Juan Cole: Israeli Snipers and other Forces have killed 16 Palestinian children since start of 2019

writes that Middle East Monitor says Israeli Snipers and other Forces have killed 16 Palestinian children since start of 2019.

Israeli occupation forces have killed 16 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank and besieged Gaza Strip since the start of 2019, Defence for Children International-Palestine (DCIP) said yesterday.

In a report, the rights group said 12 children were killed in Gaza and four in the occupied West Bank.

It accused the Israeli occupation forces of “using excessive force and explosive live ammunition against children aiming to kill or permanently maim them.”

Emphasis Mine

Thus, the Middle East Monitor will be accused of being antisemitic for reporting this. The Israeli supporters will probably say that Israelis are defending themselves. Any nation that justifies killing children does not deserve to exist.

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Chris Dillow: Centrists' failure

Chris Dillow writes about Centrists' failure.

Corbyn is popular – insofar as he is – not because he is a political genius (he’s not) nor because many of us have become antisemites or have lost our minds. His popularity – especially with young graduates – rests upon material economic conditions. The degradation of professional occupations and huge gap between the top 1% and others have radicalized young people in erstwhile middle-class jobs; financialization has made housing unaffordable for youngsters; and a decade of stagnant real wages – the product of inequality and the financial crisis - has increased demands for change.

Emphasis Mine

Dillow recognises that the Marxist credo that politics follow material conditions. He also says that such material conditions do not always lead to a leftward shift in political thinking.

You might also object that politics is about more than economics, and that the battleground now is about culture and identity rather than a few quid here or there. This misses the point. The great virtue of economic growth, as Ben Friedman showed, is that it creates a climate in which toleration and openness can thrive. Stagnation, by contrast, gives us closed minds, intolerance and fanaticism. If centrists are sincere in wanting a more civilized and tolerant politics, they must create the material conditions for these. In fact, in office they did the opposite.

Emphasis Mine

Abundance gives us tolerance; scarcity gives us intolerance. The economic insecurity makes people fearful of the others taking money and benefits away, and this fear allows politicians to play the protector by keeping the others away.

The very people who created the harsh economic conditions that give rise to intolerance are the ones who use intolerance to keep power. These people have no incentive to change the system that keeps them in power.

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