Second aid flotila bound for Gaza leaving this week

[archibaldcrane]

Ashmada - do you think that Israel should stop building settlements?

Do you think they should relinquish settlements they've already built?

Simple questions.

[Elvis]

That's the most retarded shit I've seen in any BG thread.
Not only are those "arithmetics of life" arguments stupid, they're incredibly insensitive.
Senseless loss of civilian life is always a tragedy, whether that life is Palestinian or Israeli, whether numerous or not; human rights violations do not excuse other human rights violations.

Of course it matters. It matters when you try to equate the people living under occupation for 40+ years to that of the regional superpower. And your Hallmark card BULLSHIT aside, Israel kills Palestinians at both a much higher rate and with diplomatically immunity. Of fucking course the arithmetic matters.

This is also in conjunction to the other crimes committed against the Palestinians by Israel - including but not limited to, the intentional de-development of the Gazan economy (and establishing a dependence upon Israel), the systematic lack of accountability of the IDF in the territories (Yesh Din studies DURR), the theft of water resources, the encroachment of the settlements, blah blah fucking blah.

There is no equivalence between Israel and the Palestinians. One has the support of the world superpower and gets away with murder over and over, and the other is a punching bag.

And I won't even touch on the implication that the side which causes the least civiliant casualties (not out of humanism, but rather incompetence/bad equipment) is necessarily morally justified in its action.

I never established some kind of causal relationship between the disparity in casualties and moral high-ground.

Suicide bombing began in 1994. When was the LAST suicide bombing?

The vast majority of popular resistance to Israeli colonialism has been NON-VIOLENT.

Yet, Israel REGULARLY jails non-violent activists in a manner that is NO DIFFERENT from the Arab dictatorships in the region.

Israel once expelled a Palestinian non-violent activist in the late 80s - who had Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s wife's approval (she vouched for him in a letter of protest against his expulsion) - for intending to practice Gandhian non-violent tactics.

Israel has most recently jailed the leader of the Bi'lin village committee for INCITEMENT (he is a non-violent protest organizer) against the State.

Incitement.

Right. And Hamas merely wants Netanyahu to quit, maybe?
They've gone on record saying Israel doesn't have the right to exist, ffs!
How much more unambiguous d'you want them to be?

Hamas has not emphasized that part of their charter (written in the late 80s) for some time now and have gone on record in the Washington Post, stating they'd be willing to recognize Israel in phases. They were ambiguous but no politician (it was Ismail Haniyeh(sp) I believe) is going to spell out their strategy outright.

The point here is that NO STATE has an inherent and arbitrary right to exist. Especially a State that insists on existing as an ethno-religious State. A Jewish majority would not arise without the ETHNIC CLEANSING of the indigenous Palestinian Arab population.

And you speak as if that ethnic cleansing has ceased. It hasn't moron.

Hamas has already recognized that Israel exists. I don't expect them to recognize Zionism as a legitimate ideology anymore than Native Americans recognize Manifest Destiny as a legitimate ideology.

Someone says I don't have the right to exist while stroking his AK-47, I'll have a hard time not to take it as a threat on both my life and anal virginity.

What the fuck are you babbling about?

Hamas is at war with everyone. You think the rockets help Palestine?
They:
- Don't accomplish any kind of militarily significant result. You've said that yourself.

Israel has been occupying Palestinian land for decades and you are somehow concerned once again about these crude, worthless rockets. Earlier you said you weren't a fan of the numbers game. Well if you compare both sides, there is an OBVIOUS huge gap in crimes committed and the capacity to commit crimes.

Not to mention, that Israeli crimes are on-going, every single second. Every day of occupation and colonialism is a crime.

Both sides suffer from them, either directly or indirectly. Hamas merely uses Palestine as a tool to spread their brand of religious zealotry, they don't care about the civilians.

I don't give a shit about Hamas. They are the current leadership of the Palestinians in Gaza. Palestinian society is fragmented. There is no one leadership.

Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people, and I do not care to defend their tactics or ideology.

You don't. But we're in 2011, Captain Hindsight.
Pointing out errors of the past doesn't help solve the present situation one iota.
More than 50 years have passed, maybe we could move on from the implications that Israeli have no right to be there?

