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A 🧵on ceasefires. In my experience, 3 elements are normally needed. Readiness by both sides to stop fighting (on conditions). A broker to negotiate a deal. And int supervision to give confidence that both sides will respect the terms. Gaza conflict is not at this point yet 1/6
On readiness to stop fighting, Netanyahu seeks destruction of Hamas (impossible - he will have to settle for enough damage done to its mil power) + release of all hostages. Hamas demands release of all Palestinian prisoners in Israel in return. Tough negotiation lies ahead 2/6
The honest broker role has usually been the US using mix of diplomatic weight and mil muscle. Think Kissinger (1973 ME war), Habib (1982 Lebanon), Holbrooke (1995 Bosnia). Sometimes a group can work (Ahtisaari/Chernenko forced Milosevic to accept a G8 plan on Kosovo in 1999) 3/6
In Gaza, no single broker w’d have confidence of both sides. It will need a group involving eg US, Egypt, Qatar. There will have to be arm-twisting to get both sides to the table. Only US can pressure Israel: the rift over a humanitarian pause is a first public sign of this 4/6
On int supervision of a ceasefire, in the past this has often been UN blue-helmets or a UN-authorised US-led peacekeeping force. Neither looks feasible given state of Israel/UN relations and risks to Western troops in Gaza. Some form of multilateral force from Arab states? 5/6
Finally, is there any point in calling for a ceasefire? Depends on your objective. If you want to take a principled position, then yes, absolutely. If your interest is in practical proposals as a first step to a ceasefire, then a humanitarian pause has to be the priority 6/6
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1720700329769967909.html
Sorry, yes. Thanks, @kelvin.
It's thread from a few days ago that I saw today when it was commented on by Sonia Sodha.
I think my post a few above might have been optimistic
Labour says Gaza ceasefire would help Hamas after frontbencher resigns over Starmer’s stance
guardian blog.
Rone - you may feel Starmer is a bit too far right for your tastes, and that’s fine, but given the choice of someone at the right of the Labour Party, or someone at the (historical) right of the Tory Party I know who I’m choosing.
To be honest, I’m probably one of those middle class, slightly academic, Guardian reading, left of the middle ground types that Starmer’s politics appeals to.
Probably.
I would like him to sit on the fence a little less, but I can understand the need to do it 12 months out.
On tea of coffee, as a drink, coffee except when feeling ill, as code words, there isn’t one to mend the other. The ex-punk on HIGNFY was spot on.
Were the Undertones “Punk”?!
Rone – you may feel Starmer is a bit too far right for your tastes, and that’s fine
Rone is perfectly capable of speaking for himself but that really isn't what I am picking up is at the crux of rone's comments.
My understanding is that he feels that Starmer's cures for the UK's economic ills won't work.
I agree. If they won't work for the Tories why will they work for Starmer and his cut-and-paste chancellor?
You either go for a radically different approach or you accept the status quo. Just choose.
Starmers positions are no longer remotely left wing. right of centre. somewhere around where Heath would have been
I understand why he is doing this even tho I think it wrong
right of centre. somewhere around where Heath would have been
You think Starmer is that far left? I very much doubt you'd see Starmer caving in to the miners, or calling a general election on a single issue to let the voters have their say. Probably other stuff too but my knowledge of Heath's record is patchy at best. All I know is that he was definitely in the wrong party, and probably much further to the left of where Starmer is now (and that's without considering the support of war crimes).
All I know is that he was definitely in the wrong party
Not really. Until the collapse of the post-war consensus the Tory Party was a social-democratic party which supported a mixed economy and universal welfare state.
Albeit a business friendly social-democratic party.
He’s pretty similar to Theresa May in policy terms, isn’t he?
Rone – you may feel Starmer is a bit too far right for your tastes, and that’s fine
I do - but more relevent than that - you just can't technically and operationally improve a Western economy like ours by both balancing the books and expecting magical growth. It's counter intuitive. To deny it is folly.
When you start talking government 'book' balancing (like Reeves) then you are leaving nothing to go in to the public sector and then circulate through the private sector and create the growth they claim we need.
You can call it left-wing if you want but here's the secret - the right need it too. Because there is no private money without the state creating money for us to spend in the first place. The government backs all credit from commerical banks too.
The thing is Labour are being driven by right-wing thinking - the belief that the Government saves money up from surpluses.
It's garbage.
Government's with central banks issue the money each time they need to buy things (Supply & Appropriations act) - They don't pull from a savings account! I know why they think this way, it's so they can appeal to that prudent Conservative thinking. Household etc.
