You said "protecting" and protection is far different from "not target".

We have laws for an important reason, without them it's up to any individual to decide for themselves what is just at any given moment. What happens when Israel decides that what's fair and just seems barbaric to you or me? We agree on the rules ahead of time so that we can act accordingly.

If you want war crimes to include "must protect journalists", then I'd suggest your best chance at realizing that goal would be to get the legal codes modified.

You said journalists, not civilians. If you want to talk about civilians now not journalists, that's a new topic.

> Onus doesn’t mean legal requirement. Civilized nations can be, should be, and generally are held to standards far exceeding legal statutes.

Are they? USA literally has a law on the books that authorizes bombing the netherlands if any of their troops are ever held responsible. Trump pardoned 4 people who masacared civilians (including 2 children) in Iraq

The west doesn't just not go beyond the legal requirements, it flouts the legal requirements when convinent.

Proof forbthe claim about the US bombing the Netherlands please.

GP is referring to the "Hague Invasion Act", aka "American Service-Members' Protection Act of 2002" passed under GW Bush to authorize a US invasion of The Hague, to protect American officials and military personnel from prosecution [by the ICC] or rescue them from custody. Originally drafted in response to the Iraq invasion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Pr...

Oh dear... I knew the US is one of the few to not recognize the ICC. Never heard of Section 2008. The wording so interesting, especially part covering also people of NATO allies: So theoretically, the US could sent Seal Team Six to extract a member of the Dutch armed forces from The Hague, and attack a NATO member in order to free a citizen from said NATO member. Theoretically, right after Seal Team Six delivered a wanted war criminal to The Hague. Well, I guess at least the strike is easy to position in that case...

Thanks for the throw back to the times of bad George W. policy and laws, almost forgot how bad it was over everything that happened since 2016...

Failing to protect and targeting is widely different, and it is not in good faith to claim the latter without evidence.