Short-Form War
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Audio Recording by George Hahn
Fifty-one percent of Americans aged 18 to 24 believe the Hamas attacks of October 7 “can be justified by the grievances of the Palestinians.” That’s not how most Americans feel, and the disparity in sentiment is correlated with age.
This is not unique to the Hamas attack. The older you are, the more likely you are to be pro-Israel: In March 2022, 69% of Americans over 65 had a favorable view of Israel, while just 41% of those under 29 did. Worries about increasing antisemitism in the U.S. are similarly correlated: 85% of seniors say it’s growing; 52% of Gen Zers say it’s not.
Young people are resistant to the views of their elders. And that’s a good thing. As kids enter adolescence, they develop a healthy gag reflex triggered by anything associated with their parents. This helps them develop their own opinions and beliefs about the world, and it’s also good for the parents, because by the time kids are 18, they can be such assholes that everyone’s ready for them to leave the house.
But that doesn’t explain students at my employer (NYU) holding up protest signs reading “keep the world clean” with images of the Star of David in trash cans. I’d like to think this is a fringe view, but when 51% of their cohort believe the murder of 1,200 people is justified, something more serious is happening.
Young people’s attitudes about Israel have been hardening for some time: Months before October 7, a majority of Americans under 43 were more sympathetic to the Palestinians than the Israelis. Yet during that time, U.S. policy has remained staunchly pro-Israel, and American media generally favorable toward Israeli interests. That gap is widening into a gulf, between establishment views and those of young people. All of which made me think of … Dresden.
125,000
In 1945 the U.S. and British air forces rained 4,000 tons of high-explosive bombs on the German city of Dresden for 48 hours straight. The attack was militarily advantageous. It impeded German troop movement, destroyed a key city center, inflicted heavy German casualties, and, as the officers of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey put it, “left the German people with a solid lesson in the disadvantages of war.” It also destroyed acres of historical and culturally priceless art and architecture and killed 25,000 civilians.
The Allies considered it such a success that a month later the U.S. repeated the tactic at an even greater scale on the other side of the globe, destroying 16 square miles of central Tokyo and killing 100,000 civilians — making March 9, 1945, the deadliest night in human history. Four months after that, Truman ordered the atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Contemporary assessments and public opinion in the U.S. focused on the military advantage gained from these attacks, and little mention was made of the horrific human toll. It had no measured impact on U.S. support for the war or those prosecuting it.
What would have happened if the people of Dresden had had TikTok? The same TikTok that is serving me dozens of videos from Gaza, epitomized by a couple taking cover with their innocent child from Israeli bombs. Around them only rubble. Heartbreaking. Heartbreaking enough to make you hate those behind the bombs, whatever their flag or justification.
Three Photos
For most of modern history, governments and elites have had outsized influence on the narrative, especially around foreign affairs. Outright, 1984-style control is unnecessary, when words, sounds, and images are only accessible through controlled channels. Corporate ownership of media, access journalism, and bias go a long way in choosing what stories to cover and how to frame them.
The exceptions prove the rule. When contrary evidence breaks into public awareness, the impact can be profound. Just three photos shifted U.S. public opinion against the Vietnam war more than thousands of dead American soldiers or lost battles: the 1968 image of a South Vietnamese General shooting a prisoner in the head, the 1970 picture of Mary Ann Vecchio kneeling over the body of a Kent State classmate, and the 1972 image of a naked girl fleeing napalm. If you are over 50, you likely can recall these images just by closing your eyes. If you are over 70, you don’t need to close your eyes. Regimes that lose control of the narrative lose power soon after. The shift in American opinion about Vietnam brought down LBJ. The Gulag Archipelago fatally undermined the Soviet Union’s historical and moral narrative. Ayatollah Khomeini’s taped sermons brought down the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran.
All governments seek to shape the narrative. Vietnam was called the “living room war” because media, especially television, brought it home in ways that newsreels never did during World War II or the Korean War. The lesson the U.S. military took from the experience was a simple one: It had to regain control of the narrative. It implemented a system of “embedding” journalists within military units, which, of course, meant what the journalists saw and how it was presented to them fell largely under government control. Embedding put the genie back in the bottle for a generation. But social media, especially the short-form video format popularized by TikTok, has shattered the bottle.
The Mobile Screen War
Young Americans spend at least 10% of their waking hours on TikTok, and 76% of 18- to 24-year-old Americans are TikTok users, compared to 7% of Americans 65 and older. That’s time they are not spending watching CNN or reading the Wall Street Journal. And on TikTok, the scale and reach of pro-Palestine content dramatically outweighs pro-Israel content. As of this week, videos tagged #StandWithPalestine have received more than 10 times the views of videos tagged #StandWithIsrael — 324 million vs. 3.4 billion. One TikTok user reported that his stream turned rabidly anti-Israel once he started engaging with such posts, and Jewish creators on the platform are reporting escalating harassment.
Cause / Effect
This is cause and effect. Young Americans (see above) are already drifting away from the attitudes of their parents’ generation (my generation) toward the conflict. Young Americans are more diverse than older Americans, and presumably more sympathetic to non-white groups such as Palestinians. And if mostly what you know about Israel-Palestine is Gaza post-2006 and bulldozed houses in the West Bank, your views are likely going to be different from those of someone whose frame of reference includes the Yom Kippur War and Munich. Young people are more prone to make pro-Palestinian content, more prone to consume it, and the wheel turns.
Accuracy Is Incidental
Access to more viewpoints and more sources of information is a good thing on balance. Despots should not be allowed to disappear their people any more than democracies should be able to firebomb someone else’s, and the unflinching testimony of a livestream can help stop them. But an unbounded information landscape is not an unalloyed good. Because social media does not favor accuracy or balance or diversity. It favors clicks. The more engaging and enraging the content, the more clicks it receives. Is the image I get of Gaza on TikTok more accurate or true than what I see on CNN? In some cases, yes. But on social media, accuracy is incidental. This presents, I believe, two profound risks.
Where We Spend Our Time
Sam Harris said you become where you spend your time. We were discussing Twitter on my podcast — I was addicted to it at the time, and I had noticed I’d become more curt, venal, and reactionary. Also, I was having thoughts in 140 characters (no joke). He pointed out that humans are more influenced by our environments than we’d like to think. If I spend 5% of my waking hours getting angry on Twitter, I become a 5% angrier individual. Same is true if I spend more time with my kids expressing and receiving love. We become where we spend our time. (Side note: I am no longer using Twitter.) (Another side note: still angry and curt.)
Just as my addiction to Twitter made me more like what I consumed there — sputtering angry hot takes — spending time on the TikTok of #standwith___ has a predictable effect. The conflict, generations old and woven into the fabric of global politics, is reduced to suffering, anger, and violence. There is a good side and a bad side. Instinctive tribalism kicks in, and young people walk through Washington Square Park with images of the Star of David in the trash, and a 6-year-old Muslim boy is stabbed by his landlord. Social media algorithms identify our politics and then shepherd us into a hermetically sealed bubble, framing our worldview through a window of rage and extremism.
CCP(roblem)
We know the first risk is real, and it’s playing out — you can see it on your phone and in the street. Our discourse is more coarse, our focus increasingly on what divides us. The second risk is more insidious, visible only in outline. But those outlines are coming into sharp relief. There is a nonzero probability that TikTok is being manipulated and leveraged by the CCP to sow division in America. That probability is high. It’s what we would do and have done. In the Cold War, both the United States and the Soviet Union engaged in a variety of covert actions aimed at fomenting internal strife. Radio Free Europe, a CIA-backed initiative, broadcast pro-democracy messaging into the Eastern Bloc to encourage dissent. During World War II, Nazi Germany dropped leaflets over American troops that highlighted racial injustices in the U.S., hoping to demoralize troops and incite racial tension. Every nation has done, or is doing, this … actively. The U.S. itself continues to pursue such tactics to this day. The U.S. Army’s 4th Psychological Operations Group describes itself as follows:
The CCP has control over the most powerful, yet elegant, weapon in the history of propaganda, and the default position is they (i.e., the CCP) are not using it? I have stated this view before. China cannot beat us kinetically or economically, but it can beat us by tearing us apart from the inside. TikTok, in my view, has the potential effect of several carrier strike forces. A 21st century Trojan Horse that also generates $100 billion in annual revenue. I was at the White House this week for an AI Summit. Government officials are not allowed to be on TikTok for security reasons. This comes at a cost, as I believe they’d be more alarmed at the skew of information.
