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Awful Things Are Happening

Terrorism in Colorado. Continued awful violence in Gaza.

Steven L. Taylor
17

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Here are two news stories from today that I raise because they are important, and because readers may wish to comment on them. I do not have a lot of insight to offer, save the simplistic yet sincere wish that we humans would be kinder toward our fellow denizens of this globe.

First, I will note the developing news from Colorado via CBS News: Attack at Boulder’s Pearl Street Mall in Colorado burns six people, officials say; suspect in custody.

Witnesses said the suspect used a “makeshift flamethrower” and threw Molotov cocktails that burned multiple victims during a march in support of Israeli hostages, according to an FBI official. Six people were injured.

[…]

The suspect was identified as 45-year-old Mohamed Sabry Soliman, FBI Special Agent in Charge Mike Michalek said Sunday evening. Soliman was allegedly heard yelling “free Palestine” during the attack, according to Michalek, who said that it was “clear this is a targeted act of violence” and it is being investigated as an act of terrorism.

A walk to remember the Israeli hostages who remain in Gaza was taking place in Boulder’s downtown at the time of the attack. Two sources said witnesses told investigators the suspect also allegedly yelled “End Zionist!” during the attack.

The victims of the attack ranged in age from 67-88, police said. One was seriously injured, with Boulder Police Chief Stephen Redfearn saying it would be “safe to say” that person was in critical condition.

This is horrific, and I hope that those who were injured recover soon. This seems to be appropriately labeled terrorism, and I find it disturbing that a peaceful march would be attacked in this fashion.

Another story of human suffering via the BBC: Red Cross says at least 21 killed and dozens shot in Gaza aid incident.

A “mass casualty influx” of people, many with gunshot or shrapnel wounds, was received at a Red Cross field hospital in southern Gaza, the organisation said, following disputed reports about an incident near an aid distribution centre in Rafah.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said 21 people were “declared dead upon arrival” while women and children were among 179 cases.

The organisation’s statement came after the Hamas-run civil defence agency in Gaza said at least 31 people were killed and many more wounded in the incident, which it blamed on “Israeli gunfire” targeting civilians.

But the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said findings from an initial inquiry showed its forces had not fired at people while they were near or within the aid centre.

[…]

Another incident was said to have happened near a separate aid centre in the Netzarim Corridor in central Gaza, with the Palestinian Red Crescent reporting 14 injured.

The BBC was contacted by doctors at the Nasser hospital who said they had received about 200 people with injuries caused by bullets or shrapnel.

So, yes, these stories have some key linkages, but speaking for myself as someone who writes about politics here pretty much daily, 365 days a year, the primary linkage is that I don’t know what to say at this point that is especially profound or especially helpful.

Here’s a non-exhaustive list of not especially complex statements.

  • This all makes me sad.
  • Rather obviously, it is wrong to use violence against peaceful protestors.
  • I am afraid that the Trump administration will use the event to further weaponize their insincere concerns about antisemitism.
  • And yes, I do think this is clearly an antisemitic attack. It is very likely a hate crime in addition to being a terrorist act. I also do not take the current administration at its word on its concern about antisemitism.
  • I wish that Israel would figure out an endgame in Gaza.
  • The conditions in Gaza are truly horrific, and Israel is flirting with a famine on its borders.
  • Regardless of Hamas’s crimes, Israel is creating a humanitarian disaster by choice. This is not defensible.

So, topically, these events are linked, but I am not both-siding this, nor am I justifying one as being caused by the other.

Mostly I am just saying that they happened and both are results of human making choices.

I want to see some better choices from people, please.

Meanwhile, from NPR: Hamas pushes back on the latest Gaza ceasefire proposal offered by the U.S.

Call me crazy, but I wish that the US had someone with more relevant experience than being a real estate developer in charge of these negotiations (not to mention one whose attention is being split between Gaza, Ukraine, and other issues).

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17 responses to “Awful Things Are Happening”

  1. Kurtz Avatar
    Kurtz

    Oh, I see. You finally wrote about these big news stories. But you can’t even talk about those evil Muslims without criticizing Israel. So biased.

