Surprisingly, despite being in the south, most people seem to support Palestine. Except for this one trump supporting guy who screams that Israel is the "only democracy" in the middle east and how the Muslims are "terrorists" It's kind of funny because just a couple days ago, he was screeching "America First! America First! Stop giving aid to Ukraine. Take care of our own!" (Not a bad thing) but apparently, Israel doesn't count and we "need to send them more money."
I remember how it felt after 9/11, where it was like a deluge of hatred against Muslims and bloodthirsty. It was frightening.
Right now feels different. I haven't encountered a lot of pro-Israel people, even the conservatives and libs seem wary. I live in the south too. The only bloodthirsty type I've encountered so far is an ex-marine coworker who is a surface level lunatic. He keeps complaining the IDF has too much trans activism to fight against Hamas, so that's the type of rhetoric I'm hearing.
It's all been either tepid sort of "war is bad" or just unhinged racist conspiracy theories. Actually feels a lot different than the initial Iraq War surge.
Anyone crying about muslim "terrorists" needs to learn about Lehi/Irgun and what they did and called themselves.
Anyone crying "it's the only democracy" needs to answer why an Israeli born in the west bank gets to vote but a Palestinian born in west bank doesn't.
Anyone opposing Palestinian liberation needs to answer if they acknowledge the genocide being perpetrated against Palestinians. Either they are ignorant or will reveal themselves as genocide supporters.
Most people I know either just don’t want WW3 to start or are pro-Palestine. I’ve taken to saying “for legal reasons I can’t discuss this right now” when it comes up with coworkers or strangers or whoever I’m not sure about, which says a lot while technically saying nothing I feel.
I have a couple close friends that are on the “both sides” bullshit and I just told them outright that we aren’t gonna talk about it until they grow up and are prepared to consider other perspectives.
it's honestly been pretty fucking hard on me. whenever i think about the whole situation, especially how western media will do anything to twist the narrative, i get pretty bummed. seeing pro palestinian sentiment online though has been reinvigorating and beautiful. i hope this situation can bring more people onto the left and in solidarity with working and oppressed peoples worldwide
I guess Canada has enough Muslims and minorities who identify with Palestine that our state media has to both-sides the situation enough that people feel sympathetic for Palestinians.
All the parties have the same conclusions on Ukraine though, because of Ukrainian diaspora we let in after WW2, seems we're more unified on that than the US; being pro-peace instead of sending more weapons is way more taboo here.
On Israel, realistically Canada has 0 say on the situation, this is one of the many things where we just defer to US foreign policy. The two parties that can realistically be elected are very pro-israel, the third socdem party's representatives are pretty cucked into being pro-israel too (even if the members tend to be more pro-palestine than the others).
But our prime minister paid lip service to providing humanitarian aid on both sides (whatever that'll look like with Israel's siege, and calling Hamas terrorists), and said Israel has the right to defend itself within the bounds of international law (a caveat America would never put on that statement).
One of my coworkers came up to me and said "damn, I can't believe they have that many people living in that small an area without much water or infrastructure", even though I avoid talking about politics at work (other than pro-union stuff).