It’s a common misconception that propaganda is like advertising: a barrage of messaging favoring one side or attacking another. Uncle Sam telling you to buy war bonds or black-and-white movies of Aryan youth saluting the swastika. That’s not how China would use (is using) TikTok. The more elegant strategy is to atomize the enemy (us). Find small differences of opinion and broaden them. Carve off slices of support for a long-time ally, one demographic group at a time. The Nazi propagandist Goebbels wrote that the purpose of propaganda is to generate “volcanic passions, outbreaks of rage, to set masses of people on the march, to organize hatred and despair with ice-cold calculation.”
Xi Jinping has described the Internet as “the main battlefield in the battle for public opinion,” and in 2013 he said, “online public opinion work should be taken as the top priority of propaganda and ideological work. Many people, especially young people, do not read mainstream media and get most of their information from the Internet. We must face up to this fact, increase investment, and seize the initiative on this battlefield of public opinion as soon as possible. [We must] become experts in using new means and methods of modern media.” ByteDance employees have confirmed the CCP has backdoor access to American TikTok user data, which it has used several times. In addition, the CCP has refused to let TikTok’s parent company ByteDance go public for national security reasons. FBI officials have themselves stated TikTok could be used as an “aggressive weapon” against the U.S. and China’s enemies at large. In sum, the CCP’s manipulation of TikTok is hiding in plain sight.
Oppenheimer Moment
The CCP’s Oppenheimer moment was the fusion of TikTok and October 7. Or maybe I’m being paranoid and am out of touch with a generation reacting to an Israel that has veered rightward. Maybe an increasingly non-white population has an easier time recognizing oppression. Or maybe we live in a social media era in which views are ushered to their most extreme on their own without interference from state actors.
Maybe.
Life is so rich,
P.S. This week on Prof G Markets we discussed Meta’s monster quarter and the U.S. deficit. Listen here. (Or watch.)
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The omission of preceding history is at best mediocre reasoning, and at worst, purposeful biased. Palestinians were kicked out of their land by Zionist Jews under the protection of Europeans. Scott, the injustice doesn’t start in Yom Kippur or Munich, its violent beginning was started by the now Israelis way back in the late 19th and early 20th century. Admitting that is the first step to a solution.
This argument is misleading and wrong, you have a duty to correct it if you really want to be part of the solution not continue fuelling the problem –> “Israel-Palestine is Gaza post-2006 and bulldozed houses in the West Bank, your views are likely going to be different from those of someone whose frame of reference includes the Yom Kippur War and Munich”
This was multifaceted and a well informed opinion is always a good read. I do feel that we as observers who get to choose sides and scream our perspectives into the void, are losing sight of the bottom line that violence and hatred begets more violence and hatred. The destruction we are witnessing will only fuel further attacks in the future; if this doesn’t escalate into a world war then in will simply be a never ending cycle of fighting and anger. And for what, religious beliefs. Beliefs being the key word, because at the end of the day these are very strongly held differences of opinions about something that someone was raised to believe in, and is actually supposed to invoke love and peace and mercy.
Why are large sprawling cities like you see in the west called ‘camp’? As in ‘Refugee Camps’.This is pure propaganda- which has been going on since I was a teenager in the 60s
where are the tic tic videos of the Hamas tunnels made with our tax payers donations over the decades since the 60s.
Actually Scott, The firebombing of Dresden was extremely controversial, at least in Britain, even at the time it happened in 1945. Post war it was an embarrassment, and contributed to the low opinion of then chief of Bomber Command, the odious and insubordinate Arthur Harris.
Western Democracy doesn’t work, has never worked, and without a major rewrite, will never work!
The entire West has murdered more innocent people that have never done anything to them, than any other group in the history of the planet! Let that sink in. In addition, not one, but all of them only grow through murder, terrorism & theft of land and resources!
Democracies alr constantly at war, with either themselves, or murdering others, and here’s the greatest irony…
No foundation of civilization has EVER come from the mind of a Western European… NOT ONE!
Yet you expect a rational thinking person to believe that China, Russia and others are evil? It’s a massive brain washing, especially from us, we’re the #1 War Criminal on the planet, well ahead of #2 Israel.
“Instinctive tribalism kicks in, and young people walk through Washington Square Park with images of the Star of David in the trash, and a 6-year-old Muslim boy is stabbed by his landlord.”
This sentence speaks encyclopedias. Joseph Czuba, 71 (by news accounts a Catholic) stabbed Palestinian-American Wadea Al-Fayoume, aged 6 years, 26 times at his home. A beautiful boy, viciously murdered with a knife placed in rhetorical balance with protesters carrying ephemeral images emphatically denigrating the State of Israel. Says it all.
worst post ever
F-ing brilliant, as usual. As Cassandra was to Agamemnon, so too are you to Israel and the Biden administration. They both had better get a stronger message out on TikTok or we will be looking at a second coming of the Trump presidency and a tsunami of antisemitism in this country.
I was following until it went into propaganda. What is the takeaway from the tiktok talk and the CCP and Israel Hamas? Is it that the CCP is “ripping us apart from within” by making kids in the US not stand with Israel anymore? If so, that’s a bizarre argument. This read to a real turn and I
m not sure it ever got back.
As others here have iterated, it is disingenuous to simply lay this at the door of China.
Anyone who’s been paying attention for the past 3 decades has seen the open practice of apartheid by Israel. But, most people in the US were persuaded to ignore it by two things – a hugely pro-Israel government policy, and a large Zionist lobby that does a great job of labeling anyone critical of Israel as antisemitic. This has stifled any real discussion on what has been happening to the Palestinians for decades.
Another interesting fact that didn’t come up here, but was discussed on NPR last week… the age vs. propaganda situation in Israel itself is the exact reverse of that in the US. Young Israelis are rabidly anti-Palestine and right-wing, while their older counterparts are more liberal and sympathetic to a two-state solution. Regardless of how the younger generation in the US will shape foreign policy in the future (if they even go out to vote?), the domestic situation in Israel will be driven by the upcoming generation there, and it does not look good for the Palestinians!
occupation, apartheid…better you go learn some history before writing comments. Check the real facts (and not just “facts” from either side’s propaganda) and then decide for yourself.
Thanks for outing yourself as one of the people who think the slaughter of innocents can be justified by ‘history’.
For background on these hard ethical issues, look into Sam Harris – Making Sense. Let’s take a breath and hope for better next steps on both sides.
For me, in many ways, Prof G has been a guy to look up to, but I guess this is where I mute his views.
But then as a non-white third person, I can see the reasoning (not justification) behind his views; a white American living in the US who has a handful of friends and business relations in Israel. With this sort of dynamic, (and if you are luckily not a staunch Republican), by design you are prone to fall into the “bombs headed for Iraq but with rainbow and BLM sticklers” Democrat group.
I hope Scott hasn’t cemented his views on this particular discourse and revisits it irrespective of his monetary and familial ties with Israel.
Another point, CCP definitely has been weaponizing TikTok, but similarly, Instagram has been doing its fair share of narrative control; shadowbanning, and disabling accounts that have been reporting about the massacre of Palestinians at the hands of IDF.
Also, I feel like the dawg is smart enough to see that this is one of those “if a handful of varied people are disagreeing with you, maybe you are wrong” kind of situation.
I’m a student in my early 20s at a top college in a western country. I think this post is well written and helps to bring some balance to the debate which has been heavily one-sided on social media.
