an impact on other countries in Latin America? How popular is Gabriel Boric in Chile?

One thing that’s been on my mind ever since the October 7th attacks, is how the Arab world will perceive this conflict. It seems like Russia is trying to distance itself from Israel, with public statements at the UN claiming that the country has no right to defend itself. Is Putin hoping that the West’s near unilateral support of Israel is going to cause Arab nations to take drastic measures against Ukraine?

Nostalgia is a powerful tool. Almost every generation likes to reminisce about the “good old days”. I was in my early twenties back then. I started reading ASOIAF after the first season had ended, though before watching it. Gaming was more or less the same as it is today, with online being a major fixture and patches already becoming a huge pain in the ass. Many franchises were already transitioning to an open world formula. Politics has always been a shitshow, so there’s no real change on that front. Space exploration is picking up steam.

Not as surprising as some might think, as many in the Iranian diaspora have long had a dislike of their own government and to a lesser extent of Arabs/Islam in general. https://m.jpost.com/diaspora/article-772852

This part I can’t agree on. The very fact that Jews are disproportionately targeted amongst the diaspora, suggests that the problem far exceeds the current situation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Id say that there are a number of factors affecting it. 1) Among Muslim religious zealots, a belief that Israel is occupying the Holy Land. 2) Among Christian religious zealots, a general dislike of Jews going back millennia. 3) Among left-wing extremists who dislike the West, a belief that Israel is a settler nation forcefully occupying and displacing the native population.

I’m starting to believe in the horseshoe theory as well. Both the far left and far right want to shake up the political system in whatever way possible, even through violence.

It’s going to have to happen at some point. Best to start ASAP. Logically, it can’t happen overnight, due to the sheer scale. Israel should work on a timetable.

I think Israel needs to offer the Palestinians an off-ramp in order to move forward. In exchange for Hamas leadership renouncing power, it dismantles all settlements in the West Bank. Merely trying to destroy Hamas is ultimately going to make the lives of Gaza’s citizens more miserable. That will just open the door for another organisation like Hamas to fill in the vacuum.

There are also those who don’t want the US to be involved in the Middle East and project their dislike towards Israel because of the disproportionate amount of support it received from the US.

Then the entire conflict is at a major impasse.

Why would Palestinians subject themselves to being ruled by Israel in the Gaza Strip? I agree with the idea that a stable government needs to be established in order to prevent another extremist faction from taking over, but it needs to come from within the Arab world, otherwise it will be seen as an occupation.

As I mentioned in the other thread, there needs to be a clear distinction made between supporting the Palestinian cause and blatant anti-semitism masquerading as criticism of Israeli policy. There’s been an uptick in the latter and that needs to be dealt with. Nobody should feel threatened because of their identity.

By the end of the day, I had come across 3 different instances of the same slogan. That may have been its original meaning, but it has clearly been distorted over the years. A singular state puts the Jewish population at a severe disadvantage. As much as I’d like to believe otherwise, it’s getting harder to reconcile with the more extreme elements at play. Almost all posters of the missing hostages have been torn down, even though they were apolitical in nature.

There was another major Pro-Palestinian protest in Melbourne, Australia. After the main event had ended people started going their own way, I saw 2 girls with By The River to the Sea posters. I was tempted to confront them and ask them to voluntarily dispose of those posters, otherwise I’d involve the police. Then I decided to just move along. It’s one thing to show solidarity with the Palestinian cause, but this is a direct attack against the existence of the state of Israel. That is not acceptable.

This is something that doesn’t really make sense within the context of US politics. I can understand American Muslims voicing their discontent with Biden, but the opposition is the Republican Party which has even more hardliners that are staunchly pro-Israel. It’s not like there’s a big left wing party that will suddenly sweep in to change the status quo. The US has a right wing party (Democrats) and an increasingly far right party (Republicans).