See if they’ll read How to Blow Up a Pipeline. It’s basically “nonviolence has never worked” the book.

Same. Basically exact same scenario, except I'm Jewish and she isn't. That gives me a bit of leeway but she's still totally anti violence, and anti 'terrorism'. At the end of the day, that sort of liberalism simply doesn't make sense. All you can do is try to erode it over time.

I went down the route of 'Israel and the West created the conditions that enable Hamas existence and necessity to exist/fight.'

Ok, but innocent people died.

'more innocent people have been killed by Israel than the other way around by a very large margin, and the relations are the opposite. Hamas rises up against colonial power. Israel enforces power upon a colonised underclass.'

yes but violence is wrong, innocent people on both sides shouldnt be harmed

'Should they just sit there and live in Israel's enforced squalor? If conditions continue the way they have for the past 70 years, Palestine will simply no longer exist. Violent uprising is all they can do'

Well I wouldnt be violent, I don't have it in me

'You have never lived even remotely close to a warzone, or lived in conditions at all similar to what they have. To say that you are simply different and wouldn't react to social factors is to imply that you are genetically peaceful or civil. That is eugenecist thought.'

...

I just think there's better ways of doing it.

'of course, you, a person with no combat experience or anticolonial resistance theory knows better than the group born into and forged by that conflict...'

That's sort of the lines of the conversation. I probably wasn't as clear, and her views were more nuanced, but I think the essence is there. I definitely word things differently to be kind, and to not show how much it actually frustrates me sometimes.

"you can't tell me terrorism is good because it's never good"

Liberals are so obsessed with something being "good" or "bad" (meaning things that make them feel good or bad) that they miss the point. They can literally acknowledge how slaves killing their masters is effectively self-inflicted by the masters, and the only reason they don't always immediately turn around and say "but killing is bad" is because it was long ago and they're fully aware of how racist they would sound if they did.

"Terrorism is never good" is childish, because "terrorism" is before anything else an insult pointed at non-white people who defend their rights and tactics that many consider "terrorism" (guerilla tactics, surprise attacks, etc.) can be a means to a good end - in this case halting the settlement of Palestinian land.

Adult settlers who voluntarily live in illegal Israeli settlements have participated in a genocide of the Palestinian people, the same way German settlers during WW2 were participants in the genocide of the people of Eastern European nations, and those who took the property of Jews were direct participants in the Shoah. They're not unaware of what happened to give them that land. Often they personally committed the violence. They were comfortable with this because they believed that the IDF would protect them. It's absolutely ridiculous to see people all around the world, who have stood by and done nothing about this for generations as the Palestinians were repeatedly murdered for attempting peaceful resistance, suddenly start crying "terrorism" when Hamas (a group which would likely not exist and hold power without having been funded by Israel) has inflicted violence on the settlers in turn.

Don't justify the violence. That's a losing strategy. Actually agree with them, that violence is bad.

But...

What happened with all the "good" decisions? Like the nonviolent year-long protest where IDF snipers shot out Paletinian knees. Where did that "just, reasonable" non-violence get them? Where were we (the west) when this was all going down? How can we condemn violence from Hamas when we allowed Israel to commit violence? Who are we to judge these people? What moral high-ground could we possibly occupy? Palestinians would be justified in telling all of us to shut the fuck up and turn off the TV, just like before and before and before.

What is the point of appeasing our morality if nothing changes? We gave up being moral when we allowed so much violence to go unanswered. Why should Hamas or Palestinians care about our morality?

MLK told all of us who value a "negative" peace to Justice to shut the fuck up too.

EDIT: To use a Marxist turn of phrase: If we wish to abolish Terrorism, we must abolish the conditions that require Terrorism.

Have Lieutenant Commander Data explain it to them

So they're against the haitian revolution

I work with a lib I can never get through to; bizarrely he supports Palestine, everything else is just whatever you can read in the paper.....like Chinese spy weather balloons

Just ask your partner whether they think the French resistance was good or not

That usually gets libs thinking

You can't say nonviolent protest never works. Gene Sharp has outlined the tools/tactics for nonviolent revolution, and it has been used successfully in several countries. His writings are so effective that they are banned by many regimes. I think there is a time and place for both. Unfortunately, the Palestinians are locked away from the main society, so that can't appreciably disrupt that society with peaceful methods. Additionally, the bulk of that society supports their genocide, so they aren't just fighting against a government/dictatorial regime but a majority of the populace as well.

Does it make any material difference what her personal opinion on Gaza is?