I’m not a fan of violence. Far from it. But unfortunately I don’t think many that are against Israel realise that not everyone and every state in the world believes in peace. The fighting and tactics on both sides is not ideal. However, if Hamas is not eliminated, their burden will spread. This creates a dilemma that more need to at least appreciate before prematurely formulating an opinion which they refuse to change.
Thanks Scott for sharing your opinion. I wish more people could at least engage in intellectually honest debate where they are open to changing their mind as the facts change. I will try to do that and I do my best to be open to changing my own mind.
The most startling and shocking point here is the statistics offered about tictoc engagement and the reality that the traffic numbers are pure delusional fantasy. That’s interesting, because it sets the stage for a debate based entirely on propaganda and distorted facts.
TikTok Statistics – Updated Nov 2023. TikTok is available in over 160 countries, has over 1.1 billion users, and has been downloaded over 220 million times in the United States alone.
After reading the thought provoking story, I’m finding that the vast majority of comments here, appear as if they’re generated by AI, drawing narrative from shallow hallucinations and primarily striking out in anger, with twisted logic. Presumably, this is the voice of youthful AI?
I listened with confusion, to your segment this weekend, November 5, 2023, about the war in Gaza. I had always admired you as a free thinker, but it seems free thinking has reached a limit: Israel. With every statement about the role of social media NEVER did it occur to you to even consider that there could be some factual grounds to tilt public opinion, probably based the reporting on facts on social media which is the first medium reaching a large public that is free from the control of the Zionist Lobby and its allies? You seem to have no problem attacking bad propaganda of TikTok peddled by Xi Jian Peng, while totally ignoring the (equally) bad propaganda peddled by Natanyahu in mainstream media. I suggest you read tons of evidence available not on (suspicious) social media but from bodies like the UN, which has accurate body counts by the year published on Google.
Are you still confused on why young people support Palestine rights more that Israeli standard lies? Might I suggest that platforms that show events as they unfold in Gaza and West Bank without the deliberate filter of lies peddled by Israeli apologists and amplified by “mainstream” media could be one of the reasons? young readers can see and comprehend (with no influence of Xi Jian Peng), and sympathize, with the Palestinians who have legitimate rights but are gagged each and every time they voice them!
Congratulations, you have just joined the ranks of Israeli apologists.
Well said. For me, in many ways, Prof G has been a guy to look up to, but I guess this is where I mute his views. But then as a non-white third person, I can see the reasoning (not justification) behind his views; a white American living in the US who has a handful of friends and business relations in Israel. With this sort of dynamic, (and if you are luckily not a staunch republican), by design you are prone to fall into the “bombs headed for Iraq but with rainbow and BLM sticklers” democrat group. I hope Scott hasn’t cemented his views on this particular discourse and revisits it irrespective of his monetary and familial ties with Israel.
Also, I feel like the dawg is smart enough to see that this is one of those “if a handful of varied people are disagreeing with you, maybe you are wrong” kind of situation.
The takeaway from this post is not to enforce a side, but to remember to execute nuance, complexity, listening, and skepticism, to a landscape that does not reward any of those attributes. The world, nations, and people are pluralities, not nouns. By distilling a person or event into a binary, we reduce our ability to have public discourse.
As someone in technology who matured alongside social media, it is clear that when the tools of society stop rewarding listening and discourse, and instead reward choosing a binary position and denouncing the opposing view, is only a path to further division.
I agree. That was one of my main takeaways too. It’s weird to me that he exercises nuance to describe the civilian cost of war.
It seems like a great way to not take a political stand on what Will potentially become a genocide, if not already.
I think it is absolutely hilarious that you can raise a generation with anti bullying campaigns, telling us that everyone is equal, and that you cannot believe the news and when we apply that critical thinking you say ‘no, not like that.’ What idiots are we to actually think that all lives are equal. That killing innocent people and committing war crimes are bad. Must be China? Would have guessed Russia, but I guess they are busy.
Overall, the youth are aware. Too aware and concerned with what is to come- How it will get worse for no reason. Where as the older generation is set on setting a right, what happened. Well news flash, as you have taught and shown us, war does not make it better. It does not avoid further violence. It perpetuates it. You are stuck on a pro- Israeli rhetoric from decades ago. Of course you were fed that. What was the alternative?
The truth is is that your generation is guilty and tired of what you have allowed for. You are not the freedom fighters you thought you were. You were tired of Middle East conflicts and this it’s complicated excuse is an easy out. You created a monster on your watch. You better at least not look away.
Beautifully said Ob. Scott I am a big fan of yours but here you really are showing your bias. This really dampens how I look up to you.
Well said. I think Prof is a bit self-aware of his bias since he has familial and monetary ties with Israel. But gosh is it a bit tone-deaf to pin this on China. There is definitely some truth to it but this is a diversion from scrutiny and criticism of Israel and the massacre of Palestinians.
Imagine WWII with social networks; the effect would be the same as we are seeing now; we cannot accept in any circumstances such collateral damage.
Scott, I listen to you a lot on Pivot. My sense is you are obviously bright, personable and financially successful. My sense is also you live in a world that is somewhat like visiting Disneyland. It’s so well done you leave and you feel like your life has changed. The fantasy is now part of your psyche.
My sense is the world is currently at war. War between East vs.West generally speaking….Democracy vs. Autocracy….you know the drill. War is different. You win or you lose. People live and people die. It’s almost like the opposite of Disneyland. It’s nonfiction. You want to kill or be killed ?
Although I absolutely hate politics and geopolitical news and the journalism associated with the propaganda of war — this niche story resonates immensely.
It’s within reason to assume the attack on Israel was designed to be a dirty bomb, media event, which would provoke and prod Israel into overreaction, which would then result in pro-hamas media momentum, helping to polarize generational tensions, and amplify tribalism — using ticktock as a new weapon for terror-ism.
Imagine a new age of knee jerk instant gratification, where billions of likeminded internet users can instantly, spontaneously shift money from banks, attack capitols or unite in any cause — without thought — mindlessly overreacting, as if in the heat of (group-think) passion — pulling the trigger in rage. That’s the beauty of using demographics as a weapon, and in this case, ignoring history and facts, and instead, using passion and the instant gratification of addiction to help steer someone that doesn’t think, towards a predictable outcome.
Chaos isn’t easily quantified, but the crafty and inscrutable distribution of digital opium is key to the generational stupor that will be ubiquitous during the upcoming election. The collision of demographic forces colliding in concert with revolutionary technology will be unprecedented and unimaginable.
1. The survey question you refer to is textbook bad survey design. We can almost see the intention behind that question to polarise the debate when what we need is nuance. There was no room in the survey for people who believe that the act are not justifiable but can be EXPLAINED by the historical context. I found it disappointing and surprising that you fell into the trap of this survey.
2. Some people want to analyse the recent events without taking the historical context into account. Again, textbook bad analysis practice. You say the algorithms are biased towards the Palestinians cause to create a divide amongst Americans. I say they are receiving information about that context that was hidden from them for decades.
Scott is so right. I have been a student of Middle East and Asian conflicts all of my life (now age 72). The absence of balance of understanding with respect to the latest conflict in Israel is palpable. The Israeli people have been subjected to innumerable conflicts with neighbouring states initiated by factions in/from neighbouring countries, that have one agenda. The people of those neighbouring countries have the same agenda- to build and enjoy peaceful coexistence with their neighbours once the requisite level of trust has taken root.
The factions are ardently resisting and using their own people to facilitate and grow the resistance. There seems to be no way to mare the “level of necessary trust” strong enough to disable the resistance. Until there is, Israel will have to fight to survive and focus on their survival to the justifiable detriment of the Palestinian people. It is as simple as that.
I’m 36 and not on TikTok, but I have been stunned over the last three weeks by how much of this pro-Palestinian content has been fed to me on Twitter. Despite telling the algorithm repeatedly, that I’m not interested in that content, it persists. Elon wants to divide us, too.
