I'm more inclined to say it's a mutually beneficial relationship in which the US overlooks Israeli influence (and control) in US politics because of the benefits it gains from Israel. The US could at any time reverse this, by removing its support for Israel, but the issue with this argument is that the US literally never will do this because of both the benefits of Israel to the US in the middle east and the influence(and control) within US politics.

It's an entanglement. A tangled web of connections that can not be unentangled. They simultaneously control each other and because they will never disentangle they will never cease to simultaneously be controlled by and control the other.

I do think it's strongly flawed to say the US simple controls Israel by its ability to step back from support though, it's not a card that can or will ever be used so it functionally does not exist.

Why are we pretending that nation-states are singular entities with their own "wills"? They are networks of intelligent actors exchanging information and "energy" (money in this case). The "israel" net is heavily overlapped with the "america" net, and there is a large flow of information/energy across the 2 nets. The "america" net being much larger gives more of its energy to "israel" than vice versa, but the word "control" is meaningless for describing interactions as complicated geopolitics.

A lot of the discourse around this whole topic uses the verbal short-hand of treating nation-states as if they were entities with a will. And for good reason because a lot of the times, it's an OK approximation. But other times, you just end up arguing about meaningless things.

We don't need to pretend that the exact opposite of "zog" is true just to prove the nazi's wrong. We cant ignore Israel's own agency here. The contradiction of believing their own ethnic supremacy while being wholly dependent on the US is part of the Israeli psychosis. It has driven them to control as much of US politics as possible. First as a matter of survival, then as a matter of pride. We can't pretend that individual US political and media figures aren't controlled by the Israel lobby just because the US as a whole controls Israel.

Israel is essentially a rogue state that is entirely controlled by the American intelligence apparatus

You can't be a "rogue state" yet be "entirely controlled". That would be a puppet state. They could be controlled but aren't. The leash is almost always slack. Also the leash isn't the " American intelligence apparatus", its the federal budget.

Edit: Your title is flaming bullshit, like WTF? Israel absolutely does control many US politicians. Who the fuck is Ritchie Torres then? Jamal Bowman and Cory Bush just disappeared on their own.

Israel is essentially a rogue state that is entirely controlled by the American intelligence apparatus (and therefore, American capital).

What the fuck is this shit? Israel is literally in the process of committing the worst genocide of the 21st century and now we're getting mod-sponsored hasbara that Israel has no agency and it's all just America?

I big missing piece of this discussion is the historical Christian influence for Western control the Holy Land. In so many ways the Crusades never ended. It also sheds additional light on why Israel is held in special regard compared to other American and European imperial projects. I find it useful to see Israel through a Crusader State lens as it reveals parallels of the, often competing, influences that historically drove Western interest in that spot in particular.

If America withdrew support to Israel, this feedback loop would cease and Israel would be greatly diminished or completely collapse.

Absolutely true. I would add the rest of Europe and "The West", but we all know they are on board anyways. The Crusader States eroded and collapsed with the attenuating support of the West as well.

Hey so when are we getting that official constructive session on Zionism in the mod/admin team? Just chucking things like this over the fence doesn't count by the way.

Example: "Israel is essentially a rogue state that is entirely controlled by the American intelligence apparatus (and therefore, American capital)."

This is incorrect and Zionist apologetic and I think it's being thrown in because of focusing on a right wing trope that absolves US blame, but it is actually an overcorrection. Same as the Zionist entity flag burning emoji. Instead of overcorrecting and making escalatory announcements, you should really actually do that constructive session to deal with Zionism in the mod and admin team, which I will remind you is tantamount to Nazi sympathy in the mod and admin team.

It's not as simple as your making it out to be. Both sides infleunce each other, it's just america is much more powerful so it has more infleunce on it.

I agree that it's wrong and bad analysis. I could say more about it but mostly I'm just wondering why more poor judgement interventions being made by mod/admin team. Like are you bored or something? Not enough notifications this weekend?

Obviously a policy decree like this without discussion is going to rub people the wrong way regardless of its content. Like obviously. If you are trying to solve some sort of problem, you should say what the problem is and why you think this is the way to solve it. Instead of unilaterally announcing site political policy, apparently on your own individual initiative. Is there like some sort of schedule where carcosa has to have a reason to make an accountability post every so often? Is it over due? Are you attempting to concoct a learning experience to train new mods in crowd control? Trying to boost site traffic? Why would a person in a position of authority decide to make this particular intervention? On any topic.

Have the discussion then make the rule. Good god. Why always doing it the other way around? Announce a rule to provoke a discussion?

It really makes me thump my head in particular for someone who was on the wrong side of the recent israel-cool struggle session that was so upsetting to make announcements of site political policy on the same topic. My feeling is that this is a continuation of that conversation. At least this time you have bothered to come up with a coherent political idea so it shows some progress I guess. But it is not tied to the intervention you have decided upon, so still incomplete. It would have been better for someone with more credibility on this issue to introduce the question. Honestly it does seem intentionally inflammatory.