I'm not saying they should all pack up and leave, idiot. The reason I keep harping on the issue of ethnic cleansing is because THEY ARE STILL COLONIZING THE WEST BANK.

They are STILL kicking people off their land, out of their homes, etc etc. This behavior is not isolated to Israel's founding, it is IN-BUILT to the logic of Zionism. HENCE THE FUCKING OCCUPATION. You'd think that would be obvious. GEE I WONDER WHY ISRAEL BUILDS SETTLEMENTS?

HERE IS A RECENT EXAMPLE:

Israel admits to forcing 140,000 Palestinians from the West Bank using administrative trick

Israel has used a covert procedure to cancel the residency status of 140,000 West Bank Palestinians between 1967 and 1994, the legal advisor for the Judea and Samaria Justice Ministry's office admits, in a new document obtained by Haaretz. The document was written after the Center for the Defense of the Individual filed a request under the Freedom of Information Law.

The document states that the procedure was used on Palestinian residents of the West Bank who traveled abroad between 1967 and 1994. From the occupation of the West Bank until the signing of the Oslo Accords, Palestinians who wished to travel abroad via Jordan were ordered to leave their ID cards at the Allenby Bridge border crossing.

Now shut the fuck up.

[solanis]

The original story is about the 2nd aid flotilla with supplies for civilians, attempts to sabotage it by admitted zionist activists and Israel's threat to block foreign journalists who cover the story with a 10-year visa lockout.

Yet the only defense people can muster is 'Hamas wants to destroy Israel and kill civilians.'

The blindspots are just fucking huge today.

if you believe israel's actions are rational actions of a legitimate state, then their behavior is perfectly justified. if you believe israel isn't a legitimate state, then they are continuing offences against a group they already treat unfairly. this news story winds down to a zero-sum discussion about the state of israel's legitimacy. you're pretty uniquely dumb.

[Elvis]

I'm still waiting on that lesson in antisemitism, Solanis.

[solanis]

I'm still waiting on that lesson in antisemitism, Solanis.

I'm at work, I can either paste you logs or you can wait until I get home for me to write up something more in-depth and better explained than a chat log. what do you want?

[Correction]

More than 50 years have passed, maybe we could move on from the implications that Israeli have no right to be there?
why bring it up at all?

Sure be raining strawmen round here.

See, here's the thing.

Israel is continuing to stomp all over the Palestinians, and doing so in a way that casts a shadow on its polished image as an agent for democracy and peace in the Middle East. You know, that one shining reason that American politicians keep dry humping as the sole justification for our billions of dollars of support and unflinching military and political backing (besides the implied religious ones that nobody says aloud).

If you continue to dismiss the status quo as...well, an unchangeable status quo then you are truly putting on the blinders. The flotilla is on its way towards disintegrating Israel's credibility, and it's doing so without firing any rockets at civilians or writing a charter that says 'kill all Jooz.' In a lot of ways, it's the antithesis of the Hamas caricature you're buying into. What is the proposition for breaking the deadlock? At present, it's the flotilla. It's not changing course, and the IDF has to choose between celebrating the anniversary of them shooting people willy-nilly by...shooting them again, or actually undoing the blockade on palestinian territories that prompts such desperate and suicidal measures. It's a very effective form of protest. That's why the story is worth talking about. Quit hanging onto the 'kuya/elvis are antisemites' derails, since it's clear Dimm/solanis don't even believe that. If you want to talk about the current politics rather than fifty years of oppression, then lead by example, nigga. That's why Kuya made the thread in the first place.

this news story winds down to a zero-sum discussion about the state of israel's legitimacy.

The legitimacy of Israel's blockade on Palestinian territories is not the same as Israel's legitimacy as a sovereign state.

[Elvis]

if you believe israel's actions are rational actions of a legitimate state, then their behavior is perfectly justified. if you believe israel isn't a legitimate state, then they are continuing offences against a group they already treat unfairly. this news story winds down to a zero-sum discussion about the state of israel's legitimacy. you're pretty uniquely dumb.

Sorry, but States are subject to rules and regulations. Just because Israel is, VOILA, a State, does not give it the whole-sale right to do whatever it wants.

And no State is inherently 'legitimate'. We outright denied the 'legitimacy' of the Soviet Union, during the Cold War. That's why we had a 'Captive Nations Week'.

Is that honestly all you have?