Normally I find your commentary very reasoned and thoughtful. But on this topic I’m alarmed by some of your statements that paint in broad strokes. The other day I saw you say on Bill Maher’s show that the people protesting the bombings are Hamas sympathizers. That’s a gross mischaracterization. The vast majority of people who are sympathetic to the Palestinians are opposed to the bombing of Gaza and the general mistreatment of Palestinians by the Israeli government over the last several decades.
You come from a generation that was fed a largely one-sided narrative on this topic on traditional media outlets. But in the Information Age, we now see on our screens the countless videos of Israeli settlers confiscating Palestinian homes with impunity and the Israeli politicians referring to Palestinians as animals and advocating for the outright removal of all Palestinians from the occupied territories. These aren’t things that are left open for interpretation.
Israeli scholars themselves refer to the condition that Palestinians are living under as apartheid and have openly said that what’s been happening for the last several decades is a textbook example of ethnic cleansing. You would do well to read some of their books including Ilan Pappé’s “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine”.
The Bosnian massacres and the Rwandan massacres happened during my formative twenties but there was no social media, no TikTok to offer up video after video from one side or the other. I had to seek out information to understand it and to process the very complex reasons for the atrocities.
While I can certainly see the potential for CCP to be sowing dissent, in my mind, the biggest problem is the skewing toward simplistic views over a deeper, more nuanced understanding of what is happening. When you add in a sense of victimization across a population as well as an unhealthy dose of anger, this is what you get – non-rational views by people who justify slaughter of Israelis as warranted.
You lost me on this one. To think that some supporters of the Palestinian cause are brain washed or supporting Hamas is an unfair characterization, an attempt to label them as uneducated or unassuming. You seem to be repeating Bill Maher’s anti-Palestine rhetoric. Isreal has been running an illegal occupation, an apartheid, and a colonial regime for decades; their crimes have recently been more exposed indeed, and it’s only fair for tax payers to have their say in the matter. It is not fair to assume that young people have not educated themselves on the issue though. I’ve been reading about the issue before social media was even available. Support for the Palestinian people is not support for violence, is not anti-semitic, and is not for hamas.
I’ve been a listener of yours (and Kara) for many years, and have been enjoying your objective analysis on various topics. This is not one of them.
Agreed. His lack of nuance and understanding on this topic is astounding. Did you ever stop to think Prof. Galloway that the fact that the youth support the Palestinians is because they’re actually being shown the truth and not the typical pro-Israel narrative that our nation has been fed for decades on end? Do you think Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch refer to Israel as an apartheid state for kicks?
Well said.
You forgot to mention that the government of Gaza is committed to Israel’s destruction. To expect to normalize relations given that mandate is a bit naive.
Not so Kene, you’re out of date. Anyway, we’re not talking about normalising, we’re talking about stopping the genocide and ethnic cleansing. Hardly the same thing.
Does ticktock ever mention anything about the Arabs helping the nazis kill millions of Jews?
Word. I like the dude and have learned a lot from him (and Kara) on Pivot, but it saddens me to see where he stands on this issue. I really hope he revisits his idea that “kids these days are pro-Palestine because they are being fed Chinese propaganda”.
Hi Professor – huge fan of your work and listen to any podcast you are on. I’m a Palestinian American in my mid-30s, thankfully very successful in the business world mainly because I work so closely with companies in the Middle East looking for someone who can “live in both worlds”.
On one of your podcasts you teared up describing thinking of your Aunt, hiding in an attic, and how she would have felt today. I had a similar experience the other day, when I started reading the names of the dead in Gaza, and saw how many children with my own last name had died in weeks alone. It is impossible for me to look at this and think it is in any way justified.
I was fortunate enough to be born in the US by complete fluke, it is irresponsible for me to not call out what I see the Gaza bombings as – a clear violation of international law, a clear sign the West only condemns war crimes when they do not fund the criminals, a clear attempt at genocide of a people that have existed in Palestine for centuries.
Hi. Nice post. I think you haven’t mention critical point –
Many of Palestine supporters, are misled by online propaganda, and not fully understand the situation. I believe the way their opinion is shaped differently from their parents, lies mainly in the misleading content the consumed about it.
Wrongly, they consider IL to be the aggressor.
Hamas who rules in Gaza, and by latest polls seems to have 65% support there – has fundamental agenda vs IL. Fundamental agenda vs IL
Israeli money that arrives to Gaza, designated for development and education – is taken for war tools and tunnels.
Also, in the matter of innocent causelties – IL doing its best to defend itself while minimizing any peripheral damage, while Hamas uses civilians as human shields.
Therefore I believe that turning the hate to IL for it, is just misunderstanding.
Check out the hashtag #Pallywood in any social media.
Multiple things can be true at once. Social media has and does sow division. The lives lost and trauma inflicted on the Israeli people on Oct 7 should have never happened and are absolutely deserving of a powerful response. The destruction along the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank, and the lives lost and displaced is unjustifiable.
In every conflict there will always be people who take extreme positions. Typically these positions are reserved for those that are emotionally connected to the conflict and/or the uneducated who are just looking for a team. But there always needs to be an adult in the room, who recognizes when things get out of hand and puts a stop to it. And it’s up to the rest of us to encourage this to happen.
It’s interesting the examples used in this piece. WWII and Japan. Vietnam. Those were some of the worst atrocities in human history. Iraq and Afghanistan draw comparable comparisons for the destruction and death of thousands (if not millions).
If we desire to never repeat these atrocities again, then we all need to play our part, weed through the propaganda, and not doubt that feeling in our gut that something is wrong.
Very well said James. In the absence of a ‘responsible adult’ in the room it’s down to us to exert what influence we can. Individually that’s not much, but collectively we might just make a difference.
My daughter, who thankfully has an open mind, sent me this post. I have just recently been made aware that I am a Jew, alone in my view that there is unspeakable horrors inflicted on the Palestinian people. One of so many comments resonated with me, like “ the uneducated who are just looking for a team.”
which describes my Jewish friends and their lemmings-like support of Israel. The same friends whose grandparents,
like mine, who quickly sold their homes the minute a black family moved into the neighborhood. No respect. No open ideology. Just fear and ignorance. Thank you all for your comments and hope.
What a reactive and paranoid POV. JFC – you’re going to liken this to f*cking Dresden? The 1984-esque distortion field around Israel is breaking. You can only apartheid and ethnically cleanse in plain sight for so long without people recognizing it. Also, the older generations have been raised on a steady diet of Palestinian/Arab dehumanization. “Maybe an increasingly non-white population has an easier time recognizing oppression. ” — this is it.
As long as Palestine does not control its dogs, it should expect to be treated very roughly by Israel. You want moderation by Israel when such is construed as weakness and thus exploited at every opportunity by Hamas. If Palestine wants peace, it needs to finger Hamas. There’s no upside to genocide unless it removes an existential threat.
A couple of other commentators have referenced 9/11 but given a focus of your post (media and it’s influence on the population’s PoV of the horrors of war / violence) I’m surprised you didn’t write more about how that day and ensuing events influenced, if not defined, people who are 25 and older. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the protests or support in cities or universities is by a generation that didn’t live through that event. Millions of people experienced the terrorism of 9/11 in real time on the television. It was a shared trauma.
The US military incursions that followed in both Afghanistan and Iraq killed tens of thousands more people than the current Israeli-Hamas war and while there were protests, they were very different in size and scale.
Google Play,
The crimes of Israel have been even more exposed. That is the glory of Information Era.
Elders point of view is based upon weak and biased media of theis times. Now we have a conterpart easily acessible.
Hi Scott, wonderful article… a young person here. To answer your question, it’s hard to believe that this is chinas manipulation of TikTok when you have Israeli government officials going on live interviews calling Palestinians dogs and that they all deserve to die. No manipulation, we can see oppression and hatred because it’s being showed by the Israeli Goverment Bombing what is basically an open air prison filled of Palestinian people with no army. It’s hard to manipulate what is clearly wrong and a very clear attempted at genocide.
