Dr. Gonzo

For the US it's pointless anyways because Israelis don't need a visa to enter the US unless they want to work in the US (unless they're also US citizens, which I think 15% of Israeli settlers are). The policy of continual settlements in Palestinian territory in Israel is a shambles. It's against international law and they almost always announce more settlements when a US or western leader arrives in Israel - which makes it appear as though these settlements are approved and endorsed by the west.

Kevin McCarthy announces he'll be retiring at the end of the year. Probably off to go get some cushy lobbyist job or following in Paul Ryan's footsteps of being a shit Speaker of the House then getting a Directors job at Fox News. Glad to see that useless sack of shit will no longer be a part of any sort of governance.

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That's exactly why it does work. Those people will associate Saudi Arabia with football, golf, WWE, F1, etc... because that's when they'll hear of Saudi Arabia. Just because you've said something many times before, doesn't mean you're right. Things like the Olympics don't exist in the modern day just for fun - it's all political. The US, China, and Russia aren't just trying to collect gold medals because they just love athletics. Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the US aren't trying to host world cups because they're football mad countries.

It’s simple and proven said the man offering no proof. If it didn’t work, it wouldn’t work. If it works some of the time… it does work. Most people are stupid, if you don’t think so… pay more attention to what’s going on in the world.

Lol what? "Maybe something that works, actually does work? Nah, it doesn't... except when it does." So it does work.

Fixed

I think the US is 6 ahead of the UK on the quality of life index - I would expect quality of life in Saudi Arabia to be higher than most Middle Eastern countries now that they've knocked off a lot of the gender apartheid shite and their own morality police has been scaled back significantly though. Tax free, oil subsidies pay for a lot of social benefits, and as mentioned a big relaxation in the societal rules that were previously imposed on them, though. Those are all things that would make life more comfortable for most. Regardless, how good things may have become for Saudis in a short amount of time domestically doesn't really make an impact on their foreign policy goals. Saudi Arabia wants to be seen as the leader of Arabs and a power broker in the Middle East - doing something that is going to enflame the Arab population at large against the Saudi government isn't going to make it easy for them, in the short term at least, with respect to those goals. I'm not sure I understand your last point. I don't think you can separate the concept of jihad from Islam. There's greater jihad (internal struggle with one's base impulses to conform with God's law) and there's lesser jihad (external struggle with non-believers), and different Muslim scholars have different takes on what both of those mean. If you're using jihad as a translation of "holy war" - I think that's a pretty huge oversimplification.

God, very sorry to hear that - condolences to you and your family and wishing you all have a much happier 2024.

I hope one day all Middle Eastern countries make peace with one another, including all countries making peace with Israel and all countries making peace with Iran. But I don't think now, with tensions being as high as they are - and with the aftermath of this war likely to leave a lot of resentment towards Israel from the Arab/Muslim world at large... it's not the right circumstances to have Saudi Arabia involved in setting up a legitimate government for Palestinians that actually cares for the national interest of Palestine. It's one thing to balance Saudi's national interests on the conflict domestically and walk that tightrope. It gets much harder for them balancing their interests while also maintaining the grip of influence they want to have over the Arab world at large. Amongst Arabs, making peace with Israel is not popular. Resistance and victory from "river to sea" are very popular though. Can the Saudi monarchy enjoy the same influence if they come in to help remove extremism from Gazan governance while Iran, a country that is predominantly not Arab, would be seen as the dominant country in protecting Palestinian Arabs? The best case scenario for MBS is he's seen as a bringer of peace in the eyes of the western world, but the worst case scenario for him is he's seen as a traitor to the Arab world and lose significant influence in the region to Iran. There's a reason why Saudi official statements on the conflict are very carefully worded to lay the blame at Israel's feet.