Ok, just a checklist of replies to get back to:

The issue of legality of Israel's hijacking ships in international waters -

The issue Plow brought up of Jews being scattered for 3000 years, then 'returning' (collectively no doubt, according to his air-tight, logic!) and legitimately buying land (vague, how much?? what were the demographics of the proposed Israeli State according to the Partition Plan? ILL WAIT WHILE U WIKI-IT).

[Elvis]

I'm at work, I can either paste you logs or you can wait until I get home for me to write up something more in-depth and better explained than a chat log. what do you want?

Why wouldn't chat logs work? Do both. Give me something to read for now? Then elaborate later.

[Indalecia]

I'd like a statement that didn't have blinders bolted on for the entire thought process.

[solanis]

I'd like a statement that didn't have blinders bolted on for the entire thought process.

in a thread about israel? from both sides? you might as well ask for hugh hefner and his girls to take a vow of chastity

[Demosthenes11]

internalized antisemitism? what the fuck is this? If anything, it's the opposite. Americans grew up and their only school lessons until college were about how oppressed the jews were for no reason and how strange musselmen are and their weird religion. We are taught that jews are the oppressed and muslims act irrationally in school.

To blame thought, either way, on internalized dogma is such a cop-out. you are saying "I can't argue with you, your opinion is different from mine."

[Ashmada]

I never established some kind of causal relationship between the disparity in casualties and moral high-ground.

Right, you brought up said disparity just because you felt like it. Not to support a point or anything. Right.

This is also in conjunction to the other crimes committed against the Palestinians by Israel - including but not limited to, the intentional de-development of the Gazan economy (and establishing a dependence upon Israel), the systematic lack of accountability of the IDF in the territories (Yesh Din studies DURR), the theft of water resources, the encroachment of the settlements, blah blah fucking blah.
Yet, Israel REGULARLY jails non-violent activists in a manner that is NO DIFFERENT from the Arab dictatorships in the region.

Israel once expelled a Palestinian non-violent activist in the late 80s - who had Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s wife's approval (she vouched for him in a letter of protest against his expulsion) - for intending to practice Gandhian non-violent tactics.

Israel has most recently jailed the leader of the Bi'lin village committee for INCITEMENT (he is a non-violent protest organizer) against the State.

Incitement.

... there we go, I'm an IDF apologetic, now. That was even faster than expected.
What part of "violations don't excuse violations" read as "I love the IDF and they can do no wrong"?

Everyone knows the Israeli government has a whole lot of unjustified blood on its hands, I'd be the last to deny that.

There is no equivalence between Israel and the Palestinians.

Never implied one. Relatively small scale and relative lack of success still doesn't excuse terrorism.

The vast majority of popular resistance to Israeli colonialism has been NON-VIOLENT.

Yes, and non-violent resistance to oppression should be lauded.
Once again, what part of "senseless loss of life is always tragic" read as "I hate those Palestinians and wish them all a slow, painful death"?

I'll mercifully skip the ad hominem parts of your diatribe, I can take it. But please, spare those poor strawmen; they've done you no harm.



Correction: I admire your dedication. Takes guts to keep harping on the strawman after it's identified.
Where the hell have I argued in favor of blockading the flottilla?
Here's the thing: you took a statement out of context and hope to build a villain out of it. I know these kinds of threads badly need a target, but damn, don't be too hasty painting anyone with a slightly more moderate opinion than Elvis as a hound of the IDF.

YOUR billions of tax dollar support, btw. Here (EU), we tend to support "whoever the americans hate". It's like a passive-aggressive mini-cold war of sorts. Our politicians suck at trolling, though, so the US doesn't care. Or even notice.

[solanis]

internalized antisemitism? what the fuck is this? If anything, it's the opposite. Americans grew up and their only school lessons until college were about how oppressed the jews were for no reason and how strange musselmen are and their weird religion. We are taught that jews are the oppressed and muslims act irrationally in school.

To blame thought, either way, on internalized dogma is such a cop-out. you are saying "I can't argue with you, your opinion is different from mine."

yeah, because jews are a maginalized group. we're taught that blax are an oppressed group in school, are they suddenly not oppressed and is there suddenly not rampant racism because we learned about slavery in middle school? terrible logic.

as for the second part I'd paste to you what I said to kuya when he made the same criticism but I can't figure out how to view sent PMs the point is not to silence anybody, which is a common mistake in social equality discussions, but rather to educate so that all parties can rationally examine what privilege bias they have, isolate it from their arguments and responses, and move forward without that wild card variable. ignoring it is stupid as shit.

