u/Efficient_Phase1313

EDIT: Looking at the comments, a reminder this post is about the ORIGIN of the conflict. The conflict today is vastly different than it was 150 years ago. But many people like to waste time projecting their fictional narratives over the entire period. As someone whose family lived in Ottoman Palestine, for the layman, I hope this can act as a starting point grounded in reality, as opposed to tracing the conflict backwards from today through heaps of myth and propaganda.

This is the most clear and concise description of the conflict I could come up with if I'm centering empathy on the Palestinian side. Obviously not everyone will agree with it but it is at least far more historically accurate than the current prevailing narrative on the source of the conflict, and I hope rational open minded people will go 'wow, this actually makes a lot of sense' and perhaps start doing their own research and looking to broader sources. I'm partly aware of this because my grandfather lived in British/Ottoman Palestine, spoke Arabic, and had Palestinian friends. And growing up with many Palestinian friends decades before this current discourse erupted, I can confirm this was the prevailing narrative and consumed the majority of our discourse in Israel - Palestinian conflict discussion groups where representatives from Palestine would often come to bring their stories and discuss their solutions to the conflict. This new black and white settler colonial narrative only began to take over Palestinian discourse in the past decade, and seeing the shift first hand is a unique personal experience that others simply don't share. Anyways, here's the historically accurate context of the current conflict:

To add proper context to the conflict, it was never a black and white issue about colonization and indigenous resistance but a class issue against new immigrants similar to the white replacement theory. Unless you can tell me Theodore Herzl predicted WW1 and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, or had some insane plan to go to war with the Ottomans for independence, the intention of the Zionist project was to be a community of legal immigrants and Ottoman citizens with representation in the Ottoman court. The early Zionists even had some of the political class learn Turkish so they could advocate for themselves as legal residents. The term colony back then just referred to an immigrant group, back then Dearborn Michigan would be considered a colony in the same way.

The issue was prior to Zionist migration, Fellahin (the peasant workers) were considered the lowest class in local arab society, and largely constituted recent migrants from Jordan who founded small farming villages on previously uninhabited land. The ancient, indigenous Palestinian population (which absolutely exists) mainly lived in the cities they had always lived in since Roman times. Despite Fellahin being the lowest rung of local arab society, Jews were still considered the lowest class of all.

When the Zionists arrived and started forming a growing immigrant middle class, the Fellahin were being reduced to the actual lowest class, even beneath the only group they were previously above (the jews). To add insult to injury, the Fellahin that were hired by the new Jewish migrants quickly joined the growing middle class, but there were only enough jobs for a minority and this further pushed the remaining Fellahin down the social hierarchy, leaving them in fear of effectively becoming an 'untouchable' class in arab society which had previously allowed them at least some respect as fellow Muslims and the freedom to till their own land without competition from other farmers. Originally the land was divided into city dwellers and rural farmers, but the Jewish immigrants were taking up space in the farming sector of society and the direct competition was leaving the remaining Fellahin losing more available land (not land they owned, but land they always saw as potential opportunity for livelihood) and being further left behind.

This inevitably led to a predictable backlash and enmity against the Zionist migrants and is largely the cause of the conflict. And to me, that's very understandable and there's a lot of sympathy to be had for the Fellahin and its hard to argue that what happened to them was fair since no one stepped in to address their concerns, they felt the need to protect their livelihoods by taking matters into their own hands. And that's worth discussing. But we can't solve the conflict and right that wrong if we don't acknowledge reality for what it is. The sad thing is this false 'settler colonial' narrative in the more traditional European sense has now created two realities that neither side is willing to budge on, making it harder to find a common ground towards a peaceful future. The narrative that the Israelis come from genocidal European Nazis who took the land at gun point from the get go is objectively fiction so you'll never convince the Israelis to admit to something that didn't happen. At the same time, the Palestinians will never admit to the above narrative because that requires them to accept that responding to the class crisis caused by the new Zionist migrants by rejecting statehood and doubling down on forever wars was a disastrous and self-inflicted miscalculation. This is even harder to accept as they see that the Palestinians who did choose to live among the Jews (today's arab Israelis) are flourishing and by admitting to all of the above they have to accept what they could have had and that they suffered for nothing, whereas its much easier to assume their current state was outside their locus of control and thus violent resistance was their only choice.