They called Hamas dogs. Not palestinians. The media clipped that part out
The Hamas terrorists never once boasted about killing Israeli’s, they boasted about killing Jews. Is ethnic cleansing acceptable depending on who is doing the cleansing and who is being cleansed? Seems when Hamas wants to cleanse Israel and the world of Jews those are casualties that can be lived with by the 51%. People are so quick to distinguish between the people of Gaza and Hamas but if there is a difference why are the people of Gaza not turning on Hamas? Ask any Palestinian what it was like to live in Gaza prior to 2006. People lived in peace and got along. The economy was growing, and there was no hatred. The only thing that has changed is that once Israel withdrew Hamas took over and declared war. Do the math.
Well said Amy. I’m afraid Scott has lost the plot – unless he’s part of it.
Another well written post that gives insight into some of the winds of change across generations. Coming from the UK I believe that the younger generations are not prepared to give Israel a Hall Pass, turn the other way and ignore what is happening in plain sight I.e the sight of a suppressed population’s situation made more hopeless with no food, shelter or ability to make themselves or their families safe. Given that we have evolved and become more sophisticated is this level of destruction and death of women and children justifiable? This feels like a powerful short-term reactive approach to a heinous event. What happens after the war? Who will rebuild Gaza, stop the suffering and make their people whole? How will the Palestinians forgive Israel and peace be achieved? Do the Israelis have a plan or are they expecting the rest of the world to pick up the pieces and tidy up after them?
Thank you for your words Scott. As always you are not afraid to speak up and say your thoughts. As an Israeli, I wish for peace. Oct 7th was a horrific wake-up call to violent beasts butchering and taking hostage innocent people, babies, elders, and families. I invite each of you to imagine what would you do in a situation like this. It’s a lose-lose situation, heartbreaking, and we still have 240 hostages including babies, kids, women, and elders in Gaza. The world should speak up and say this is not acceptable! It’s Saturday morning for us, you made me cry (it’s amazing that we still have tears left after a month). Thank you and hope everyone will stay safe and stop this madness in the world.
Does anyone else see a parallel to the U.S. where it was the Cowboys or Calvary vs. the Indians? Same atrocities, massacres, and propaganda and in the end, the one with the bigger army and better weapons won. In hindsight can you really say the Indians were the bad guys? U.S. policies never really changes. Money and power makes right – everyone or thing is collateral damage.
Hi Scott,
I don’t disagree with the connections that you highlight in this newsletter. I would however like to point out that there is a difference between a manipulated survey result asking if the Oct-7 attacks “can be justified by…” and the more rational question as to whether there is a direct ‘cause and effect’ relationship between Israeli policy toward Palestinian interests and the resulting dissent (violent or otherwise) from that population. That difference in the question potentially removes the apparent approval of violence and refocuses on root cause.
This newsletter was focused on the propaganda “war” that surrounds real wars, but propaganda is most effective when it leverages genuine discontent in public opinion. Understanding the true source of that discontent is important for the propagandists (CCP, CIA, PSYOP, etc) as well the commentators (ProfG).
You are a very smart/savvy marketer, so I can understand why you want to avoid controversial conclusions in you newsletter (and you did so brilliantly), but I think there is an opportunity to propose thoughtful and unbiased questions without taking an overly controversial position.
Appreciate your approach and always enjoy the reading your material.
Cheers
Roby, I fully agree with the point you make in your first paragraph. Well said!
clearly academia failed as kids celebrate atrocities
It’s only the loud minority of students on campuses that feel that way. The vast majority are against terrorism in general.
The bombing of Dresden served no strategic purpose and civilian casualties may have been as high as 50,000-80,000+ due to the number of refugees from the East that were in the city at the time. It was a war crime. But war crimes don’t matter when you’re the victor and can control the narrative.
There can be no justification for Hamas’ attack on Israeli civilians, there can also be no justification for 10,000+ Palestinian civilian victims in the name of “Israeli Self-defense”. Cutting off food, water, and electricity to an area with 2 million civilians is also a war crime. (Think Warsaw and Stalingrad from WW2).
Despite what many talking heads would have us believe, criticism of Israel is not Antisemitic.
Our Allies need to be held to the same standards as non-allies if we wish to have a modicum of credibility in the World.
Professor—all else aside, the Harvard Harris Poll cited contains many seemingly contradictory answers, likely because of ambiguously-worded questions. Yes, 51% of aged 18-to-24 respondents said Hamas’s attack “can be justified”—but that same age group had the *highest* share of those who would “refuse to hire” law students who supported the attacks on Israeli civilians. Roughly two-thirds (65%) of 18-to-24 respondents said “Hamas is a terror group that rules the people of Gaza with fear and is not supported by them,” and again, 65% supported Israeli retaliation against Hamas… A sweeping conclusion about the younger generation’s mindset on this topic may not be warranted. And if, indeed, they approach complex issues with broader empathy and a higher degree of nuance, perhaps that should be commended!
Wait, so after more than 40 years of a one sided politically controlled narrative behind which America has funded more military aid than anywhere else on earth, there is an inevitable backlash and your answer is that the PRC is behind it so let’s get rid of tiktok?
I don’t think Galloway is trying to resolve the long-standing historical and current atrocities. I believe he is trying to put a point on how we here in the US are ripping ourselves apart in taking sides in the atrocities. I think it’s a very valid point that CCP (and why not others) are using Tic Toc to seed discontent in our youth and society for the incendiary effect, not for supporting the Palestine point of view.
Well, I’m 41, have always voted Democrat, and am not on TikTok and have never been. The 10/7 attacks on Isarelis were atrocious. But I support the Palestinian cause and condemn indiscriminate killing in Gaza. It’s not just folks in the U.S. ripping themselves apart. The protests have been global, from the UK to Chile. Most of us have never seen so many dead children in our lives as we have in these past few weeks. And yes, I know that there a lot of humanitarian disasters going on in the world right now. So why am I so apalled at the one in Gaza? It’s not because I’m anti-semitic or being “fooled” by social media. It’s because because this particular crisis is being funded by the U.S. government to the tune of $14 BILLION DOLLARS. As an American citizen, a voter, taxpayer, and decent human being, I will be expressing my outrage. I find it very condenscending that you’re telling us that the CCP is influencing our views.
So funny you mentioned twice that maybe the gen-z is just “sympathetic to non-white groups”. More than half of the Israeli people are non-white, and I’m not talking about the 20% Israeli Arabs, I’m taking about Jews who are non-white, many of which have come from Arab countries like Morocco, Iraq, Yeman etc.
People know so little about Israel and yet have so strong opinions…
This is a great point and is very much misunderstood in US media/social (on the right and the left). This may be a stretch, but I suspect the perception of Israel as wholly Euro/white was instrumental in establishing affinity in the US (i.e., the Judeo-Christian values that all the wingnuts), and now it is detrimental. The truth is very inconvenient sometimes …
Plus, the Euro vs. non-Euro ethnicity intermarriage rate is fairly high. Before the century is over, they’ll probably be mostly brown.
Scott, thank you for an in depth and insightful article on an overwhelming complex situation. The history you provided helped me to see the current situation through a different lens. I appreciate you and the work you do as it consistently opens my mind to new ways of thinking.
DSome of your post recently have one my respect. This one not so. I am 80 years old, and have never seen a TikTok video , and prefer to read whatever news I get. The actions of Isreal for the last few decades have created Hamas , which cannot justify the massacre of 1400 people , mostly civilians , by Hamas. The bombing of Gaza has killed until now more the 9000 Palestinians , more than half of which were woman and children. These facts do not depend on videos , and are not influenced by the CCP . The relatives of those victims who survive will become terrorists with nothing to lose, like Hamas. Hopefully Isreal does not come upon the “final solution” to solve this problem , with no easy solution.
Correction of fat finger mistakes : Some of you recent posts have won my respect. Not this one. I am 80 years old, and have never seen a TikTok video , and get my information by sceptically reading various online websites. The actions of Israel over decades have created , and nourished Hamas , which still of course cannot justfy the recent Hamas massacres . The bombing of Gaza has, until now , killed more tha 9000 palestinians, half of whom were innocent children and women. Thes facts are readily available, and are not influenced by the CCP. The relatives of these victims who survive will become terrorists with nothing to lose. just like Hamas. Hopefully Israel does not come upon the “final solution” to solve this problem , which has no easy solution.