[archibaldcrane]

Ashmada - do you think that Israel should stop building settlements?

Do you think they should relinquish settlements they've already built?

Simple questions.

Nothin?

[Demosthenes11]

yeah, because jews are a maginalized group. we're taught that blax are an oppressed group in school, are they suddenly not oppressed and is there suddenly not rampant racism because we learned about slavery in middle school? terrible logic.

as for the second part I'd paste to you what I said to kuya when he made the same criticism but I can't figure out how to view sent PMs the point is not to silence anybody, which is a common mistake in social equality discussions, but rather to educate so that all parties can rationally examine what privilege bias they have, isolate it from their arguments and responses, and move forward without that wild card variable. ignoring it is stupid as shit.

bias exists with or without education. You can't just remove bias from things - it exists in all forms. The news has a bias, data has a bias (yes, it is), everything has a bias. That's what makes us human beings. Humans are not rational creatures, which is why rational arguments have to be constructed and are not fluid. It it laughable that you think you need to breakdown someone's bias before arguing with them - that is the point of the argument. One side provides examples, data, evidence, etc. The other side rebuts with similar things, and one side may see the fault in their argument, or others may see fault in one of the sides.

stop playing the victim (lol) card. nobody is trying to silence you, you just want to get your potshots in and argue something irrelevant rather than the actual topic - a cop-out.

[Elvis]

Oh that's right, it was anti-Palestinian riots killing off Palestinians who had legally bought (back) their land for some 30 years before Israel was even established as its own state.




Oh, really? Who are the Palestinians exactly?

You mean they're *NOT* the people that took over Palestine as the Jews were kicked out?

The Roman Empire being the main source of aggression for a lot of the time means whoever wants to can just take the land afterward?

Sweet, this dude I know robbed a bank, I guess I can just go find the money and take it since it wasn't me that robbed em.



Sure, pretend that minuscule by comparison events of the last 60 years are all that matters, ignore the basic reality that people were kicked off their land and fucking bought it back, and that the fighting has deeply intensified over the last hundred years due to fear of "negative" impact on Arab nationalism, and you've almost got yourself a credible point.

Until you face the reality that the "victims" now whom are supposedly seeking peace are "offering" peace in exchange for... letting them win their war lol.

Palestine has been in use just as long as the term Israel. For example, Shemot (Exodus) 13:17 says God did not lead them [by] way of the land of the Philistines. Amos Chapter 9:7 says that the Israelites were brought up from Egypt in the same way that the Philistines and Aram were brought respectively from Caphtor and Kir. Josephus, claimed that the Jews were not a maritime people and that they inhabited the inland hill country, not the coastal plain. The Palestinians had already dispatched a delegation of representatives to Great Britain in February of 1922 that styled themselves as “Arab People of Palestine” and members of the “People of Palestine” . A distinct “Palestinian” identity had been developed long before as a result of the Egyptian siege of 1832 (more below).

Reliable sources, including Avigdor Levy, Elli Kohen, Aryeh Shmuelevitz, and Walter Weiker estimate the number of Jews in all of Syria and Palestine at about 20,000 at the beginning of the 18th century. The names of the Jewish communities implied that they did not consider themselves to be members of the same nationality, i.e. Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Romani, Misrahi, etc. The Ottoman authorities also treated them as members of different ethnic and religious sects, i.e. Surgun, Kendi Gelen, & etc. See for example Avigdor Levy, Jews, Turks, Ottomans: A Shared History, Fifteenth Through the Twentieth Century (Modern Jewish History), Syracuse Univ Pr, 2003. You keep mentioning that some Palestinians migrated into the area. If being an Ashkenazi (German) born in the United States of America doesn’t prevent you from also being a Jewish and Israeli national, then why does it matter where a “Palestinian” or “Arab” national was born? The use of that deceptive narrative by Zionists has been fully discussed in:
*Rosemary E. Shinko, “Discourses of Denial: Silencing the Palestinians, Delegitimizing Their Claims,” Journal of International Affairs 58.1 (2004);
*Baruch Kimmerling, Politicide: Ariel Sharon’s War Against the Palestinians, Verso, 2003;
*Marcelo Svirsky, “The Desire for terra nullius and the Zionist-Palestinian Conflict,” in Paul Patton and Simone Bignall (Eds.) Deleuze and the Postcolonial, Edinburgh University Press 2009.
*Lawrence Davidson, “Historical Ignorance and Popular Perception: the Case of U.S. Perceptions of Palestine, 1917,” Middle East Policy3.2 (1994): pages 125-148;
*Joyce Dalsheim, Settler nationalism, collective memories of violence and the ‘uncanny other’, Social Identities, Volume 10, Issue 2 2004 , pages 151 – 170;