Government's mostly don't run surpluses (I think about 6 in the last 40 years or so.) - conversely it's totally natural to run a deficit. When they do run a surplus (Clinton) - recession often follows because a surplus is drain of money out of the private sector, and the taxation just deletes the money recovered - never to enter circulation again.
Starmer was on record not even 3 years ago saying (and there's a video clip) - Government spending doesn't function like a household. So why did he change his mind over something so cruicial? And yes you can say appealing to the centre ground is to get traction with voters - but he appears to be doing it by getting all his macro-economics second hand from raving monetarists. The people that gave us trickle-down.
This is what happens when you base your economics on bogus Tory economics. And that's why the centre is flawed too.
There is no real economic scrutiny - just an acceptance that if we do it the Conservative way it will work.
Many / most economists would agree that in times of low growth you ramp up borrowing and spending and in high inflation you reduce it - I think
Rone is an advocate of the magic money tree - I mean modern monetary theory. By my understanding the main difference in this compared to Keynesian economics is when you turn the spending taps off and if running a surplus is ever needed and how serious inflation is? Correct me if I am wrong Rone - I'm sure you will 😉 I don't agree with Rone on this stuff but acknowledge he does know more. However right now is the time we should be investing in infrastructure and not mega projects but lots of small ones if you follow MMT or Keynes. Monetarism has been shown not to work. That way you end up with stagflation.
The reason Starmer is doing this is once again fear of the right wing press mislabeling him as wanting to spend money he doesn't have. there is still the fear of the rampant inflation and high interest rates from decades ago
However as Rone points out its an absurd situation to compare national economy to household budgeting if you have borrowing and money printing powers. It does however back Starmer into a corner over spending and this is why his policy position holds no hope for the country.
Its yet another issue where he could have been brave, shown leadership and educated folk but he took the cowards way and followed the right wing lies
Government’s mostly don’t run surpluses (I think about 6 in the last 40 years or so.) – conversely it’s totally natural to run a deficit.
There has been a surplus in 6 years out of the last 70 years I believe.
So if a budgetry deficit signals an economic crisis we have had 64 years of economic crises in the last 70 years.
The biggest and easiest boost to the economy is increasing benefits and minimum wage. Poorer folk spend all their money locally and quickly so it goes round and round the economy. Richer folk hoard it and spend it overseas taking it out of the economy. thats why tax cuts do not lead to much greater economic activity and trickle down does not work
The reason Starmer is doing this is once again fear of the right wing press mislabeling him as wanting to spend money he doesn’t have.
I keep seeing this excuse for Starmer, that he is only doing this to not spook the right wing press and centrist voters. But what is the actual evidence that these are not his beliefs and convictions? IMO Starmer is showing us who he really is, and it is about time people started believing him.
Starmer was on record not even 3 years ago saying (and there’s a video clip) – Government spending doesn’t function like a household. So why did he change his mind over something so cruicial?
from rones post above. Starmer is not stupid - he knows this is nonsense
I don't think that shows his current actions are faked for the media, in fact his purging of progressive voices within labour as soon as he had the power to do so would more indicate that his previous statements were the lies.
IMO Starmer is showing us who he really is
Why? What proof is there?
There is ample proof that Starmer has repeatedly lied throughout his rather short political career, I haven't seen any evidence to suggest that he has now suddenly stopped lying.
People who lie on a day-to-day basis in an attempt to achieve desired objectives don't suddenly stop lying, it's their modus operandi. Starmer hasn't suddenly and fundamentally changed his personality from what it was a couple of years ago.
The truth is that any politician who changes their script from radical left to fiscal conservativism over a matter of just a few months has no idealogical commitment. Only a commitment to personal self fulfillment.
However I have no doubt that Starmer will rule as a right-wing prime minister, because accepting the status quo is incomparably easier than challenging it.
I'd like to know what turned Starmer from a committed and conscientious human rights lawyer, into whatever it is he has become. He seems so hungry for power, he's become blind to any semblance of principles or ethics.
The reasoning is you cannot achieve anything without getting into power - so whatever is needed to be done to get into power so he can do some good. end justifies the means.
Thats the reasoning I am sure. I accept the principle but he has gone too far. He is just scared of the rightwing press
Also I believe him to be a technocrat - he has no real ideology bar a vague desire to do good. Unfortunately he has surrounded himself with rightwingers so that is all he hears. Nor is he a leader. Its just not his skillset.