They back ISIS, Al Qaeda, have ties with the Taliban, and are the largest spreaders of the Wahhabi ideology in the world. They're doing well to reduce the powers of political Islam in Saudi Arabia, but that's simply because it's a threat to their own monarchy. They aren't exactly people I would trust though to not foment more extremism outside of Saudi Arabia. They might be good for Newcastle United FC, but the amount of faith I have for them to produce any sort of meaningful peace in the Middle East is an absolute 0. Imo the worst options in some sort of multinational coalition to set up a transitional government for Palestinians would be the 3 most troublesome nations in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia - have a history of fomenting extremism and backing awful people for their own benefit, see above Iran - have a history of fomenting extremism and backing awful people for their own benefit, notably in this conflict: Hezbollah (which they basically completely control at all levels) and Hamas Qatar - have a history of fomenting awful extremism and backing awful people for their own benefit, notably in this conflict: Hamas, who's leadership they house and protect There's a reason MBS and his government have been very careful and deliberate regarding their statements on Israel. While he wants better relations with them and close ties to the West - his people largely fucking hate Israel and side strongly with Hamas. Being openly involved in trying to end this conflict with peace between both people will not sit well with many Saudi Arabs. For a man who's done a lot to ensure his people don't openly rebel against him... I'm not sure he wants to risk pissing off that many Arabs all at once. With Jordan and Egypt, there's the same balancing act of what their government wants vs. what their people want - but they do have the vested interest of not having open and continuous conflict on their borders. They've got more skin in the game to actually create a lasting peace. Whereas MBS is pretty far removed from the suffering of Palestinians and Israelis and to an extent benefits greatly by continually using the plight of Palestinians as a prop to demonstrate how Saudi Arabia stands up for Arabs in the region.

Yeah but attributing that to all Venezuelans, many of whom are simply trying to flee the shitty situation Maduro's government has caused, is just stupid. Also if bribery is a problem, it's not just the Venezuelan government to blame. Criminals, regardless of where they are from, will always take advantage of a culture of corruption. Bribery going far is indicative of a culture of corruption being rampant in Peru and Chile and is a societal issue for Peruvians and Chileans to address if the problem has gotten out of hand. Making blanket statements like "they are vile from their government to their people" because of the actions of criminals is no different to those people who are anti-Latino in the US because Mexican cartels cause crime in the US. Or people who are anti-black in the US because "they have gangs and commit crimes." Or the many people around the world that end up hating anyone from the Middle East because "they're all terrorists." That kind of thinking doesn't actually address any problems, it just causes bigotry to spread.

That was genuinely hilarious

I think it would have to be some sort of multinational coalition of peacekeepers setting up a transitional government. Some Arab countries would need to be involved, I think. Probably Jordan, Egypt (due to proximity & history) and Oman (due to their long time role as being mediators for conflicts between Arabs and/or Middle Eastern nations). Realistically, though, I imagine the Saudis would want to be involved. Then pair them with the US, UK, and Germany as the western peacekeepers & mediators. Rightly or wrongly, the US and Israel are often seen as one in the same, with regard to this conflict. The US isn't going to be seen as an unbiased and objective protector of Palestinian interests - so this transitional government will not be seen as legitimate. Also, I'm not sure the US has the best track record of nation building - the occupation of Afghanistan led to a government that on paper could stand up on it's own two feet, but in reality was just a government and military on paper and the US funding they received was largely stolen by corrupt officials. I don't think you get a transitional government set up that's seen as legitimate without it being a multinational coalition backing it. Otherwise those cries of "colonialism" and "we are anti-imperialists" (which I think are ridiculous, given the history of the Arab conquests - what was that if not colonialism and imperialism?) will never die down and extremists will cling to keeping the conflict alive forever.

Don't be quick to tar all Venezuelans as vile. They are desperate people living under serious oppression - the circumstances that lead people to do things that they wouldn't otherwise do.

Yeah. It's twice now too people have tried to equate the suffering of Palestinians with the suffering of the people of Iran in this thread as well. And I think that's pretty ironic considering the point of view of many Iranians, all over the world, but especially those in Iran. So many Iranians, especially in Iran, view Palestinians as one of their oppressors. They pay their taxes and they see a government completely neglect their needs and spend a huge amount of money on backing groups like Hamas, as well as spending money to improve the lives of Palestinians rather than focusing on their own citizens. That resentment grew a lot last year when loads of Palestinians and Lebanese in the west expressed support for the Iranian government against the citizens demanding basic human rights. And nowadays, when you see an Iranian that comes out as super pro-Palestinian, it's usually someone that is very much pro-IR and against the people of Iran. Like the guy who commit the terror attack in France recently. I do my best to not harbour the same sort of resentment to all Palestinians. I know that most Palestinians are born into oppression that comes at them from basically every angle, external and internal. They're fed loads of propaganda from a young age and especially for those within places like Gaza. They're not allowed to have dissenting political opinions. Like Iranians, they face constant oppression from the same group of people that claim to be their protectors. They're basically groomed from a young age to either fight until they are martyred or to become unwilling cannon fodder for the sake of Palestinian propaganda. But Hamas, like the IR & Israel, are oppressing the people of Gaza. To quote the wise @Spike: "Just because the person holding the chains is the same colour as the slave, doesn't make it more ethical." And saying that doesn't excuse or justify Israel's own war crimes and human rights violations. That is categorically untrue. The Nakba was a violent and forced removal of Palestinian Arabs from their homes. The history of this conflict is tinged with loads of human rights abuses. Hamas's crimes decades later don't suddenly absolve Israel's crimes. For there to be meaningful and lasting peace, Israelis and Palestinians need to recognise and reconcile that the horrific mistakes of their current and past leadership that have led the conflict to this point. Wiping out Hamas and leaving a group of shellshocked civilians behind left to their own devices in the aftermath is not going to do much in the way of fighting the extremism that keeps the cycle of violence going. I think people on both sides of pro-Palestine/pro-Israel have done a lot to sort of whitewash and rewrite their histories. It's not helpful to anyone who wants to see Israelis and Palestinians living normal lives where they don't have to worry about getting killed.