The 19th century British Foreign Office Confidential Prints FO 424 and early 20th century Arab Bureau Papers FO 882 relate that the origins of the Husayni (aka al-Husseini), Khalidi, Nashashibi, ‘Abd al-Hadi, Tuqan families, and the many clans and tribes – including the Beersheba Bedouin – pre-date the first Zionist Aliya and that all of the groups had been settled there for centuries. Most of the inhabitants today can trace their ancestry to one or more of the families named in the 19th century British reports. Hashem died and was buried in Gaza 1300 years ago. His Husayni descendants moved back to the region from Allepo in the 1600s. By the early years of the 18th century the post of Mufti of Jerusalem was held by ‘Abd al-Qadir ibn Karim al-Din Husayni. He died leaving no male heir and the Hanafi mufti-ship passed on to the Jaralla and Alami families. But, ‘Abd al-Qadir’s female descendants retained the family name and their claim to sharifian (i.e. Hashemite) lineage. The notable members of that particular branch have included Yasser Arafat and his uncle, the Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini.

Zionists always mention a poorly-defined region called “Eretz Yisrael”. The Torah suggests that Moses died somewhere in Transjordan because he was not permitted to enter the Promised Land. In fact, Gideon Bigger says that’s why Lloyd George used the Jordan river as the border – because Joshua and the children of Israel crossed it on their way into the land of Israel. Of course, there are other passages in the scriptures which say that all of the land between the River of Egypt and the Euphrates was included in the Promised Land or Eretz Yisrael. Judea was only a small fraction of this “Greater Eretz Yisrael”. It is a little known fact that the Sultan adopted a statute which provided for the immediate and free settlement on the best lands available, for groups of Jews between 200 and 250 families, everywhere in Greater Eretz Yisrael, except for Palestine. In 1882 the American Consul advised a group of Romanian Jews who had requested settlement in the “Pashlik of Palestine” about the ordinance and summed-up by saying “In conclusion, there is nothing to prevent all the Israelites on the earth from settling in Asiatic Turkey. They shall not settle in Palestine-that is the only prohibition. The Zionists never seriously considered settlement in the portions of Eretz Yisrael beyond the boundaries of Palestine.

Joseph Mary Nagle Jeffries, “Palestine: The Reality”, Longmans 1939, reprinted by Hyperion Press, 1975, explains that Palestine was part of the Arab homeland called “Bilad al Arab” or “Arabistan” (page 4). The ‘Arabistan Ordusu’, the provincial Ottoman Army for Arabia, was originally based at Damascus, and was put in charge of Cilicia, Syria (including Lebanon and Palestine), Iraq, and the southern Arabian Peninsula. see Stanford J. Shaw, Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Cambridge University Press, 1977, page 85; Caesar E. Farah, The Politics of Interventionism in Ottoman Lebanon, 1830-1861, I.B.Tauris, 2000, page 417. The claim that “Palestine” is only a small unimportant part of Arabia is tantamount to the claim that “Judea” was only small unimportant part of Eretz Israel.

Muhammad Ali was an Albanian mercenary who became the King of Egypt. Palestinian nationalism began long before the first Zionist Aliya when his son, Ibrahim Pasha laid siege to Palestine (in 1832) and encountered massive resistance. King Farouk of Egypt was a descendant of the Albanians and one of Napoleon’s Colonel’s. Most Egyptians consider themselves to be descendants of the ancient Pharaohs who have adopted Arab culture. Egypt lay outside the jurisdiction of the Provincial Army of Arabistan. Egypt was not part of the Arab homeland discussed by the Sharif Hussein and McMahon. It is somewhat ironic then that Egypt and King Farouk assumed the leadership of the newly formed League of Arab States. The Convention of July 1840 offered a grant to Muhammed Ali, during his natural life, of the government of the region described alternately as “Southern Syria” or “Palestine” or the Pashalik of Acre. See Index to the executive documents of the House of Representatives for the second session of the forty-fifth Congress, 1879-’80 page 1019.

