Ryan Girdusky clashed with British-American journalist Mehdi Hasan on Monday night.
CNN has banned a conservative commentator from appearing on the network again after he told a Muslim journalist “I hope your beeper doesn’t go off,” an apparent reference to the spate of exploding pagers in Lebanon that killed members of the Hezbollah militant group last month.
Ryan Girdusky made the comment during a heated debate with Mehdi Hasan, a prominent British-American broadcaster and an outspoken critic of Israel’s war in Gaza, on “CNN Newsnight” with host Abby Phillip.
The guests were discussing the racist jokes made by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, which overshadowed former President Donald Trump’s rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden on Sunday and continue to make headlines two days later.
As the debate turned fractious, Girdusky and Hasan sparred over whether the latter had been labeled an anti-Semite. “I’m a supporter of the Palestinians, I’m used to it,” Hasan said.
Girdusky replied: “Well I hope your beeper doesn’t go off.”
I didn’t realize that HAMAS was as large an organization as the Israeli government and armed forces.
We’re also talking about a completely different country from Palestine that had nothing to do with any part of any of these conflicts, and even then, an indiscriminate terrorist attack on Palestinian civilians wouldn’t be justified by HAMAS’s terrorism. That’s like saying that the US bombings on Iraqi civilians are justified by Al Qaeda’s attack on the WTC on 9/11.
Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel for a year now. It’s hard to claim they have nothing to do with any part of these conflicts
Hezbollah only exists because of Occupations and invasions by Israel
1982
Israeli Withdrawal
2006
2007 - Present
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/17/beyond-hezbollah-the-history-of-tensions-between-lebanon-and-israel
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli–Lebanese_conflict
And yet, that still doesn’t justify killing civilians randomly.
And Israel has been running a military campaign to exterminate Palestine since the 1950s. It’s hard to claim their hands are clean in any of these conflicts.
I still remember when they were offering Israeli citizenship with the purchase of former Palestinian homes to American Jews in the 2000s.
Claiming they were justified in attacking israel is very different from claiming they have nothing to do with the conflict though. If you feel that firing rockets at israeli civilians is fine and good, say that instead of pretending hezbollah was uninvolved