76 Comments

Now this was worth watching every minute! Mehdi, the legendary king of debating - Eylon did not stand a chance 😂

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One of the best debates I’ve ever seen, well done Mehdi

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Bruh, this was a masterclass on debating. Mehdi destroyed every one of Elyon’s points. Very refreshing to see these assholes get debunked at every turn. The changing and bending of facts, making a mockery of every humanitarian law, in addition to all the flat out lies. When Mehdi turned his pin for the hostages bullshit around to also supporting the release of innocent Palestinian children (hostages)…bravo good sir, bravo! Shut him the fuck up, real quick!

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Mehdi, you did a great job in the debate! Really appreciate your work for the work. Never ever stop raising your voice for justice, our support is always with you!

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I watched parts of it, and it's a testament to how dangerous propagandists can be. Most rhetoricians would be crushed under Eylon Levy (from a rhenorical perspective, not factual, mind you), but Mehdi held his own.

The most telling part was when Levy refused to justify the apartment building collapse that only killed innocent people, saying that people were not owed an explanation. The debate was literally about if Israel's actions post-October-7th were justified.

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I was in the audience and the disgust at Eylon during that exact moment was palpable.

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Final remarks summed it all up… Mehdi clearly won that debate, he had receipts and compelling arguments. However he was arguing against a real life sociopath, and it was bizarre to see how Eylon’s weak and frankly limp arguments still get some applause, tepid though it was.

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The applause for Elyon was paid for, that's what they do , just like when that war criminal went to congress they had to pay ppl to applauded, even he knew it was staged and he had to tell them to stop applauding

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It’s so bizarre, having to stack an audience with people to make sure you have applause… all to snip and edit clips to falsely show his arguments getting traction for social media… but it makes sense that he would do this. I don’t know why I expected more from John Donovan. Mehdi handled the whole thing like a pro

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For sure Mehdi is getting better at keeping his cool, my blood boiled a few times and he calmed me right back down. He will never get invited to another debate cause they know the truth hurts way more than paying ppl to stand by you.

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Add to that: birds with the same feathers will flock together, when they have immorality in common, then they will stand together

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I was very surprised that you didn't challenge Levy on the rehearsal of all the 7 October atrocity lies Mehdi ... because they are an action of Israel since 7 October ...

The Israeli state gaslights with generalised comments designed to evoke scenes of grotesque and atrocious war crimes in the minds of listeners, but from the mouth of Eylon Levy they sound like he's reading some overly dramatic florid description written in The Daily Mail and no more believable. He is not a great debater ... he has the presentational style of a pantomime "Dame" - hysterical and constantly presenting Israel (as if it were him/herself) as the victim in a grotesquely over-acted drama.

At some point the numbers of actual civilians killed by Hamas and other escapees of the Gaza camp will come to light - the rest, whether killed because they were IDF or Israeli police, or because they came face to face with "the Hannibal Directive" will NOT amount to Hamas's war crimes. I can't wait for the ICC to give that degree of attention to the events of that day.

Sadly the west will decry the court as misled, mis-informed or malign. I can only imagine that this might end if the southern hemisphere boycotts any international body of which the USA remains a "Person of Significant Interest". The USA and UK need to be put in their place.

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Why insult women and so eloquently. Use your words better.

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There was too much to talk about,

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Dear Mr. Hasan, thank you for being a bold and courageous voice of logic, reason, and humanity against such true evil in this world. I am profundly grateful for you and your work.

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Thank you 'Open to Debate' team for hosting this marvelous, much needed debate on this super divisive subject matter that needs sooo many more of these debates. THANK YOU to the debaters. And thank you to everyone there having watched live and watched later on as I did.

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Thank you for sharing the full debate. Like some other commenter said, these war mongering leaders need to debate, not the average human who understands the difference between right and wrong. That would be a debate... one of citizen to leader. The world needs that kind of justice.

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Mehdi did something most debeaters never do, he actually answered every question asked and didn't dodge. If he disagreed with a question he stated his point why.

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Great debate. I wish our media can host such debates with Biden, Trump, Kamala and our key players in government. This way we/public get to learn and decide, vs. our leaders hiding behind the influence of money, religion, nationally, party affiliations etc.

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As much as I appreciate Hasan and agree with his perspective, I was disappointed with his closing attack accusing defenders of Israel as sociopaths. I believe a segment of that camp are likely sociopaths, but I don't know how productive or accurate it is to lump the entire group into that category. I separate racism, Islamophobia, white supremacy, fear, and imperialism, as separate and distinct (though related) from sociopathic behavior (ASPD). I truly believe racism, white supremacy, eurocentrism, islamophobia, and broad US sympathy & latent nostalgia for colonialism is the larger reason for this rationalization and indifference to Israeli War crimes. Fear of white/euro trauma/threat from brown, Muslim people, connotations of Judeo-Christian defense from Muslim aggression, and belief in the need and defense of Western modernity and civilization to pacify, neuter, conquer, tame, and/or annhilate the non-Western other is responsible for more of the support than the mental disorder of sociopathy. I think Biden is a Zionist ideologue with significant racist worldviews and values. I'm uncertain whether he is an actual sociopath. Sociopaths have actual mental health conditions that can't be linked to ideology, politics, world view. Calling then sociopaths is a cop out. It also does disservice to people who are clinically sociopaths and what they're confronted with to mitigate/address their mental health needs. I know it wasn't point of debate but I was so deflated by that conclusion, after he did such a strong job throughout!

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He specified "knowing full well what Israel did". I'm sorry but only a sociopath justifies the mass slaughter of children.

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He could've said "You're a bad person" or "You have no moral compass." Sociopath is a bit different. As it turns out, many fascists are perfectly well-socialized people in real life (which makes them scary).

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I agree as to the followers of fascism. Not sure about the perpetrators of it. trump and vance can hardly be called "perfectly well socialized."

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You don’t have to be a clinically diagnosed sociopath to act like one. And make no mistake- Israeli society is caught in the grip of sociopathic behavior most likely due to the weaponization of their holocaust trauma. The abused have become the abusers - victims of Nazi sociopaths have become the Zionist sociopaths.

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Just watched the full debate and had a bucket next to me ready for every time I heard a type of lie that makes you vomit

memorable quotes;

"If you want to convince them terrorism is a dead end, then stop inflicting terrorism on them"

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Many times I wanted to scream at Eylon's lies, but Medhi crushed him each time

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I was rather disappointed, not with Mehdi, of course, his words are always from the heart, filtered through his formidable mind and straight to my few remaining marbles. But I’d hoped for better from Eylon than Netanyahu talking points, recited neatly, in order, direct from his crib sheet, ending up with ‘let’s all blame the Jews!’ John Donovan was such a benign presence, endlessly patient, unafraid to slip in a few mild but well deserved rebukes over a cheap shot or two…

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