EDIT:

Sorry for the wall of text but it is all as lucid as I can make it.

[Elvis]

2nd Part:

Article 49(6) of the Geneva Convention points out that destruction of the inhabitants as a separate people was one of the goals during WWII when some countries colonized others and displaced or deported the indigenous peoples. Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide for the practice. It involved military attacks, occupation, and eviction with the intent of destroying the members of a targeted group as a social unit in their distinctiveness and particularity and their feeling of belonging together. A biological-physical destruction was not necessary, since forcibly transferring children of the group to some other group is considered a constituent act of the crime of genocide. The 1951 Refugee Convention recognized that principle. It stipulated that the unity of the family was the natural and fundamental group unit of society and that maintaining family unity is an essential right of the refugee. You constantly express support for the proposition that Israelis should profit from their own criminal wrongdoing at the expense of Palestinian society and families.

The Zionists have always claimed the legal right of any so-called Jew or "Jewish convert" to "return" and live anywhere within the vaguely defined borders of "Eretz Yisrael" in accordance with the biblical legends. That "right" spans at least a hundred generation gap in residency and is supposedly based upon the Balfour Declaration, the San Remo resolution, and the now-terminated League of Nations Mandate. It really doesn't matter whether a convert's family ever lived in the land during the Second Temple period thousands of years ago. (Try to find me that 3000 year old documentation, Plow)

FYI, the Israeli Supreme Court and the International Court of Justice rejected that "fascist" argument. They held that post-mandate era Jewish settlers have no inherent legal right to live in the occupied territories. See the related rulings regarding the legal rights of settlers living under regimes of belligerent occupation in the ICJ Wall case and HCJ 1661/05 The Gaza Coast Regional Council v. The Knesset et al.

Children born in refugee camps abroad and dependents born on military bases overseas normally do acquire the nationality of their parents and usually do return to their countries of nationality. So, 2nd and 3rd generation refugee descendents living in camps located in Thailand, Pakistan, and Iran have been "repatriated" to Laos, Cambodia, and Afghanistan because they are members of those societies. The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) plans to do the same thing with most of the more than one hundred thousand people from Myanmar who have been living in Thailand for more than 20 years.

I sincerely believe that this abstraction known as 'Jews' lived in that region 3000 years ago. However, that does not give present-day 'Jews' (again, I like to generalize Plow and explain it's relevance to TODAY.) or the Zionists 60+ years ago, a right to expel the people living on the land presently.

There is no rationale for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. To imply that because 'Jews' lived there 3000 years ago (Question for Plow: how long did the Temple last?; Who lived there BEFORE 'the Jews'?), they now have an inherent claim to the land which has seen a REPEATED change in ownership for the thousands of years that followed is preposterous.

[Elvis]

I will hyperlink as many of the sources above, if anyone wants to follow.

EDIT:

Nevermind, I'll hyperlink it all anyway.

[solanis]

bias exists with or without education. You can't just remove bias from things - it exists in all forms. The news has a bias, data has a bias (yes, it is), everything has a bias. That's what makes us human beings. Humans are not rational creatures, which is why rational arguments have to be constructed and are not fluid. It it laughable that you think you need to breakdown someone's bias before arguing with them - that is the point of the argument. One side provides examples, data, evidence, etc. The other side rebuts with similar things, and one side may see the fault in their argument, or others may see fault in one of the sides.

stop playing the victim (lol) card. nobody is trying to silence you, you just want to get your potshots in and argue something irrelevant rather than the actual topic - a cop-out.

are you seriously arguing that anti-semitism is a good and valid place to argue from? all sides benefit when they analyze their bias. surely you are trolling

ps the group that was complaining about potential silencing was the anti-israel crowd, not the pro-israel group.

[Demosthenes11]

the good irony here is, to prove they have a bias, you need to construct an argument on why they are wrong which should subsequently show their bias.