Thread on Refaat Alareer. I strongly disagree with his past statements defending October 7 and describing all Israeli civilians as combatants.
1. Refaat attacked the left wing Prime Minister of Nepal for condemning the shooting of Nepalis and other civilians on October 7
2. Refaat Alareer condemned Ilhan Omar and compared her to “an Israeli Nazi” because she denounced Hamas hostage taking and murder of civilians on October 7.
This is despite Ilhan Omar’s long record of criticising the Israeli government and supporting Palestinians
3. Refaat Alareer attacked the Prime Minister of Kosovo and Irish Foreign Minister simply because they condemned Hamas hostage taking and murder of civilians on October 7.
The Irish Foreign Minister was calling for a ceasefire on October 7 and Refaat condemned him for it
4. Refaat Alareer compared a Palestinian refugee from Gaza to an apologist for the Holocaust because the man wrote an opinion piece pointing out that most Palestinians in Gaza had nothing to do with Hamas and did not approve of them. Ahmed had personally lost innocent young family members to IDF bombing and wanted to show how many innocents were being harmed by Israeli policies of collective punishment
5. Refaat Alareer responded to news of a random terror attack on civilians in Tel Aviv by arguing that all Israeli civilians are justified military targets with “Palestinian and Arab blood on their hands”
6. Refaat Alareer explicitly celebrated the October 7 Hamas attacks on civilians.
He defended the Hamas attack on kibbutzim filled with civilians by writing “Israel uses third class Jews as human shields to protect white Jews”
7. Despite previously arguing that all Israeli civilians are legitimate military targets, Refaat Alareer switched to full blown October 7 atrocity denialism as the extent of Hamas atrocities became clearer in the days after the attack.
First he used softer language, arguing that “Israeli forces were responsible for *some* of their own civilian deaths.”
Then he claimed that Israel “systematically and deliberately murdered its soldiers and settlers including little ones who were held hostage.”
The evolution of this conspiracy theory is telling. As Hamas atrocities became more and more indefensible, it started off with the claim that at least some of hostages were accidentally killed by the IDF in cross-fire. It then mutates into blood libel, a claim that Israel systematically slaughtered its own babies and children as a false flag attack to manufacture consent for genocide.
Note that even here, while claiming Israel slaughtered its own civilians, Refaat still would not use the term “civilian,” instead using the term “settlers” to dehumanise the victims and imply that their deaths are to some extent deserved. He used the term “settler” even to speak about children
8. Refaat’s persistent and continued denial of Hamas atrocities against Israeli civilians evolved to a point where he argued Hamas “attacked Israeli military bases and only military bases.” Two sentences later he flipped and admitted Hamas took civilian hostages but calls them “settlers” to dehumanise them and justify their hostage taking despite hostage taking being a war crime under international humanitarian law. He also denied Hamas’ use of rape as a weapon of war against Israeli women despite abundant testimony from witnesses and first responders
9. Refaat made vulgar jokes about Israeli victims in the course of denying Hamas atrocities against Israeli civilians, sarcastically asking whether Israeli babies were cooked “with or without baking powder.”
Information about October 7 was fluid in early days and some horrific claims were later to be disproven. But young children were still killed, injured and taken hostage by Hamas so jokes like this on the part of Refaat were dehumanising and wrong
10. Refaat taunted traumatised Israelis, claiming frail and elderly women taken hostage at gun point by Hamas fighters had “bonded with their captors.” He claimed “ALL the rape allegations are lies.” As though Hamas fighters who filmed themselves parading the shattered, half-naked and contorted body of Shani Louk through the streets of Gaza while spitting on and slapping her corpse would not in a million years use rape as a weapon of war.
11. I understand Refaat Alareer grew up traumatised by persistent violence, brutality, occupation. I wish he had not been killed and I wish peace and coexistence between Palestinians and Israelis were possible.
Hatred and dehumanisation are not the answer. Neither Palestinians or Israelis are evil. These two societies have both been scarred and traumatised by more than a century now of bloody violence and massacres. It will drag on forever and claim so many more innocent lives unless a lasting political settlement is concluded. Mutual recognition of both Palestinian and Israeli humanity is the only path forward.
I condemn all attacks on civilians whether Israeli or Palestinian. I denounce all the horrific atrocities and endless rounds of revenge killing we have seen throughout the century of this conflict. I stand on the side of both Palestinian and Israeli civilians
12. Refaat attacked Mehdi Hasan - one of the loudest pro-Palestinian voices in mainstream media - simply because Mehdi Hasan condemned the hostage taking of Israeli children.
13. Refaat: “Are most Jews evil? Of course they are.”
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At the Mearsheimer event in Brisbane Australia, I asked John Mearsheimer why anybody should ever listen to him about Ukraine ever again considering he has been wrong about Ukraine every single time and now quotes Russian military bloggers like “Big Serge,” he just dodged response and claimed he has been proven correct in Ukraine because Ukraine is still suffering against Russia.
I’ll try get video up as soon as I get a hold of it.
Text of my full question:
In your infamous 2015 University of Chicago lecture, you dismissed the idea that Russia would ever try to ‘’conquer Ukraine’’ — arguing ‘’Putin is much too smart for that.’’
Then, in the lead up to the 2022 invasion, you argued, and I quote you word for word: ‘’What the Russians are going to do is CRUSH the Ukrainians. They’re going to bring out the big guns. They’re going to turn places like Kyiv and other cities in Ukraine into rubble. It will be like Fallujah, Mosul, Grozny.’’ You argued Western intervention would be pointless because Russia would level Ukraine and go nuclear against the West.
