Hasan acknowledges that "From The River to The Sea" originated with the PFLP. The slogan has always been used as a call for emancipation and not antisemitism. Hamas adopted it as their slogan because it was the slogan of Palestinian liberation but the meaning of the slogan didn't change just because it was co-opted a militant marginal faction. Ethan asks "so why does it makes it ok to argue with a group that makes up 80% of all hate crimes" (I thought it was 60% just now, Ethan...). Hasan says it's because Palestinians are the oppressed party against the state of Israel, which in itself does not represent the interests of Jews and falsely conflates its goals with the interests of Jews. Jewish people themselves who are involved in anti-Zionism will say "from the river to the sea". Ethan asks "you shouldn't be offended by it because some Israelis say it?" and Hasan points out that Jews using the slogan means it's not about anti-Semitism, because if it was then they wouldn't use it. Ethan says that there were Jewish collaborators with Nazis. Hasan says "please, don't tell me Jews' Voice For Peace are akin to Kapos". He says there's a broader point that Palestinian liberation is just, while the Confederacy was not.
Ethan says Jews at large don't like the term. Hasan disagrees, so Ethan questions him how he can even say what Jews think. "How can you speak for my entire ethnic group, I find that really interesting", and then asks him how many Jews he's polled to form that opinion. Hasan says it doesn't matter if Jews find it offensive, so Ethan goes "It doesn't matter if a minority group find something anti-Semetic?". Hasan says it's not about Jews, it's about Israel, and Ethan counters that although talking about a one state solution is more feasible to him having discussed it, when Jews hear calls for a one-state solution, they assume this will mean the mass genocide of Jews. Hasan says Israel has all the power so he's going to listen to Palestinian voices. Ethan says if a phrase has been co-opted by terrorists then people should back off using it.
Hasan points out that people claim calling for a ceasefire is anti-semetic and after a certain point you have to concede that this is a disingenuous approach to crush dissent. Ethan argues that doubling down on using a phrase that Jews feel is calling for their genocide is antithetical to constructive discussion. Hasan says he won't make concessions that hold no historic weight and he believes Palestinians when they say what the term means. Ethan objects and says there are people who use the phrase to call for the death of all Jews, and so Jews are within their rights to object to it, and he finds it interesting that Jews are the only minority group that people are prepared to say "fuck you" to. Hasan counters that Muslims are a minority group too, and Palestinians are an even smaller minority group, and the larger conversation is Anti-Zionists vs Zionist Christians. People don't call you Islamophobic for criticising Saudi Arabia, but they call you anti-semetic when you criticise Israel. He thinks people use that argument about "From The River..." cynically. He feels that arguing about the optics of the phrase calling for Palestinian liberation when 11,000 Palestinians have been slaughtered is bad.
Ethan complains this is making him look bad, and the objections to the phrase have nothing to do with the actions of Israel. The argument then devolves into Hamas changing its charter and removing references to Jew killing, but - Hasan concedes - there will still be anti-semites in Hamas. Ethan asks him if he thinks there's anyone in Hamas who isn't an anti-semite and Hasan says there are and Ethan can yell at him for thinking that if he wants but it's true. There's 18 year olds who don't know anything but bombs exploding over their heads and Hamas is simply a means of violent retaliation. People don't operate on good and bad, they operate on "this bomb blew up my family, I hate this fucking state".
Ethan makes Hasan play the clip of that guy calling for a thousand October 7ths. Hasan starts reading out the subtitles and Ethan goes "lalala can't hear you", as a joke that people ignore antisemitism, and then insists he wants people to see it. Hasan points out he's shown this clip on his stream already. "Do you think every single person watching right now has seen every second of your stream?" Ethan asks. They start playing the clip again and Ethan keeps talking over it and interrupting Hasan. Hasan points out that for every single person in Hamas saying this sort of bloodthirsty stuff there's the same number in Israel saying it. Ethan insists he's not saying it to defend Israel, he's just illustrating why Jews are uncomfortable with the phrase "from the river to the sea". Hasan stresses that the guy does not speak for Palestinians or even the whole of Hamas because Hamas has multiple factions. Ethan asks "at what point is this phrase allowed to be offensive?", then his son wanders in and he talks to him for a bit while Hasan waits. Hasan then says that people can't tailor their optics to make concessions to people invested in upholding an unjust structure.
Ethan says "I'm assuming you don't believe Israel has a right to exist". Hasan says "I don't believe Israel has a right to exist as an apartheid state". Ethan argues that the slogan is calling for the destruction of Israel, and Hasan reiterates that the PFLP who used to the slogan specifically wanted the Zionist state dismantled to create a secular state of Jews and Muslims and everyone else in the lands of Israel. Hasan quickly dips out to get food (his Dad apparently made him some food) so Ethan plugs the Teddy Fresh Black Friday sale again. Hasan observes that a lot of Israelis think that a single secular state would mean genocide but Israeli concerns have been overrepresented. Ethan agrees that Palestinians are the ones being wronged, but does that mean they've got a right to use phrases with impunity? What if they said "Israel doesn't exist", would that be ok? Hasan feels this depends on context.