    /s

    3
  2. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    I wish Israel had an endgame for Gaza, too, but I’m afraid the reality is that if Gaza ever ends, the need to keep Bibi in office diminishes. Bibi knows that and doesn’t want to go to jail. Endless war, yeah, that’s the ticket!

    2
  3. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    When this crisis began I said there was no solution. I think people here believed I was celebrating that fact, which was not the case.

    The cancer that is Hamas could disarm and disband, go into remission. But when Gazans demonstrated for this, they were attacked by Hamas and brutally suppressed. The tumor cares nothing for the body it is killing.

    Egypt could allow Gazans in. It refuses, despite a population of 115 million to Gaza’s 2 million.
    Rather underreported is that Egypt’s border with Gaza is every bit as closed as Israel’s. Before October 7, it was Israel that allowed Gazans to come in for work. Egypt could feed Gaza, but it doesn’t. It doesn’t even make noise about it.

    The Palestinian Authority could open its arms to Gazan refugees, but it won’t. The PA in fact works to suppress any pro-Hamas movement in the West Bank. There has been no new intifada. Even if Israel’s boot was not on the West Bank’s neck, the PA hates and fears Hamas for reasons of its own.

    Other Arab states could allow resettlement/ethnic cleansing. But the Arab concern for Gaza isn’t even skin deep. It’s just posturing, as evidenced by the Gulf States’ enthusiastic love affair with the man who wants to pave over Gaza and build a Trump golf resort there. Did the Arab monarchs even suggest a solution to Trump? If so, they kept quiet about it.

    Israel’s ‘just keep bombing’ strategy is not working. He says with droll understatement. The rubble has already been well-bounced. Sinwar is reportedly dead and it seems to have changed nothing. Iran’s meddling has been crippled, and it seems to have changed nothing.

    Calling for still more condemnation of Israel, cutting off weapons exports to them, is fine as posturing, and sure, go for it if it makes you feel good, but it won’t save a single Gazan child. Trying to strangle Israel’s Iron Dome would just guarantee a full-scale ground attack, yield more Israeli deaths, harden those few Israeli hearts not already turned to granite, and cause Israel to allow the settlers to rush in. I’d say that would be full-scale ethnic cleansing, but you can’t push people out who have nowhere to go.

    Bibi has his personal motivations, but Bibi is not the only player, and even absent him there remains no solution. Hamas is a cancer, Israel is the brutal chemotherapy that, in the end, seems unable to eradicate the tumor and causes intolerable suffering to the patient. Remove Bibi and the Israelis will still not tolerate Hamas attacks.

    There is agreement on only one thing: Israel, Egypt, the Palestinian Authority, the Arab states and the Trump regime all wish Gazans would just. . . disappear. And that’s apparently just fine with Hamas. Unless the Hamas cancer decides to go into voluntary remission, there isn’t even a temporary solution. All the various doctors are surrounding the patient, shrugging their shoulders and wishing the patient would just die, already, and free up the bed.

    No solution. Or at least no solution that is not even more appalling than the status quo.

    3
  4. Scott Avatar
    Scott

    @Michael Reynolds: At the very beginning, I also gave my black or white prediction on the endgame. There was just two possible outcomes: 1)one state, where Palestinians are given complete citizenship in a greater Israel; or 2) a Palestinian state where settlers are expelled from a Palestine. A compromise is not possible.

    Israel’s actions, if not its words, are pointed to neither of these two possible outcomes. Their actions are those of setting up ethnic cleansing.

    I don’t see a solution either. The only thing my unimaginative mind can come up with is for the Gazans to engage in a passive, non-violent Gandhi like resistance. Even a mass march of the powerless to the Israeli border without guns or weapons, daring a slaughter.

    I have no hope for this.

    3
  5. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Michael Reynolds: I will say what I said at the time as well: none of that justifies Israel creating a mass humanitarian crisis.

    And if the ultimate goal is to do everything they can to make Gazans disappear, there are several possible words for what that might mean, and all of them are the words used to describe crimes against humanity.

