We don't discuss Israel/Palestine here these days very much, but I think that today's events deserve a thread, maybe. I posted this on the non-covid news thread but there's not much of a pointer there to specific issues such as this one, so I thought I'd start this.

Here's my post from that thread:

"The EU and the US have immediately condemned Hamas and sided with Israel. That's disgusting. I don't like what Hamas are doing but I'm not going to forget the dreadful things visited on the Palestinians over the last few decades, and, more specifically and relevantly in this instance, to Gaza, which get a free pass from Israel's chief ally. Two and a quarter million civilians blockaded into a stinking ghetto, deprived of proper medical care and even of decent drinking water by the Israeli regime. It's new news and it's bloody bad news. Sickening."

I don't know what prompted Hamas to start this action against Israel, but terrible consequences, mostly for the citizens of Gaza, are almost inevitable. What I don't like even more than Hamas's attack is the kneejerk response of western governments who are all too prepared to ignore the context of the last half-century or more and, specifically, the inhuman treatment of the two million-plus citizens of Gaza in the last fifteen years by the Israeli regimes. The theft of the best land in the occupied areas of Israel and the construction of illegal settlements, virtually unchallenged by western nations and the EU, is an issue perhaps not directly connected to Hamas but which is a running sore for all Palestinians in any case.

Anyway, the whole bloody thing depresses me. There are no good guys in all this. Enough from me for now.