Article 49 of the Geneva Conventions prohibits ethnic cleansing:
Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.
Any coerced transfer of Palestinians to the Sinai or Jordan or wherever would be a prima facie violation of this statute.
I know the response from many would be, "war crimes aren't real," and as much as I disagree with that viewpoint, let's set it aside. The real significance here is that if the United States and Israel openly commit ethnic cleansing, that act would be the official abandonment of the postwar moral consensus that has ruled the institutions of the First World for almost 80 years. The secular religion of the United States defines Hitler as Satan and the Geneva Conventions as its commandments. To flout those commandments would be publicly discarding the standard that makes Hitler into Satan.
Yes, US proxies have violated the Geneva Conventions several times and gotten away with it if they were valuable enough. But the fallout of this decision would be far bigger than that. Popes have gotten away with all kinds of degeneracy and graft behind the scenes, but a Pope has never publicly broken the commandments against adultery or theft and told everyone to just get over it.
The natural response would be, "well if you can get away with it, how come Satan can't?" And the emperor has no clothes.
Yes. That's precisely what I'm saying.
Fair enough. Maybe I should restate my point that "Yugoslavia would have gotten away with it" in today's world.
Not mutually exclusive statements.
Yep, as I thought, "no this doesn't matter"
Israel is polling at sub 30% favorability with Americans 35 and under. They're living on borrowed time and by extension, the whole Jewish diaspora is in trouble.
Then you have a point. But how much it actually affects the actions of states, as oppose dto post facto justification, is a separate matter. It's very easy to persuade people to go to war, you know, regardless of nominal form of government. Goering pointed that out right before he was executed.
That depends not on the morality of the matter, but on whether it is in the interests of the #1 great power to do something about it. It seems to be very interested in breaking up hostile states, so I'd say no, they'd have bombed Yugoslavia into smithereens even today.
You're correct: the same hubris that led the US to conquer Iraq led it to try the same in Ukraine. I think Russia would have done the same regardless of what happened in Iraq though. It wasn't going to hand over its only warm water port to NATO under any circumstance.
What is the favorability of Egypt or Saudi Arabia? Or UAE? Or China when Nixon went there?
What Americans believe about foreign policy simply does not matter to the rulers. They want their stationary aircraft carrier in the Middle East, and by golly, they'll do anything to keep it. They will then clothe this in rhetoric that appeals to liberals ("only democracy in the middle east") or evangelicals ("God's chosen people").
Propaganda seizes on sources of discontent. American actions give Putin an opening just as French and British actions gave Hitler an opening. The propaganda then harnesses the groundswell of energy from the people. Goering said it was easy to start a war because at the time it actually was stunningly easy!
You seem to think I'm saying American power brokers actually care about the Geneva Conventions in their heart of hearts. What I am saying in fact is that they don't care, but they use the conventions as a tool to manufacture consent. If Israel turns Gaza into a resort, that tool is now broken. And yes - that matters!
You seem to come back to this theme that consent of the people is insignificant because governments simply do what they want. In reality it is highly significant and when improperly managed the people will revolt. This past November is an earthshattering demonstration.
Of course Russia always had their sights on Crimea, but then you have to ask yourself: why invade in 2014? Why not 2012? 2005? The obvious answer is because in 2014 America had weakened itself in Iraq and Afghanistan and degraded itself with Obama's self-flagellation.
Totally irrelevant. Israel's entire existence depends on their umbilical cord to America, and when zoomers and disenchanted millennials become powerful enough to cut it off, Israel is done. Don't believe me? Then ask yourself why the deep state is getting thrown out in the street by a bunch of 19-year olds.
I truly don't understand how you can type "what Americans believe about foreign policy simply doesn't matter" when MAGA saved us from invading Iran with Nikki Haley or anyone else at the helm. It would also be worth considering why we haven't invaded Iran previously, as well.
Isn't it still?
Look, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that it will have zero effect. I'm just saying that you probably grossly overestimate the extent to which there would be any sort of effect. Even leaving aside the anti-democratic nature of the modern West, people simply don't care about what their countries do elsewhere, unless it affects them.
Oh, I absolutely got the first part. Only a great moron would believe that the ruling class believes in this sort of thing. As for the second part, Putin may be able to exploit it because he has his country's propaganda apparatus drumming away at it, but the Western propaganda apparatus will be drumming away at "Israel made Gaza bloom: from a terrorist-infested failed state to the Eden it is today". They'll manufacture consent just as well, perhaps with slightly less ease because you can't fool all of the people all of the time.
There is no bar.
It's highly unusual. I live in Europe where the ruling classes have been foisting immigration on us for 50 years, which has utterly wrecked the continent. And what do people do? Nothing. You think they'd care about a little ethnic cleansing that dudn't affect them? Not a bit, unless they can virtue-signal about it... and they won't be if they're accusing their own rulers or their rulers' puppetmasters the Americans.
Because Ukraine was coup'ed in 2014 which made it a now or never moment.
Let's be real, and this in no way reflects on the American people, but the American government has done plenty wrong, both against its own people and people elsewhere. As European governments have. Whether the kind of virtue-signaling apologies are appropriate is a separate question.
I'm enjoying the show but not yet getting my hopes up. Let's see what sticks. A few 100k votes difference, and Trump would be in jail, and everything bad would be happening.
To be honest, I think the only difference between Trump-1 and Rubio-1 was the embassy move to Jerusalem and the strike on Soleimani. Where he did not depart in being more hawkish, was just mostly neocon nonsense. I'm hoping he'll do better this time around.