No comment although I have them.

[matthew cissell]

Tracy,

Ok, you stepped into the ring. I've seen your lengthy tirades and rants and
normally ignore them as they lack depth, clarity and any meaningful
contribution to discussed topics. You say I am wildly sentimental? Go look
at your own words. You have certainly misunderstood the rhetoric employed
in my post, the purpose of which was to compare the creation of the USA and
Israel as "imagined communities"; the ideas that feed into Zionism (go read
some Isaiah Berlin) and the desire of the jewish people to have a land of
their own is the same as the creation of the US (mutatis mutandis), a
point that did not escape Edward Said.

As for Zionism, you might hold back on your "disease" metaphor and go
listen to some reggae that is heavily Zionist in its outlook and language.
Irie.

Oh, go look up the word "annihilation"; in German it means Vernichtung.
Sound familiar? Imagine someone annihilating your garden, house, or
community. Does it sound loaded? Loaded like a chamber slipping into the
chamber as the sights train on you? Because violence is behind what you
imply.

And if you want to be on Mach T's side go right ahead but I don't think you
will like the company much as they are serious hamberder munchers and they
are ready to produce a thousand years of peace, it just involves undoing a
bit of history and then making everyone forget. Gosh, that almost sounds
nice but it won't be with "Imagine" on the soundtrack, unless the lyrics
have been rewritten by Identitarians, national conservatives, white
nationalists or whatever euphemistic label they have cooked up to rename
their creed: fascism.

Y por cierto, there are certainly aspects of Israeli governmental action
that look fascistic at times. You see, the wonder of fascism is that it can
appeal to anyone - jews, gays, POC, ... you and me.

And finally, as that great author once wrote, "It is not enough to be
anti-fascist, one must also be anti-totalitarian."

Sincerely,
MC, son of Homer and descendant of Irish, Scots and Cherokee (among others)
and a wrestler struggling with the nightmare of history and the madness of
humans. Ni dios, ni patria, ni rey. Ne Obliviscaris.

On Thu, Oct 14, 2021 at 6:21 AM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