It's this unfortunate dichotomy that has made the current conflict intractable, and unless some degree of historical realism is accepted neither side is ever going to find common ground and budge on their current red lines

EDIT: Some people are taking this post incorrectly, so to be clear this isn't a statement on the deal being good or bad. This obviously is not the desired outcome nor the best policy and its well known that the Vance-Witkoff-Kushner wing beat out the Rubio-Hegseth-Bennett wing of the administration likely due to pressure from Turkey, Qatar and Pakistan with Saudi Arabia just going where the wind blows (with the opposing side being Israel-UAE left out to dry). People say they are tired of waiting, etc etc. Look, you're either in this fight for the long haul or you're not. You either want the regime to fall or you don't. If you DO want the IRGC to be defeated, we have to deal with the reality on the ground and build our policies around that. My point is we do not know what situation we are currently in. It could be far more favorable for regime change then we think, or it can be a complete capitulation and failure. We don't know. And until we do, it only helps the IRGC to convince more people to 'give up' or that 'the fight is lost because Trump surrendered'. The point of my post is exactly that, don't give into IRGC defeatism yet. Once we see the fine print, we very well may have to. But until then, stay rational and think about where we actually are, where the IRGC is, and what can be done to ensure they eventually fall and a free Iran is achieved.

Hello, I am the DoW employee who made a post months ago about the efficacy of the blockade which was well received, and another post that I deleted about the potential deal to be signed before it was signed.

Well, we've now signed what sounds very much like the deal I previously mentioned. In short, the only things we know now are Iran opens the strait with no tolls, US lifts blockade, 60 day ceasefire extension. In a vacuum, that would be a tremendous defeat for the IRGC. The question is are they getting any money out of this deal. And while they most certainly are, no one knows right now what that money entails.

To briefly cover my statement from the previously deleted post: if this is just strait is opened in exchange for lifting the blockade and partial sanctions relief on oil sales and NOTHING else, that is a TREMENDOUS win for the anti-IRGC coalition from a tangible standpoint. Obviously each side will try to present themselves as the winner here so I wouldn't be too concerned with who comes out of this with more 'international clout' or who 'looks stronger' because ultimately the goal is the collapse and defeat of the IRGC. It doesn't matter if idiots on the internet, leftist pundits, or gulf states think the IRGC 'looks strong' if at the end of the day they are too financially ruined and divided to maintain power and prevent an uprising.

The main concern is how much money is the IRGC getting out of this deal. Any upfront money (e.g. unfreezing of assets) is a tremendous win for the IRGC and an embarrassing capitulation by Trump that makes this deal look far worse than Obama's. An 'understanding' to unfreeze assets/release sanctions in the future if Iran follows through on terms they most certainly won't is fine because the IRGC won't give up the nuclear material and then they don't get any money. That's what this is all about. What is the IRGC getting tomorrow? And right now we don't know.

The IRGC's propaganda wing is out in full force claiming 'we're getting 12 billion USD unfrozen tomorrow' or 'complete lifting of oil sanctions'. This could be true, and this could be a horrendous deal. But right now WE DON'T KNOW. So before we go around spreading the doom and gloom the IRGC psyops want us to believe, we should be patient and quiet until we know exactly what the deal entails.

Again, if its open the strait in exchange for ending blockade + partial sanctions relief on Iranian oil, that's still a HUGE win for the anti-IRGC coalition, because they give up their biggest (really their only) trump card/piece of leverage (the strait) in exchange for barely surviving economically. Even with partial sanctions relief on oil sales, they have to sell that oil. It won't provide enough money up front to deal with the massive economic damage they've suffered from the conflict. But if they DO receive billions up front (e.g. unfrozen assets or major sanctions relief) then that's different and it's a loss for us and a win for the IRGC.

But right now we don't know, so let's calm down and see what the details are. Personally, I'm not optimistic, but literally no one outside the smallest circle of deal makers actually knows who is coming out of this ahead. For all we know it could just a be a total wash that kicks the can down the road past midterms. It could be a victory, a complete capitulation, or a wash. We don't know. So let's wait, and not play into the IRGC's propaganda by assuming the worst

Hello all! Big vintage anime collector here, I own multiple animage issues (and some original publicity cels for images used in the issues I have) but have never been able to locate a good condition copy of the 1982 February issue. If anyone here knows someone who could help me find a copy for my collection I'd greatly appreciate it! Thanks!