In a podcast interview, former President Barack Obama suggested that all parties are complicit to some extent in the Israel-Palestine conflict, acknowledging the complexity of the situation.
He emphasized the need to consider multiple perspectives and engage in constructive dialogue.
Obama said, “All of us are complicit to some degree.” (Trending: Pro Sport Announces Shock Decision On Transgender Athletes)
“If there’s any chance of us being able to act constructively, to do something, it will require an admission of complexity,” said the former president.
“And maintaining, what on the surface may seem contradictory ideas — that what Hamas did was horrific, and there’s no justification for it; and what is also true is that the occupation [sic] and what’s happening to Palestinians is unbearable,” he continued.
“And what is also true is that there is a history of the Jewish people that may be dismissed unless your grandparents, or your great-grandparents, or your uncle, or your aunt tell you stories about the madness of antisemitism. And what is true is that there are people right now who are dying who have nothing to do with what Hamas did. And what is true, right — I mean, we can go on for a while,” explained Obama.
“And the problem with the social media, and trying to — TikTok activism, and trying to debate this, on that, is you can’t speak the truth. You can pretend to speak the truth. You can speak one side of the truth, and in some cases, you can try to maintain your moral innocence, but that won’t solve the problem,” said Obama.
“And so if you want to solve the problem, you have to take in the whole truth, and you then have to admit nobody’s hands are clean, that all of us are complicit to some degree,” claimed the former president.
“I look at this, and I think back, ‘What could I have done during my presidency to move this forward’ — as hard as I tried, and I’ve got the scars to prove it. But there’s a part of me that’s still saying, well, ‘Was there something else I could have done?’ That’s the conversation we should be having. Not just looking backwards, but looking forward. And that can’t happen if we are confining ourselves to our outrage,” warned Obama.
“I would rather see you out there talking to people, including people who you disagree with. If you genuinely want to change things, then you’ve got to figure out how to speak to somebody on the other side, and listen to them, and understand what they are talking about, and not dismiss it. Because you can’t save that child without their help. Not in this situation,” said Obama.
Critics, however, argue that Obama’s approach creates a false moral equivalence and minimizes the severity of violence perpetrated by groups like Hamas.
They also highlighted his post-modern stance and past responses to similar conflicts as problematic.
Political analyst, Joel Pollack, said, “Obama’s approach matches his posture toward the Middle East throughout his presidency. He creates a false moral equivalence between the deliberate murder of 1,400 people in Israel, with extreme brutality, with an ‘occupation’ that does not exist in Gaza and that exists in the West Bank only because the Palestinian Authority refuses to agree to peace with Israel.”
“He adopts a post-modern approach that insists there is not one truth, but many truths, which has the effect of minimizing the evil of genocidal violence, as practiced by Hamas, into merely one perspective among many,” he continued.
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