Hey – To blame Israel of making Hamas is like blaming USA for making ISIS and UK for making nazis …. Israel is not pure justice- but it makes no sense to blame a democracy – to create a monster that rape / kills kids. This is a little overstretched….
You can’t compare Hamas to ISIS. Hamas was created under the Israeli occupation and is only concentrated within the Gaza Strip, its sole purpose is to fight against oppression. It has nothing to do with religion. While isis is a religious extremist group. They are not the same.
You can’t compare Hamas to ISIS. Hamas was created under the Israeli occupation and is only concentrated within the Gaza Strip, its sole purpose is to fight against oppression. It has nothing to do with religion. While isis is a religious extremist group. They are not the same. However, one can understand the confusion since the media has blurred those lines for you.
Fatah/PLO pursued a political solution, Israel didn’t want a solution seeking expansionism over defining it’s borders. Israel encouraged the creation of Hamas to weaken Fatah/PLO and a possible agreement. So Israel did have a hand in their creation.
Hey – To blame Israel of making Hamas is like blaming USA for making ISIS and UK for making nazis …. Israel is not pure justice- but it makes no sense to blame a democracy – to create a monster that rape / kills kids. This is a little overstretched….
Spot-on. 50 years from now I’ll bet Steve Jobs is viewed as an enemy of civilization as nobody accelerated ‘atomism’ like he has. Tik-Tok should really just be outlawed in the US. It’s just cancer, and we fight that like hell, don’t we?
Anti Israel is not anti semitism – repeat five times
I’ll tell this bs to crowd, when they try to kill me. bet it will work
Indeed and that’s deflection. It is intentional. Obviously, being against Israel’s Zionist colonialism and apartheid in Palestine is not antisemitic. Also, being pro-Palestine is not siding with Hamas.
Discrimination on the basis of nationality is still afoul of Civil Rights law, and just plain unrespectable bigotry.
Wow, this is a silly take. I am horrified by what happened on Oct 7, I believe Hamas is worse for Gazans than Israelis (although it’s pretty awful for Israelis too), and way too much criticism of Israel is driven by anti-Semitism (sometimes subtle, other times blatant). Still, Israel is definitely not without blame (historically and presently), the current government has some seriously despicable and racist elements and has zero interest in pursuing a reasonable and just outcome for Palestinians, and Israel’s behavior in the West Bank is unambiguously abhorrent.
The notion that we must stand with Israel no matter what is as flawed as the unhinged river-to-the-sea chants currently playing on US campuses. The latter is only a few minutes old, while the former has been a rule of law for decades in the US, where Israel has stood alone as the unrivaled victor of our foreign policy narrative. Accuracy was as ‘incidental’ then as it is today on TikTok.
Now that narrative has broken, the pendulum is swinging wildly the other way, which it *always* does when a forced narrative breaks. This build-up was happening with or without TikTok and it’s reaching fever pitch there simply because that’s what young people use.
Blaming this on China is the equivalent of yelling “get-off-my-lawn” to no one in particular. Or, taking lists of names of college students who are demonstrating. Wait, that’s actually happening …
spot on.
Exactly, but he’s NOT just blaming this on China, he is blaming this on Russia—through—China which is convoluted and weird. It’s also insane that a thinker like Scott has to reach ‘that’ far to try to understand why younger people see the middle east and go “this is clearly not working, we’ve been doing the same exact thing for 60 years and it’s never worked… why would we keep doing the same thing? Let’s just undo this thing completely.”
It is a really interesting article and so are the responses. I did post on my linked in that neither I nor most people I know in a position to hire in financial services will hire anyone who believes “From the river to the sea”. It is plainly genocidal in intention. It is also really bad policy to enable the Palestinians to believe as they have since the 1920’s that genocide will be a solution to their problems. It plainly hasn’t worked to date and will likely not in the near future. I get the Tik Tok imbalance between the atrocity pictures on the Israeli side vs Palestinian but the lack of analytical thinking or nuance that seems widespread in the Tik Tok generation is scary. As to Israel leaning rightward sure but Israel wants to own Gaza as much as we do Guatemala. You’d rather have a call center or casino there you can visit.
This is 100% my view . Succinctly put
I’m surprised that you are not more careful about the interchangeable use of the terms Israeli/Jewish, or Palestinian/Hamas. I think it perfectly reasonable to abhor anti-semitism and simultaneously detest the killing of innocent Palestinian civilians. Similarly, it is perfectly reasonable to abhor the killing of innocent Israeli citizens by the terrorist group Hamas – not Palestinians. I’m 78 and recall all those events; that does not make me careless about understanding a complex situation. Just because it is possible that Bibi has been itching for this opportunity to look powerful for a long time does not mean that the majority of Israelis agree with him.
I suspect the younger cohort know very well the difference.
I am 80, and completely agree with your post. And I have never opened aTiktok video.
Scott, Israel has certainly leaned rightward over the past decade plus. However, I appreciate your balanced analysis, which has not been common. Of course, Hamas committed terrorist atrocities — and you can’t justify it. But I think the key point to consider is how so many young Palestinian men can become so dehumanized they could kill innocent Israelis face-to-face. That is a lot of hatred and it doesn’t spring from nowhere. Racial animus must certainly play a role but there are more important factors such high unemployment, poverty, repression and, of course, hopelessness. Those conditions provide Hamas a steady stream of recruits. Anyone trying to better understand this conflict should watch the documentary “Gaza” on Amazon’s free ad-supported platform. Shot by two Irish journalists over several years, it screened at the 2019 Sundance film festival. The film depicts traumatized Gaza residents trying to live their lives under Israeli air strikes and the blockade in place since 2007. You also get a feel for how that life can sow militancy. And that is why Israel’s military response and its clear disregard for Palestinian life will never bring lasting peace. It will only create more hatred among a people with whom it has to live side by side. Very sad indeed. We should thank TikTok and streaming TV for broadening our perspective.
Poverty and unemployment breed an inclination to commit mass murder? Dear God, you actually believe that? If so, Native Americans should have slaughtered everyone by now. As for the blockade since 2007, convenient failure to mention why. Love that. Did it pollute the Irish filmmakers’ narrative to include mention of homicidal attacks on Israelis from Gaza, the Gaza Israel pulled out of in 2005, and handed over to Palestinians? Who then elected Hamas. It’s amazing how this is the ONLY conflict in the world in which one side gets a pass on its vicious violence because, you know, oppression. Explain Native Americans to me? Explain the Maori? No group in the world resorts to vicious violence the way Arabs do. See Yemen, Syria, Libya, etc. But it only matters when Palestinians are killed. Golly gee, I wonder why?
“No group in the world resorts to vicious violence the way Arabs do”
Well, there it is. You win for the most cringe worthy comment of the week. Wonder, how do you feel about race and IQ or race and propensity for crime?
She does have a point which you can’t seem to address with facts.
Is this satire? You actually think the statement “no group to violence the way Arabs do” is making a good point? What are your facts? Did you plot head circumference against propensity for violence? If so, I hope you used the y-axis for violence (response). Or is this just a general observation?
There are lots of observations we should ponder. Have you looked at published violent death rates by country? By those measure, Arabs aren’t very good at violence, but select countries in Central/South America and Sub-Saharan Africa are super-duper amazing at it. Maybe the Arabs are just inept. What broad statements can we make about, say, Salvadorians and their ethno-racial propensity for violence?
Or is this only inter as opposed to intra group? If so, America helped liberate earth from several hundred thousand Iraqis while liberating Iraq from ghost WMDs, thereby making us the unrivaled killing leader in the region over the corresponding period. Was that viciously violent (I bet it was if you were Iraqi), or does better media packaging and closer affinity absolve us?
