u/Gary_Garibaldi

I managed to upset and annoy people on both the Palestine and Israel sub-reddits leading me to be banned on both. TBF to Palestine sub-reddit, I was banned by an auto-moderator following a pile on from other redditors and a human moderator quickly reinstated me. Here are my reflections:-

Palestine Sub Reddit

I was banned having been accused by multiple redditors as being a zionist shrill spreading hasbara before a human moderator realised it was a ridiculous accusation and reinstated me. The Palestine sub reddit advocates for multi ethnic, multi religious state between river and sea with equal rights for all.

I caused offence because someone posted a video of Palestinian peace activist Aziz Abu Sarah and Israeli peace activist Maoz Inon being interviewed on American TV. The poster said that they were fed up of needing to find 'common ground' between Israelis and Palestinians. I simply asked what the alternative would be? If we wanted one state where Jews and Arabs lived freely as equals, how could it be done without finding common ground and what is the solution?

The original poster went off on one, told me I was naive and didn't know what I was speaking about and that I was not welcome to the Palestinian cause. I didn't bother telling him that i've been advocating for Palestinian human rights since before the little pr*ck was born although I did mention that I believed Maoz Inon to be a genuine guy, that i've met one of his family members, that Maoz Inon has lived and worked amongst Palestinians in the city where my In-Laws come from (Nazareth).

If there is to be one democratic free state between the river and sea it means Israeli's and Palestinians will need to work together for it and i'll never demonise Palestinians or Israelis looking to make that step. It seems like this idea was too much to take for some on the Palestinian sub-reddit who see this type of dialogue as surrendering to Israelis (ie Liberal Zionism)

AskIsrael sub-reddit

I was banned for 'pushing an agenda'. I actually agree with their ban as I was pushing an agenda by continuing to push a point on Israeli terror attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank and 'AskIsrael' is supposed to be a place for the genuinely curious to find out something about Israeli life, not to use it as a soap box to push their own narrative.

However, being an observer on Ask Israel shows alot about Jewish Israeli society and its collective delusions. Someone recently asked a question whether Jewish Israelis think about the suffering of Gazans and feel any sympathy. A minority said 'no, we should have gone further and wiped them all out', more said 'I know the suffering is bad but find it hard to care deeply after October-7th' and some said 'they brought it all on themselves'. Almost no one could say 'yes, the suffering is appalling'.

I struggle the most with the 'they brought it all on themselves' line of thinking the most. I challenged other pro-Palestinian advocates on October 8th who said 'well, given the horrendous violence Israel has subjected Palestinians to over the last 100 years, what did Israel expect?'. It sounds like an excuse, for the brutal murder of innocent people- innocent people like me and you. I don't see many Israeli's looking to think about how their language would sound if it was used to justify the killings of Israeli civilians (or even soldiers). The lack of introspection is startling.

I had started engaging with one Israeli who I thought was sincere, thoughtful and rational but soon after our conversation took a nose dive when we were discussing early Zionist history leading up to the Nakba. He/She was determined to selectively quote from history books as if it were gospel whilst ignoring other historical artefacts which would suggest ill intent on behalf of early Zionists towards Palestinians i.e. it felt very dangerous to this person to even give a little weight to the idea that Israel have been aggressors and not victims at any point in its history. He/she started ignoring specific cases and resorted to calling me names to get out of having to confront uncomfortable truths.

So for both, what I am seeing is that to acknowledge each others humanity, each others suffering means to diminish your own. We need to move beyond that.