Ethan says he's just telling the Jewish perspective, and Hasan tells him he's not saying the Jewish perspective because Jews aren't a monolith, and then they argue about how many anti-Zionist Jews use the phrase, and then Hasan says "I don't concern myself with what Jewish people think about a particular slogan when I'm talking about the historical context of the slogan". He asks if Ethan thinks that anti-Zionist Jews his knows and respects would use a phrase that's calling for an ethnic cleansing, and Ethan responds by accusing him of using Jews as a token and again asks Hasan if he's polled Jews on this. "Show me all the Jews screaming from the river to the sea, I'd like to see a fucking video of it. Find me one video of a Jewish person screaming it". Hasan pulls up a tweet from Jewish Voice for Peace defending the phrase. Ethan then says "What do you actually know about this group?" but Hasan points out they're the largest network of Anti-Zionist Jews in America, so Ethan switches to saying "don't you see how fucked up it is to say this group of people say it's not offensive so you don't get to be offended", which Hasan points out he only did because Ethan specifically requested it. Ethan then says he said he wanted a video of a Jew screaming it and a tweet doesn't count because people brigade anything on Twitter and that people retweeting it probably aren't Jewish, which Hasan points out doesn't actually change the fact that a network of anti-Zionist Jews tweeted it in the first place, so then he says "show me a video not a tweet". Hasan offers to phone Noah Kulwin and Ethan says "I don't care what one person says", although Hasan points out he's asking to see a video of one Jew yelling the phrase. Ethan says this is like saying that if he could find one Palestinian that says occupation is justified then it's ok. Hasan counters by saying that the morality behind that statement is incorrect, whereas this argument is just about whether or not a phrase is anti-semetic.
Ethan starts saying he'll find a group of white people who say the Confederate flag isn't racist. Hasan actually pleads with him to stop, because "you're making a conflation that makes you look horrible, you're making yourself look bad, please stop", associating Palestinians calling for liberation with oppressors upholding oppressive values. He points out that there's a lot of white people who think "black lives matter" means "fuck all whites" but that doesn't change the morality behind the sentiment. Ethan insists "From the river" is offensive to Jews. Again, Hasan insists "as your friend" to stop repeating this sentiment, and Ethan flatly states that Jewish people feel the phrase is harmful to them because terrorist groups use it. Hasan says he's not going to alter his position and does "Free Palestine" mean kill Jews because Hamas say it as well? Ethan says it depends on context, which Hasan points out he was already saying. He points out there are Zionist Jews who would argue Free Palestine is calling for the death of Jews.
Hasan asks Ethan "When you want to understand what the slogan Black Lives Matter means, do you ask white people what it means or do you ask black people what it means?". He ends up asking this several times because this actually temporarily stunlocks Ethan who can't work out how to respond. Eventually Ethan starts saying that the phrase is different so it doesn't insinuate anything about white people. Hasan responds that the phrase isn't "From the river to the sea, we should kill all the Jews", so also doesn't insinuate anything. Ethan says he's just explaining how people feel; Hasan argues that if he were telling him what white people feel about BLM he'd say he doesn't care what they feel.
Ethan asks Hasan if he cares that his chat is calling him racist. Hasan says he hasn't been looking at chat. Ethan asks if Hasan has moderators and if he cares at all. Hasan says people are saying that because of the conflations he made that Hasan had specifically warned him not to do, including comparing Jewish Voice for Peace to the Kapos. Ethan says "you are so bad faith for saying that and fuck you for even putting that out in the world, my point was you can find anybody to defend any fucking thing, that was my point". Hasan then just re-explains the points he's been trying to get Ethan to understand for the past hour. Ethan starts reading hate comments out loud and asking "don't you moderate? How can you be surprised when your discord is full of fucking freaks?". Hasan says "I love you but there's only so much I can do if you're making that argument, you know that right? You're an adult and the words that you're saying are going to be perceived by people in a certain way. I can't constantly tell my community to shut the fuck up - which I have, because I know you personally and I know that your heart's in the right place, but they don't know". Ethan says he's just telling him his perspective and he doesn't know what the fuck Hasan wants from him, and that his chat is filled with psychotic monsters and that he needs to moderate. Hasan says there's 33,000 people in the Twitch chat and it's so fast it's impossible to moderate, but he'll put it in "email mode".
Hasan says there's only so much he can do about those comments when Ethan makes those comparisons, and Ethan says "I can make any comparison I fucking want, dude" and claims Hasan is putting words in his mouth. Hasan has to quickly walk out the room. Ethan continues complaining, noting someone had just called him a fat zionist freak pig, then addresses chat to say he understands the analysis that the phrase "From The River to The Sea" is not anti-Israel or anti-semetic, he's just explaining why most Jews find it offensive because they interpret as calling for the deaths of Jews, and so it's not good to keep using it. Hasan comes back at this point and Ethan continues saying that people can use that phrase but he just wanted to clarify how Jews feel, and it's not fair that people are so shocked Jews feel that way. Hasan suggests the better thing to do would be to educate Jews to understand that the phrase isn't calling for their deaths. Ethan asks if Hasan understands why that phrase might be scary to Jews, and Hasan agrees (which Ethan initially seems to take as a win) but he continues on to say that he also understands why Black Lives Matter might be a scary phrase for some white people and it doesn't matter. Ethan whines that Hasan won't make any concessions while he makes so many concessions to Hasan, and so "it's not fun to talk to you when it's like that". Hasan just explains he's trying to combat disinformation about the phrase through educating people on the meaning. Ethan stresses he's just trying to educate people on why Jews find the phrase scary and not understanding this is a barrier to constructive conversation. Hasan says again that he does understand it but he's trying to deliver a counterfactual. Ethan says "peace and progress happen when we have empathy and connect". He decides that "we just keep talking in circles" and he doesn't want to keep talking about it and his throat's sore. Hasan sighs and sarcastically says "I'm sorry we couldn't make peace on this one issue".