To recap:

The mods/admins (including OP kristina) apparently arrived collectively amongst themselves at a completely ass backwards opinion which was in opposition to the entire rest of the userbase. (Briefly for those who missed it: the then-non-existent emoji of the burning israel flag would, if added, be an antisemitic dogwhistle and/or convey approval of the holocaust.) This was a reflection of some sort of prior discussion and ideas which had at the time had some degree of consensus from userbase. In the intervening years, every person on planet earth had their analysis of this issue sharpened at least a little bit, hexbears included, and the general opinion had changed dramatically which was not understood by the mods/admins. Instead of engaging with the political concepts and moment, they decided to instigate and then all piled on a giant shit show throwdown fight. Which when they understood themselves to be losing badly, told the "stupid" users to stop wasting their time posting on trivial matters. Many different aspects of political argument from users only met with inter-personal, conspiratorial, and emotional from mods/admins.

Eventually, "confused" why anybody (to say nothing of everybody else) cared about inconsequential emoji, the mods/admins backed away from the fight, unbanned numerous users, emoji was added by 1 mod who apparently was able to change opinions with rest of planet earth. The userbase was overall managed into a more peaceful situation because ultimately, that's how the balance of power goes. Various people left the site or withdrew because the conflict was so hostile. The collective political clarification came at a price.

But unless I missed it (and I could have) there was never any resolution. No indication that any of the minority who were on the incoherent side of that argument changed their mind politically during or after the struggle session. Nor was the question of why mods/admins were permitting and even encouraging each other to go around ratcheting up the hostility on the basis of personal disputes.

It was just a stalemate. Mod applications opened and I assume (?) the team expanded, hopefully adding some diversity of opinions to better reflect the userbase. Everyone awaiting vague reforms.

Even kamala harris knows that everything exists in context and we didn't just fall out of a coconut tree. I am not "relitigating". I am wondering why again mod deciding to stir shit up by leading with censorious and dismissive assertions instead of attempting to collaborate.

I think this choice does a real disservice to the ostensible goal of the intervention by winding up feelings of interpersonal power struggle with politics. It is so arrogant, in the specific context of the recent chapter described above.

And look, if you are going to lead with threats it ought to be with an argument which has been better developed. It is clear from comments already that userbase again has a more nuanced understanding of the topic than the person who condescendingly lectures and warns of consequences should they step out of line according to her judgement.

Even those who broadly agree with the core ideas are seeking to develop the point further. Because as posted, it is insufficiently mature. Disagreement, discomfort, confusion, and contributions are being made re the politics and/or the policy. This comment is solely addressed at the policy, its implementation and the broader framework.

At minimum, the political stance that is to be enforced on this website requires significant clarification so that users can understand what the rule applies to, and mods can have clear guidance. Which is good for mods because it avoids the perception that that are arbitrarily enforcing ill-considered, unknown and unknowable rules according to their mood. It's better if there is some degree of mutual understanding rather than initiating with conflict.

Soon will have a bunch of bans I guess? In this very thread there are outright refutations, yet the comments are not removed. So a rule is announced, then it is immediately ignored? On replies that generate a notification to OP who is so interested to enforce. So what is the meaning?

Ah yes, remove any posts that don't vibe with you.

Israeli and Zionist influence in the USA is a purposeful choice of the American government. It allows the American government to circumvent many domestic and international laws by allowing Israeli firms to do the spying and dirty work for them

The American government is totally allowing "israel" to wiretap the president's phone conversations.

I have not had a single election, local, state, or federal, since I began voting, that did not have candidates receiving money from AIPAC, dem or republican alike. To think "israel" has no control over US politics is just wrong. Look how many politicians are tanking their own careers to back "israel's" genocide. The candidates in the upcoming election in my parent's district has every candidate jumping through hoops to show their loyalty to the zionist entity. To claim that they haven't been influenced by the zionist lobby is an opinion removed from reality.

And what about Epstein? Maxwell's father Literally worked for the Mossad. Do you think some loser like Epstein, who had no real future manager to randomly become a rich playboy just by trafficking children? No external mechanisms that got him rich clients that could in turn be used to blackmail them? It's not even like "israel" is denying these facts with any effort. They're constantly making subtle references to how much influence they have over our politicians.

Netanyahu brought up the sex tapes in the context of the Pollard demand ... not wanting to directly threaten the powerful American president, a crucial Israeli ally, Clinton was told that the Israeli government had thrown the tapes away

Yeah the US government totally isn't influenced by "israel" and they totally control the dog on the leash and actually the US wanted their own president to have his office telephone bugged for 10091838292 IQ reasons none of us would understand.

There are so many more examples of these dog politicians tanking their own careers to give their undying support to a foreign country, to try and pretend that the influence doesn't go both ways is not buried in reality.

Then how do you explain AIPAC? [Serious]

I salute our hardworking mods for their roof-knocking posts announcing they will be demolishing any replies or posts that contain the antisemitic lie of israel using money, clout, intelligence or media to influence other nations. Israel represents all Jewish people around the world and one word can be substituted for another when determining if post or reply is vile antisemitism or just garden variety political speech. Thank you for standing up for our forums suffering Israeli posters who just want to be able to use the respected adl’s definition of antisemitism like the rest of social media does.

If it weren’t for your commitment to holding the most expensive brand of paint chip up to people’s words before applying rules this place would fall into utter chaos.

Oh we got 2 threads about this. I'll post the same thing in both. I will not argue with anyone about this.

"Isreal has a powerful lobby with lots of Western backing and a far reaching influence as a result" is fine.

"I'm gonna use neo Nazi terminology that originates from white supremacist conspiracy views about how Jews secretly control everything" is not.

It's honestly not even that complicated. One is factual. The other is neo Nazi propaganda. Hexbear can do better. Death death to the IOF