Should we go down the rabbit holes of money or crime and ethnicity/race? Honestly, this is as bad as the anti-Semitic yuck on campuses. I haven’t even addressed the point about Native Americans docilely accepting their fate …
You should watch the film. It only depicts daily life. There is no narrative per se. As for your comparison to Native Americans, they did indeed commit what today we would call terrorist atrocities back in the 1800s when they still had the capacity to do so in the fight for their land. And so certainly did the U.S. government at the time. It’s common historical knowledge.
Humans are prone to violence when cornered… it’s called fight or flight, look it up… and yes Rick while I’m sure it bothers you that indigenous native Americans still live in todays world… there was a time they were heavily prosecuted by the white settlers who stole their lands, then heavily harassed for being non-white.
Not sure you meant to respond to me …
I see what you did there:
The hole which is “What’s the conflict in Israel about” could have been filled with more contextually accurate and unbiased as possible info from mainstream media all these years but there was enough of an Israeli bias that prevented that…
so NOW when the youths research why Hammas tries to justify their unjustifiable actions, the youths will get hits/videos showing the Israeli gov/settlers/supporters trying to justify their unjustifiable actions against Palestinians in the far and near past PLUS what they see today on the Tok , like, craters where people and buildings used to be.
They will feel embarassed that they didnt know what was up like when they realized how unoppressed their lives were after seeing Charlottesville and G Floyd get killed on the phones.
They will feel guilty that their gov/country has not helped/been explicitly complicit.
Then they will feel like they gotta make up for it with passion, protest and political pugilism.
Their passion and lack of access to info (phenomenah that describes reality as accurately as possible- my definition), distrust of the “news” from big media and big media itself makes them look for other sources, their own sources, thereby creating more mislead youths feeling like they have to make an “for them/against them” decision to pick a side. Do they get right or wrong? Yes!
It would be interesting to to know if the YouTube Shorts is consistent with TikToks? That would be an indicator as to whether the CCP are actively tipping the TikTok scales towards Palestinians or not? Prior to Oct 7, I have seen roughly equal amounts of pro-Palestinian creators on both platforms complain of being muted and silenced. Anyway, if you or your team read this, it would be interesting to see some stats comparing YouTube Shorts and TikTok.
Excellent post. I hope we remember that TikTok is an extension of the Chinese government and we only see what they want us to see. Why do we never see the death camps of Muslims in Western China? Because the CCP won’t allow it on TikTok. Why do we see so many images of suffering hundreds of Palestinian children and none of the suffering of millions of Ukrainian children? Because that’s in the interest of the CCP, to divide the American public and brainwash American youth. Don’t believe me? Alex Xu founder of the American precursor to TikTok changed his social profile name to “keepsSilence”…
Interesting to focus in on TikTok and not Meta. Meta has been censoring pro-Palestinian content and bumping it down the algorithm as has been heavily observed by users. Couldn’t I construct the reverse argument that “older generations are more likely to use Facebook and thus be exposed to pro-Zionist content, which is skewing favour towards Israel?” I think you are right to highlight that wars in this age of social media are different, but I think this is less a platform conspiracy or a generational trend and more of an inherent reaction to oppression and genocide. In the book of “worst crimes” genocide is and should be at the top. Add refugees, it gets worse. Add an open air prison where these people have lesser rights, it’s even more apparent. And finally, acknowledging the high number of children: well now this just seems unfathomable.
Absolutely untrue. I see more pro-Palestinian propaganda on Meta/Facebook than I see honest reports about what’s happening in the Middle East or Ukraine. What they are trying to pull down is deep fakes generated by AI, which is rampant in social media, created by Russia and Iran.
Untrue. I’ve seen more Anti Israel content in the last 4 weeks – despite being subscribed to pro Israel content – than I’ve ever seen before by perhaps an order of magnitude. Even comments on non political news posts are rife with “Free Palestine” spam.
Our multigenerational family does not see Hamas attack as justified. We do agree with Jewish Voice For Peace in supporting Cease Fire Now. No one I know sees Hamas attack as justified. We do believe oppression, apartheid and dropping bombs does not make anyone safe.
It’s easy to be against bombings and support ceasefire when living in the safety of North America. Here in Israel we run every day to bomb shelter against rocket attacks on Tel Aviv. Hiw can we live with an ISIS-like organization at our backyard? You wouldn’t! Hamas is hiding inside residential areas of Gaza, how can we destroy it? The world tells us what not to do but not what to do. Will the world be happier if another 10.7 happens, just because we accepted a ceasefire?
Thank you for this rational comment Dan
Thank you for this astute comment Dan
If I lived in Israel I would be asking why my government is keeping millions of people under apartheid conditions and why my own leader Bibi Netanyahu is on record saying that the best way to avoid a two-state solution is to bolster Hamas. Why did he allow money to flow freely to Hamas all these years knowing what an extremist group they are? And btw, Israel has killed more people in Gaza in the last three weeks than any Palestinian group has in the last century.
Wendy you are doing a great injustice for the black people by calling Israel apartheid. Go learn about the Arabs in Israel and see they have full equal rights, they are part of the Israeli parliament, and judicial system. No “race based” discrimination in Israel
If you were referring to the West Bank, the Palestinians there lives under their own governance which they elect with their own institutes. Indeed the Palestinian government is doing a “race based” discrimination by not allowing Arabs sell lands to Jews, if you do so you will face a death sentence.
I guess that’s with prof Galloway meant that your generation is feeding of Tik Tok.
Well stated Wendy! No one I know supports Hamas. That’s a refrain you often hear from the pro-Israel side that’s an attempt to delegitimize the actual grievances millions of Palestinians have living under apartheid conditions.
Wow … So, this is the first take you have made where I was just shaking my head the whole time. I’ve worked in various social media most of my career and online has definitively been pro-Palestine for a long, long time—especially on the left, but it’s deep in hard-Libertarian thought as well. It’s been so pervasive that I haven’t thought of it as an ‘alternative’ view in many years. The entire narrative over countless 4chan, reddit, blogger, wordpress and live journal posts, in the last twenty-plus years, has been one that recognizes that Israel is following the abuse cycle. The victim becomes the victimizer—or in this case, the victims of a genocidal maniac become the genocidal maniac for another group. That view is taken as ‘fact’ by the under 30 crowd. They are waiting for the Palestinian Anne Frank story to emerge, and know it is out there.
Add to this 9/11. The big “thing” that everyone under ~45 knows, deep-down, is that 9/11 was because of the boomers (The original ‘Me’ generation) support for anything and everything to do with Israel. The wars fought since Vietnam have been around oil and/or because of our support for Israel. The boomers are about bombing brown people, especially Muslim brown people, and every bomb dropped creates a fresh new radical—what very much looks like, genocide might not be in our best interest. What are we getting for all these billions?
Great post. And I think you are right about TikTok. My one question to you is what we should do about TikTok? Regulate it? Ban it? I think it is a dangerous tools that our enemies control. But I am not sure what to do about it?
Good job, Scott, blame the Chinese. Are we at war with them? Why do you assume we aren’t smart enough not to be manipulated by the CCP? Don’t you value different perspectives?
Btw, before you refer to Vietnam again, I would suggest you read Shoot Anything That Moves. I knew I was being lied to, much like now, but it took decades to pass before the real horrors of that war were revealed. I’m 71 years old. I’m happy that there are alternative news sources today young people can turn to. They will learn faster.
Agreed.
Reagan started state universities away from state funding.
This limited the influence of elected officials on the composition of universities.
This meant conservatives generally lost their voice.
In the past 25 years, with their new freedom, universities have pushed subversion to adopt ideas that are at best immature, and at worst repeats of history’s worst mistakes. Subversion is the preferred method to drive change.
It takes the kids 10-15 years to realize they were duped.
I think that is the best explanation for this moment.