Then, in an interview with Chinese Communist Party controlled media outlet CGTN on February 23rd this year, you said, and again, I quote you word for word: ‘’Conventional wisdom in the West has long been that Vladimir Putin was an imperialist and he was determined to conquer Ukraine and make it part of a Greater Russia. There is NO evidence to support that.’’
So first, we were told that Russia and Putin will NEVER try conquer Ukraine.
Then you told us that Russia will CRUSH the Ukrainians.
Then, when Russia invades but fails to take Kyiv, you argue there is NO evidence Russia ever wanted to conquer Ukraine.
Your claim that there is NO evidence for that Putin is an imperialist completely beggars belief.
ONE, Putin claims Ukraine is not a country and has never existed as a country. He openly compares himself to Peter the Great while musing on territorial conquest. Here is a Putin quote: ‘’What was Peter doing? Taking back and reinforcing. That’s what he did. And it looks like it fell on us to take back and reinforce as well.’’ And while he muses about taking back Russian land, Russian military recruitment ads show Russian soldiers talking about the flats they will buy and occupy in Kyiv and Odessa.
TWO, Russian forces have systematically executed all Ukrainian cultural and civic leaders in every Ukrainian town that they have occupied. They leave behind mass graves, torture chambers and death pits.
THREE, Putin was indicted by the International Criminal Court for forcibly transferring hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia to be raised as Russian. Some three million Ukrainians have been deported to Russia, this is an act of genocide, an attempt to wipe out Ukraine as a nation and incorporate its children into Russia. For comparison: Nazi Germany deported about 200,000 Polish children for assimilation during the entire Second World War.
FOUR, Russia targets civilian energy infrastructure in Ukraine with the goal of making the country uninhabitable and ungovernable. They spent months last year boasting that they would freeze millions of Ukrainians to death.
So, my question. John, You have been wrong over and over and over again on Ukraine, blatantly wrong. You hang out with Victor Orban and quote crazy sleazy Russian military bloggers named “BIG SERGE” in your writings.
You’ve claimed to the New Yorker that Putin has never lied to other world leaders, you even said that Hitler only ever lied once or twice to other world leaders? You’ve burnt your credibility, why should we take anything you say seriously ever again?
He wouldn’t properly intellectually engage with my questions so I had to tell him the truth
Oh and the bloke sitting next to Mearsheimer is Australia’s own shittier version of him, Peter Varghese - Chancellor of the University of Queensland. He oversaw UQ’s attempt to expel me as a student for leading campus protests against the CCP
Jackson Hinkle is now the 6th biggest Twitter account by reach, performing 1637 times better than expected for an account with same follower count. 1637 TIMES. He was speaking at Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs last month, we know who backs him. But why does Elon boost him?
Jackson claims to care about Palestinian lives but supports Wagner, organisation responsible for the Moura Massacre in Mali, murdering up to 500 civillians and burying them in mass graves.
My thread on Wagner war crimes here:
Elon Musk directly boosting Jackson Hinkle on Twitter - while Jackson celebrates Russian war crimes against Ukrainians. Here he gloats about 50,000 Ukrainian civillians losing limbs to Russia
Wow. I did not know Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese gave a bizarro pro-Assad speech at a “Hands Off Syria” gala dinner in June 2013. He described the Assad regime as a “sophisticated, secular state” fighting “religious fundamentalism.”
Within two months of Albanese’s June 2013 speech endorsing the Assad regime, Bashar launched his hideous Gouta chemical attack that murdered thousands of civilians.
One of the great joys of Australian multiculturalism is we get fascist groups from all over the world - Russian pro-Putin paramilitary groups, Assadists, CCP ultras, Hindutva extremists, Sikh extremists, Greek Golden Dawn Nazis, Turkish Grey Wolves, Serb Chetniks, Croatian Ustase
Igor ''Strelkov'' Girkin was arrested today by the Kremlin for speaking against Putin. The media describe him as a ''blogger.'' But perhaps no one other than Putin himself bears as much personal responsibility for the war in Ukraine. Thread on Girkin and his war crimes
Girkin is best known for his role as the commander in charge of the shootdown of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. Girkin was found guilty in absentia by Dutch courts and convicted for the murder of 298 people. Girkin himself stated: ''I feel a moral responsibility for these deaths''
As DPR ''Minister of Defense,'' Girkin worked with other terrorist militants Dubinsky and Kharchenko to transfer a Russian BUK missile launcher across the Russian border and into eastern Ukraine. He was working as a colonel in Russian military intelligence the entire time.
More evidence Wagner PMC have gone WOKE. Yevgeny Prigozhin has taken to Telegram to announce he will host Sam Smith for a special performance of “Unholy” in the halls of the Kremlin should he take power later this week. The woke mind virus takes another victim @stillgray please… https://t.co/reUwCWghFKtwitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Yevgeny Prigozhin has also confirmed he will host drag queen story time on Red Square and make Bud Light the official beer of the Kremlin. How much did the CIA pay him?
Latest Prigozhin post to Telegram (12.36 PM Moscow Time)
“He's sat back while she's dropping it, she be popping it
Yeah, she put it down slowly
Oh-ee-oh-ee-oh, he left his kids at
Ho-ee-oh-ee-ome, so he can get that
Mummy don't know daddy's getting hot
At the body shop, doing… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
We now have ID on six of the nine pro-Russian fascists at Sydney Town Hall. James Walters has Nazi tattoos, George Jameson is linked to Nazi associates of the Christchurch massacre shooter, Bill Milic is a Serb fascist Chetnik supporter. Artem Kozmin may have fought in Donbass.… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Bill Milic, Serb ultranationalist Chetnik supporter (Nazi collaborators during World War II)
James Walters tried to hide his right arm in the photos taken at Sydney Town Hall because he has multiple Nazi tattoos on his right arm