Quote Originally Posted by Pannonian View Post
There needn't be a dilemma of the kind I described, with the kind of nuanced answer Idaho gave just now. I respect that. Unfortunately, this isn't representative of the criticisms I encounter of Iraq from the left. Idaho says he supported regime change of some kind, but not one that cost so many casualties; this isn't something you'd catch most left wingers admitting. That he supported regime change of some kind would already put him in an unacceptably pro-imperialist position, to these loons.
Can you better describe these criticisms and what's wrong with them? The general left criticism of Iraq that I am aware of is that it was a war of aggression under false pretenses for narrow-sighted political and economic priorities, and has had a dire outcome for almost everyone on Earth. Even a warmonger could detest the Iraq War for those reasons.

Back to the anti-imperialist left and Israel, they couldn't be hypocritical unless they were categorically rejecting all Western intervention BUT wanted to pursue aggressive regime change in Israel. I have never heard of such a position. They do have a general suspicion of Western intervention, but this suspicion seems justified on the grounds that interventions in practice are almost always a net negative for the people affected.