> Annihilation is a loaded word. It sounds cruel and violent. Truthfully
> though, a name or concept or form of government can be eliminated or
> replaced without destroying human lives or poisoning the earth. Nations and
> religions have changed and died before with little or even benign
> consequences. And those nations  that survived and rose to become “great
> powers" have a pretty shitty track record to justify themselves. Imagine
> all the people living life in peace.
> I don’t know exactly what Thomberi ( sounds a made up name) is intending,
> whether tongue in cheek or weirdly sincere, but I think matthew c is wildly
> sentimentalizing how Israel came into being. As to what is to be done. It
> is a question for all of us, not just Israel. Settler colonialism and its
> cruelties are embedded in most of the world. Western civilization as
> configured has desertified vast parts of the globe, moved sane indiginous
> cultures into bantustans and is rapidly destroying the diverse species upon
> which life as we know it exists, rapidly moving us toward waves of mass
> destruction . As for me, yes i really am ready to hand over my land and the
> very concept of property to the tribal peoples of north america. Would they
> want this mess, our mini-flags, banks and fracking machines? I don’t know,
> but I could not be more serious about my acre of workspace , fruit trees,
> asparagus, maple trees, and stone walls.  My whole life is about the effort
> to move myself and others toward an ecologically sustainable life, and the
> biggest impediment to change is the settler colonialist warfare that
> continues from the ancient to the modern world, that turns from warlordism
> to nationalism  to imperial warfare. What Israel and the US and China and
> Russia and Brazil and Canada and so many rapacious military dictatorships
> are expressing in this shared planet  is varying forms of  sociopathic
> madness organized by  self destructive dreams, egomania, and imaginary
> polities that have ravaged our common sense as animals, our friendliness as
> neighbors, our ability to choose life above what they have too offer. And
> what do they have to offer as their civilization crumbles? Comfortable
> places to watch the world burn, endless entertaining air conditioned
> shitpiles, debt,  fat people eating big juicy hamburgers and an all too
> violent and real global annihilation, James Bond may or may not have lost
> his dick, but he stil has a license to kill.
>
>  Zionism is the same disease as the master race, manifest destiny,
> salafism, pax romana, capitalism, militarism. Its origins can be read by
> anyone. Joshua crosses into “ the promised land” to kill the sinful
> Canaanites or make them into slaves to the chosen people.”Blessed is he who
> dashes thy little ones against a stone”. This fable has become the script
> for modern day Israel, just as some version of this script has written so
> much human history. It will script global suicide if we let it. If we
> cannot prevent it.
>
> Zionism was never the remarkable part of Judaism, the heart of this holy
> path is to choose life, to love the great mystery of being wih all the
> heart and all the mind and the very kernel of life we have been given, and
> to treat others as we wish to be treated.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Oct 13, 2021, at 4:14 PM, matthew cissell <mccissell at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > Mach,
> >
> > So let me see. You seem to propose the annihilation of Israel, a country
> > created whole cloth from ideas, dreams, stories and more by carving out a
> > space for that community that had formed a nation but lacked a state.
> >
> > Ok. Two things (that I'll say) occur to me: What do you propose for the
> > people? Do you have some... solution for them as well? Would it be the
> same
> > for Arabic and Jewish citizens? What would it entail?
> >
> > Next: If you (and others that share your view) are the descendent of
> > Europeans living in the Americas (or some other previously
> > colonized place), I suppose you are also ready to 'undo' your county and
> > hand over your land to the indigenous communities. Or are you writing
> from
> > somewhere else, in which case we might talk about that place.
> >
> > Criticizing the trespasses of any country or government is one thing, but
> > calling for its abolition is something else. The actions of the Israeli
> > government have often been reprehensible or even criminal, but that does
> > not justify your language, which would certainly find applause and echoes
> > in a certain rising current in not only US political discourse but more
> > widely.
> >
> > I'm responding not because I think your mind is likely to be changed but
> > because I want you and others to know that in this open forum you will
> find
> > voices that do not apathetically ignore your statements.
> >
> > Ne Obliviscaris
> > Matthew Cissell
> >
> > On Wed, Oct 13, 2021 at 4:33 PM Mach Thomberi <machthomberi at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> No we wouldn't want that would we.  Deprive Israel water and medicine.
> >>
> >> What would be marvelous.  Would be removing Israel from the map.  Cut it
> >> out and dispense it into the ether.
> >>
> >> Then do likewise of our collective memory of Israel.
> >> On Oct 13, 2021 9:23 AM, "Joseph Tracy" <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
> >>
> >>> I would not go so far as to cut Israelis off from medicine or clean
> water
> >>> as they have done to Gaza, but a cultural boycott is potentially a way
> to
> >>> bring the debate into a more public sphere. We need equally to confront
> >>> what so many in the western press and politics  have done on this
> issue.
> >>> They  have supported  the insane idea that anyone who publicly
> >> criticizes
> >>> Israel’s abuse of Palestinians is doing so out of  anti-semitism. They
> >> are
> >>> labeled  anti-semitic even if they are Jews whose parents and relatives
> >>> survived or died  in Nazi concentration camps.
> >>>  Sally Rooney said she would be honored to have her book translated to
> >>> Hebrew but will not work with a publisher who does not distance
> >> themselves
> >>> from Israel’s aparteid treatment of Palestinians.
> >>>
> >>>> On Oct 11, 2021, at 3:44 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> Why no comment?  This is a place for opinion.  As for me, I say
> >> Bravo!  I
> >>>> think Israel deserves full apartheid treatment right now.  And too
> many
> >>>> people are afraid to say so.   There!  I said it.
> >>>>
> >>>> David Morris
> >>>>
> >>>> On Mon, Oct 11, 2021 at 3:25 PM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> https://forward.com/opinion/476513/why-wont-sally-rooney-
> >>> allow-her-latest-novel-to-be-translated-into-hebrew/
> >>>>> --
> >>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>
> >> --
> >> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>
>
>
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>