By my understanding the main difference in this compared to Keynesian economics is when you turn the spending taps off and if running a surplus is ever needed and how serious inflation is?
Keynesianism is basically just about borrowing when you need it (to boost the economy), then saving when times are good ("fixing the roof when the sun is shining"). The trouble is in a world of fiat money you don't need to run the economy as if it's a current account. The central tenets of MMT and Keynesianism about the govt driving investment and growth via public spending are largely the same, but the mechanisms and limitations are completely different. In MMT you don't borrow, you just create money and spend it. It's not limited by what the markets can lend you and their confidence in the currency, but by the productive capacity of the economy and the stability of prices. Keynesianism is an outdated economic framework designed for a world of fixed currencies and gold reserves. MMT is it's modern successor based on free floating currencies and the overriding economic power of central banks (aka governments). It makes no sense to cling on to Keynesianism any more than debtor prisons and workhouses.
Dazh – does constantly creating money not devalue it causing inflation? As you can see my understanding is pretty simplistic.
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/mmt/
The reasoning is you cannot achieve anything without getting into power
That is an interesting thought. What exactly do you think Starmer wants to achieve? Beyond making it to the highest office in the land.
Have you seen a list of things which Starmer desperately wants to achieve and needs power to achieve them?
I have not seen anything since his famous "Ten Pledges" to Labour Party members, and apparently none of them are any longer applicable.
Is his list of things which he wants to achieve as PM secret, or just too vague to clearly spell out?
As above - his ideology is vaguely "to do good"
his ideology is vaguely “to do good”
Wow, he's a do-goodist!
Power to the do-goodites!!
does constantly creating money not devalue it causing inflation? As you can see my understanding is pretty simplistic.
The proper use of taxation reins in the inflationary pressure (from one of prof. Rone's pronouncements). If I have the the logic correct.
The generated money should be spent on things that are long-term assets for the country (HS2 frog zample) or lifting people out of poverty as they spend their money and don't hoard it.
Also on Starmer I do not believe its about personal aggrandisement and getting rich like Blair. I simply believe as above – its the end justifies the means
You have far more faith in him than I do, I have to say. I don't see much of him 'trying to do good' in society really. I do see his duplicitousness and desire to do whatever it takes to gain power. But gaining power for its own sake is not a good look. It leaves him looking morally and ethically bankrupt. His ability to bend which ever way the corporate winds are blowing, does not suggest a wholesome, trustworthy character.
Starmer will sack any frontbench rebels who back a SNP amendment calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. I suspect a few might put the lives of innocent children and civilians before their own jobs.
Although I hear rumours that Starmer might actually back a ceasefire himself in not the too distance future, presumably after Israel starts to wind down some of its more destructive operations.
The LibDems are officially backing a ceasefire since the weekend I believe.
The LibDems are officially backing a ceasefire since the weekend I believe.
Well at least one party is talking sense...
Why is it so hard to say 'just pack it in, and especially don't bomb schools and hospitals'.
It's not like this is a new phenomena.
It used to be the case that newspapers illegally hacked politicians accounts.
Today, under Keir Starmer's leadership, the Labour Party illegally hacks newspapers to spy on their own members.
Labour's right-wing bankrupted a council which has been dogged by political scandals, including scandals that have made national TV such as properties unfit for human habitation, and then they expell those who have the audacity to criticise.
I find it totally astonishing that they are prepared to use illegally obtained information to expell just three or four people. They really are completely obsessed with stamping out any criticism.
It must surely give an insight into what expect from our soon to be elected Labour government.
Well at least one party is talking sense…
I was at a Palestine meeting in a South Croydon mosque on Sunday, there were three speakers, Chris Philps Conservative MP for Croydon South, Sarah Jones Labour MP for Croydon Central, and Richard Howard Liberal Democrat candidate for Croydon South.
All three were asked whether they would support an immediate ceasefire. The Tory and Labour speakers refused to back an immediate ceasefire preferring instead to patronise their audience with mealy mouth bollocks about how much they of course care about the loss of so many innocent lives.
In contrast the Liberal Democrat, the last to speak, unequivocally supported an immediate and permanent ceasefire.
Out of the three the LibDem was the only one that has actually seen active service in the Middle East - he was a bomb disposal expert.
He said that he supported an immediate ceasefire for two reasons, firstly for the obvious humanitarian reasons, and secondly for what he said was the military reasons. He basically said that you don't win a war like that by bombing the crap out of people.