Scott, take you own advice and don’t talk about things you have no expertise in. Criticizing Israel is not being anti-semitic, pointing out war crimes by is real is not being anti-semitic. You said you literally want to expel students who question the actions of Israel rather than have them in school. You demand people follow you rather than engage in conversation. It’s sad to see someone I used to respect so much go full “red pill” as you say. It’s hard to view this objectively from your multi-million dollar hill of money. Sir down, and maybe learn something from the kids, because they are alright, alright?
That’s not what he said at all but, I suspect, that’s what you wanted to read as you are likely one of the students who believes it’s okay to walk around with signs calling for the elimination of Israel and, as a result, the Jewish people.
If you listened to his podcasts, you’d know exactly what he’s saying. But your comment, talk about projection.
Hey Tyler – I do not think demonstrating against Israel is wrong … But supporting Hamas – a terror organization that celebrated 9/11 (google it! You will see the fireworks), raped women, and kidnapped kids (not as a result of trying to kill Israeli soldier – but to kidnap and kill because they are Jews) – is NOT Ok … and even in America we have to put some red lines to the “freedom”. You do not have to be an Israeli Supporter – all good – but you can’t support an organization that is identical to ISIS. these students should be punished.
The sad truth is the lines are being blurred. If someone criticizes Israel it is assumed they support Hamas. If somebody supports Palestinians it’s assumed they hate Jews. But these are not the facts, and it a lazy conflation that makes people take hard line views based on emotions and not reality.
What is reality is that when you punish someone because they don’t agree or have a different (even flawed) view, you don’t teach them, you hardener their position. And that’s the opposite of what we want.
Agree with most of what you wrote.
The kids in Harvard are NOT just against Israel. They are pro “Hamas” I was there 3 days ago. It’s insane. This is NOT ok.
Exactly my feeling. Very disappointing and pro-totalitarian post by Prof G.
First the call to track down and expel (or maybe jail, torture, maim, kill…) students who oppose mass murder of civilians. Now this opinion. What will be next?
I’d also like to add, shut up about Dresden, you know nothing about that. I lives there for three years, and I can guarantee it was not strategic, it was to kill moral and simply level an artistic center of Germany. Again, don’t talk about things you have no deep exposure to. Bombing Dresden didn’t make a single tangible impact to the war.
I don’t know if I agree that Gen Z is anti-semite. I don’t want to believe that. I instead want to believe that they are pro-humanity, and hence they have empathy for the plight of the Palestinians, not Hamas or Hezbollah, but the “every day” Palestinian.
Yes, of course, they are pro-humanity, yet they ignore (Israeli) babies being burned in ovens and children being beheaded. Why? Either wilfully, or because it didn’t show up in their Tik Tok feed.
And you ignore babies and children being blown up en masse. At least 3:1 children deaths, Incase your trying to keep score. The fact is people are looking at the whole picture and not just a single narrative.
Let’s try to put ourselves in the shoes of Israel.
So Gaza strip is fully governed by Hamas, who won the election. We read the Hamas “manifest” (aka charter) and learn that:
The charter states that “our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious” and calls for the eventual creation of an Islamic state in Palestine, in place of Israel and the Palestinian Territories, and the obliteration or dissolution of Israel.
So we are Israel, our neighbor is this organization that calls for our destruction, it operates from within the population, including hospitals and schools, and it just launched a vicious attack on us.
What do you do?
1) Nothing, as you don’t want to hurt innocent civilians and you are willing to let them destroy you bit by bit (again, that’s their ultimate goal they talk about it openly).
2) you bomb the hell out of Gaza “killem all” style
3) you decide to protect your people and remove this organization who calls to your destruction. You target your attacks on their militants and facilities knowing there will be collateral damage due to the nature of where they operate from.
Israel picked 3, can you suggest 4?
Jay, Israel picked 2. Don’t you watch the news?
Children who are killed by bombs , are just as dead as those who are beheaded. Revenge is not an answer. And TikTok and and the CCP only matter to Prof-G .
Scott you are, in part, conflating anti-Semitism with opposition to some of the policies of the state of Israel. I can love and support Jews, condemn the actions of Hamas, AND be stridently opposed to the notion of acceptable collateral damage that includes killing thousands of Palestinian civilians – many of whom are children.
It is both a complicated and complex situation for which I don’t have the answer – and it would appear that nobody does. But simply questioning the utility and ethics (and long-term second order effects) of an air/ground war by Israel doesn’t make one anti-Jewish.
MD while I partially agree with the first part of your comment, however with respect, the second part of your comment is not one I agree with.
I wont go into too much detail of the history of Israel but it should not be hard for a smart person to look up the history. Israel did not exist until 1948. This is how it was created, a bully (United Kingdom) broken into a home with weapons and threatened and took hostage the owner of the home (Palestinians). The bully told the actual owner of the home (Palestinians) to empty one of its room for the bully’s friend (Jewish Settlers). The owner and his family’s life was threatened by the bully (United Kingdom) so the owner in fear of his life emptied one room and started sharing their house with the bully’s friend (Jewish Settlers). Now one day the bully’s friend (Jewish Settlers), who was armed with weapons by the bully (United Kingdom), told the owner of the house to empty the other room for another friend of the bully (more Jewish settlers) and with fear and intimidation forced the owner to empty the room the owner and his family was having to live out of and move into the garage. The owners of the home now have to live in the garage while the bully’s friends (Jewish settlers) are living in the house. What would you do if your home was taken from you by force and you were forced to live under apartheid?
To your second point, the issue is not complicated or complex. Israel did not exist and should not exist as a country! The country is Palestine where Jewish people have lived for many centuries along with the Muslims! This is not an antisemitic statement. The Jewish people are a preferred people as per the Quran. Allah sent prophet after prophet after prophet to the Jewish people. So as per the Quran which is the ultimate Muslim narrative, the word of God, there is no animosity between the Jewish people and the Muslims. Muslims consider them their Abrahamic brothers! They have lived together for a long time. In reality, history documents that it was the Christians who treated them harshly and unjustly. First during the Inquisition, in Europe, and then during the Holocaust, also in Europe. It has been the European Christian that has hurt the Jewish people. So the current state of affairs is a bunch (not even all) of lunatics, evil and racist Israelis, whom, many would say are not even truly Jewish, trying to wipe out a people they have already been oppressing for 75 years. This is not antisemitism, antisemitism is against Jewish people, while the international cry to stop killing innocent people is against the inhumane, racist and evil state of Israel.
Interesting – as an ‘elder’ and a Jew I am most definitely two-state (always had been.) I am NOT a fan of Bibi..and we must remember that it was just months ago that many thousands of Israeli’s were protesting against him. You cannot/should not meet horror with horror. There are no winners here – only innocent victims and it hurts my heart.
I think you’re missing a huge point of comparison. Show me where you spend your money and I’ll show you what you value. The US committed over $3.3 billion in foreign assistance to Israel last year – while at the same time American Millennials and Gen Z are watching the US deteriorate under: Housing Crisis, Student Loan Crisis, Opioid Epidemic, School Shootings, Health Care Crisis, Boomer and Gen X Retirement savings failure, Inflation Crisis, Flint Water Crisis, Militarization of Local Police Forces, Too Big To Fail Bailouts, on and on and on.
I understand the atrocities that have happened in the past. I understand that atrocities that are going on right now. I really believe we need to evaluate our national and international priorities right now.
Foreign Aid to Israel is dwarfed by the foreign aid spent by the US to Arab nations, including the Palestinians. ($3B vs $18B). But it’s interesting that you pick Israel as your example.
This is demonstrably incorrect. Israel receives 44% of the MENA budget from congress (7 billion, not sure where you find 18). The majority of the rest goes to Egypt Jordan and Lebanon. 276 million went to west bank and Gaza. Your turn.
Young liberals in the US are moraly blind by academic ideas of “decolonization” and identity politics, that they become the supporters of an ISIS like organization, alongside with Iran, Russia and North Korea. The abillity to justify this Islamic terror shows that the lesson from 9/11 wasn’t taught well enough to young Americans, that can’t see how Islamic fundamentalists are using their “tolerance” to destroy any Western core value.
Thank you for your words, Scott