    5
  6. Connor Avatar
    Connor

    “So, topically, these events are linked, but I am not both-siding this, nor am I justifying one as being caused by the other.”

    But in fact, you are. The situation in Gaza has been going on for all of my adult life. More broadly, this conflict is centuries old. Boulder was a nutcase, motivated by the fevers of the day. They are different in kind.

    I find myself in agreement with Reynolds’s. This is currently not a resolvable situation. They simply hate each other. They slaughter each other. Not a good basis for starting the healing. One should not be surprised that it gets handled in a ham fisted manner.

  7. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Connor: I don’t think you understand what the term means, then.

  8. CSK Avatar
    CSK

    According to NBC, Soliman may be charged with two counts of murder. This suggests that authorities don’t expect that two of the victims will survive. Awful.

  9. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @CSK: Awful, indeed.

  10. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @Scott:

    : At the very beginning, I also gave my black or white prediction on the endgame. There was just two possible outcomes: 1)one state, where Palestinians are given complete citizenship in a greater Israel; or 2) a Palestinian state where settlers are expelled from a Palestine. A compromise is not possible.

    Israel’s actions, if not its words, are pointed to neither of these two possible outcomes. Their actions are those of setting up ethnic cleansing. [emphasis added]

    If you’re setting up a dichotomy where neither option is actually available, doesn’t that make said dichotomy false? One of the problems here is that the world is hoping for something that it, seemingly, can’t have. It might be nice to pontificate that only 2 things can happen, but the reality is that there’s only one–and it’s neither of the choices. 🙁

    1
  11. CSK Avatar
    CSK

    Per ABC News, the Boulder attack happened just after the governor posted that he had celebrated Passover with his family.

    It clearly had been planned well before that, but the governor’s announcement might have provided additional impetus.

  12. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @CSK: I’ve lost my sense of the chain of events here. Passover, per Chabad.org, was April 12-20. It’s June 2nd. Why is the Governor announcing what he was doing almost 2 months ago now?

  13. Gustopher Avatar
    Gustopher

    @Michael Reynolds:

    Calling for still more condemnation of Israel, cutting off weapons exports to them, is fine as posturing, and sure, go for it if it makes you feel good, but it won’t save a single Gazan child. Trying to strangle Israel’s Iron Dome would just guarantee a…

    Your belief that Israel is restrained because we give them weapons they use to kill civilians in Gaza is baffling. It’s stereotypical battered wife logic.

    Don’t matter, of course, because this administration would support a genocide so clear that even you would recognize it as genocide.

  14. CSK Avatar
    CSK

    @just nutha:

    The day of the attack was Shavuot, which marks the 50th day after the end of Passover. Shavuot is a two-day Jewish festival. That may have been what the governor meant, and Soliman took it to mean Passover itself.

    1
  15. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @CSK: Thanks. That helps.

    1
  16. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    @Gustopher:
    You decide to murder your wife. I refuse to sell you bullets. Is your wife safe?

    You don’t understand Israelis, or, any warring party. People don’t quit just because you refuse to help them or tell them to stop. They are more likely to decide on defiance, more likely to think, well, fuck it, let’s get this sorted once and for all. They see themselves fighting for national survival and, what, they’re going to throw in the towel and self-annihilate?

    But hey, if it makes you feel good let’s stop selling them things like components for Iron Dome. So the next Hamas missile gets through and hits a nursery school. What do you think happens then? Israel gives up? Our relationship with Israel is part of the insolubility.

    Longer term, if you’re looking for the situation to change look to Ankara. We aren’t the most important player, everyone know that whoever is in the White House, the Americans are slowly backing out of the room. Israel bestrides the Middle East like a military colossus, the only potential counter is from Turkey. Do they GAF about Gaza? Don’t know. And Turkey is busy passively conspiring with Israel to keep Syria weak.

  17. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Michael Reynolds:

    You decide to murder your wife. I refuse to sell you bullets. Is your wife safe?

    If you know the person is going to kill their wife you are complicit if you sell him bullets. Your refusal to sell bullets may or may not save her life but it actually might. It leave your hands clean in any event.

    This is a really strange way to frame your position.

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