The LibDem completely won over the people in the mosque, Labour and the Tory certainly didn't!
You recently posted about Chris Philp in positive terms.
Was that post based on the same meeting or a different one in Croydon?
Are you stalking phill or are you a fan?
All three were asked whether they would support an immediate ceasefire.
If the answer to that question is anything other than a firm 'yes'... Then they shouldn't be in government, in any capacity, or any country.
What israil are doing, is ethinc cleansing, there's no better way to put it unless you say genocide.
Same as what Russia is trying to do in Ukraine.
Why is it so hard to say ‘just pack it in, and especially don’t bomb schools and hospitals’.
Because it is Israel and Israel and their supporters play the anti-semite card which Starmer needs to stay well clear of because of the fear of getting into the mess that Corbyn did not that long ago and needs to ensure he supports Jewish people.
Yes, realise it is not that simple but you know what the press and those completely ignorant readers of the press are like.
Labour having accepted the definition of antisemitism that basically means any critism of Israel is automatically anti semetic have backed themselves into a corner so now they cannot criticise Israel at all
Was that post based on the same meeting or a different one in Croydon?
Are you stalking phill or are you a fan?
Different meeting, same mosque.
At the meeting a couple of weeks ago Chris Philp was the only non-muslim given an opportunity to say something, although he said that he had come to listen, not to speak. It was billed as a meeting held so that the Muslim community could express their concerns to their MP. There were no questions, just statements. And yes he did annoyingly well, choosing his words very carefully and saying that he would convey their concerns to the government.
Last Sunday's meeting was quite different and it included the Labour MP from the neighbouring constituency plus the Liberal Democrat candidate.
There were no statements from the Muslim community just questions, and Philp was given the opportunity to report back who in government he had conveyed their concerns to (he is the police minister)
This time he did badly and I was surprised just how rattled he got when he was put on the spot over support for a ceasefire. He also got rattled when he was challenged over public statements he made concerning last Saturday's demo, which was basically regurgitating Braverman's nonsense about anti-semitism and hate. He tried to play it down saying that he was referring to "a tiny minority". He clearly doesn't handle pressure well.
For me the most disappointing aspect of the meeting was the lack of anyone from the Green Party, especially as the Green Party takes such a pro-Palestinian position. Afterwards I mentioned it to the guy who organised the meeting (who through pure coincidence I have cycled with in the past) and he said that the Green Party was approached but they weren't interested in sending anyone to the meeting. He said that he himself has voted Green in the past
The valid comparison with Russia is Hamas - both kleptocratic dictatorships with a track record of oppression and political assassinations.
The votes of our UK opposition (or devolved parliaments for that matter) will make no difference to what happens in Gaza. These votes are about principles and politicking, while the reality is that a one-sided ceasefire opens the way to Hamas remaining in power. Starmer‘s focus on humanitarian aid is the right one.
Having seen Corbyn make an ass of himself earlier this week before intellectual featherweight Piers Morgan, it’s a relief to see the considerably more credible position of Starmer’s shadow cabinet.
The votes of our UK opposition (or devolved parliaments for that matter) will make no difference to what happens in Gaza.
Of course they do, the UK is a major player in the Middle East and also a major arms supplier. What the next UK prime minister says right now matters to Netanyahu and his far-right government, even if they pretend that it doesn't.
What Israel fears most is international isolation, it is the primary reason why apartheid collapsed in South Africa.
One western country breaking ranks would be an absolute disaster for Israel. Which is of course why pro-zionists were so determined that Jeremy Corbyn should never become prime minister.
Edit: What is needed now is international sanctions against Israel, the UK can play an important part in arguing for that, even if it is selected sanctions.
All three were asked whether they would support an immediate ceasefire. The Tory and Labour speakers refused to back an immediate ceasefire preferring instead to patronise their audience with mealy mouth bollocks about how much they of course care about the loss of so many innocent lives.
I'd say the fact that you had two sitting MPs and then a LibDem candidate who has next to no chance of being elected was the reason for that outcome.
Can you explain why you think it is the reason for the outcome?
There is a slim chance that Chris Philp could lose his seat next year:
How would supporting or not supporting a ceasefire affect his chances?
Sarah Jones has zero chance of losing her seat next general election, how does supporting a ceasefire affect her?
Richard Howard definitely won't get elected next year (although I can see him eventually been offered a winnable seat) how does supporting a ceasefire affect him in ways that it doesn't affect the other two?
Genuine question as I might be missing something.