I usually just use AP to find new news, then google around for different sources to see what the more biased takes are

Well that’s the issue isn’t it. The Palestinians don’t have any allies that are less extreme because of what they’ve done to other Arab nations they’ve been refugees in. So they just have Qatar and Iran feeding an already radicalised society more extremism. If your only means of resistance is to guarantee the slaughter of your people - it’s not a good resistance though. And they’ve let radicalism take root in Israeli politics with their decades of escalation. So it’s created a vicious cycle. It’s why Israel and Palestine should be a matter resolved by world powers. We cannot trust 2 sides of extremists to do anything other than escalate. The UN needs to force a resolution to this. It’s absurd the number of Jews and Arabs in the West that have been murdered in the aftermath of this war breaking out. People far far away from the battlegrounds thinking they need to fight it out where they live because they’ve been blinded by paranoia and propaganda from these 2 extremist sides.

Also for all the talk of how casualties are so disproportionate… it should be mentioned, it’s not for Hamas not trying to kill as many Israelis as they can. They’ve literally been launching missiles deliberately targeting civilian targets. Are we supposed to be annoyed with Israel for having defense systems in place for protecting innocent lives simply because Hamas has no regard for their own civilians?

Considering Hamas has basically done nothing for Gaza other than get loads of people killed, yes. Hamas is their government and also has said they’re not responsible for protecting civilians. How do you justify this “slave revolt” when the side you seem to be totally fine with doesn’t seem to give nearly as much of a fuck about dead Gazans as you do?

I don’t watch any TV news. Reading the news is better for you. It’s got the same biases but they’re easier to pick out. TV news is just naked propaganda designed to be most effective because the psychology of TV viewers has been well studied & effective propaganda techniques have existed for centuries. I can also read relatively quickly so I can probably read from 4 sources and get 4 different perspectives, which is sort of useful. MSNBC is the same as Sky by the way. Knowledge is power. I’m not undermining anything about Iran. Iran funds Hamas. They don’t give a fuck about Palestinians as being anything other than a useful pawn in their war against Israel and the US. Honestly, supporting Hamas is just tacit support of the Islamic Republic’s reign of terror. So you’ll find I’m being consistent in my views. I think as a result, I’ve got a better understanding about what Hamas is really all about than most. But they knew the response they would elicit from Israel. They were counting on it. Meanwhile I have criticised the way Israel’s fought this war. They’re fighting like cowards in the least effective way to take out a terror group that has put civilians in the firing line.

Lmao the red cow from South Park is real? Religious people are fucking mental.

Try to bin him off to the Saudis? He won't get a game at Newcastle, but any of their other clubs and he's probably a good fit. I also think United need to sack off their scouting department tbh. They're really good at identifying high profile players we've all heard of and identifying that big amounts of money can bring those players in. But they're not so good at identifying players that are going to change things on the pitch for Man Utd in any serious way.

Was that CC is Klaas?

Yeah they've become a collection of players that just down tools when the going gets tough. You'll never win anything with players that think they've made it at the top level just because they play for a big club... that know it's too expensive to clear them out compared to just sacking a manager. I've asked this before, and I'll ask it again. How on earth is Martial still at Man Utd? Rashford's a good player and I do think part of the reason he's struggled to kick on when he looks he's turned a corner is because he's played under so many different managers it's hampering his development... but at the same time, how do you justify performances where you just turn up and mope around the pitch when its your boyhood club you're playing for? That's the sort of player you want to see have pride and passion for the crest on the shirt and if he's just turning up looking like he couldn't give a fuck? I do think Ten Hag needs to go sooner rather than later, though. Although, I hope he stays long enough for us to play you.