So, Israel can only have two actual goals in this war: either they are seeking to purge Gaza of Palestinians, or they are seeking to punish Gazans in general for the actions of a few terrorists on October 7th, eye-for-an-eye style. There is no other reasonable interpretation of this war, and the vast majority of the world's countries see it this way (as seen by the overwhelming support for all pro-Gaza resolutions at the UN, typically 150+ to 10 or less).

Now, if Israel actually wanted to eliminate the terrorist leadership that perpetrated the October 7th attack while not creating new generations of terrorists, they would have gone about this intervention in a completely different way. They would have had to work with the non-militant parts of Hamas leadership and the PLO of the West Bank and with neighboring Arab countries to bring these murderers to justice, along with sending the equivalent of police forces for taregtted operations.

For an example of how this can work, you can look at how the UK dealt with the IRA in Northern Ireland, or Spain with the Basque Country separatists. They certainly didn't start bombing Belfast or Bilbao semi-indiscriminately to weed out the terrorists there.

Of course, what I'm saying is laughably far from anything that was actually possible to imagine as an Israeli response, given the long history of repression and mutual hatred of those territories. The reality is that Israeli leadership, and a sizeable segment of the Israeli population, wants the territory of Israel to include Gaza and the West Bank, but without bringing in the huge Arab Muslim population there as full citizens with equal rights in Israel. They also want to avoid creating explicit laws officially recognizing them as the second-class citizens that they are. So, the goal of Israeli leadership is actually maintaining the status quo: people in Gaza and the West Bank (and East Jerusalem) are living as second class citizens, their land is slowly being encroached by more radical coloniats, and their anger is controlled by bombings and deprivation when needed.

High-ranking Israeli officials have openly stated this at the start of the war and throughout.

https://x.com/NTarnopolsky/status/1792891809498022385

* Been denied entry to the IDF/excused from mandatory conscription due to his extremist views

* Been convicted (in an Israeli court) of supporting a terrorist organization.

* Made a legal career out of defending alledged Jewish terrorists in Israeli courts.

* Arguably contributed to the assassination Yitzhak Rabin and the collapse of the Oslo accords.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/ben-gvir-says-h...

> Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir says he would be “very happy to live in Gaza” following the war, musing that a mass exodus of Palestinians could create room for a significant influx of Israeli settlers.

I don't know what else to call a "exodus of Palestinians" to "create room". This is pretty much the textbook definition of than ethnic cleansing. And "voluntary emigration"? Right. To where? And after 80 years of fighting over all of this it's suddenly going to be all that "voluntary". Yeah...

This is not some rando we can perhaps interpret in good faith; this is a man who for years had the portrait of terrorist Baruch Goldstein in his office and has repentantly praised him. This, combined with many other things he has said and done over the last 15 years or so means it's pretty clear what he's saying: getting rid of the Untermensch to make lebensraum for the Übermenschen.

But of course it does exactly that, via the intentionally deceptive euphemism "voluntary emigration".

https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/03/22/poll-hamas-remains-p...

I don't really see how this could work? As far as I know, all Hamas leadership supports the Oct 7 attack. The PLO and neighboring Arab countries don't really have power in Gaza.

If mere support is a hangup, then supporters of Israel's genocidal retaliation must similarly be excluded from talks.

I speak sardonically, of course: preconditions to negotiation are rarely helpful to achieving a negotiated outcome.

Here's one example: if Israel starts by treating Palestinians as human beings equal to Israeli people, without preconditions, it would remove a lot of Hamas leverage, plus it's the right thing to do.

Then, a bilateral peace committee seeking to punish genocide perpetrators on either side, perhaps as judged by the ICJ, can be established.

Did the IRA kill around ten thousands of Brits in one day and kidnapped a few thousands (I'm adjusting to population size here) ? Did the IRA have the sworn objective to eliminate England? Did the IRA join forces with another terrorist organization and a superpower bent on destroying England to encircle England from all directions and join the war?

Going for a less shallow dismissal of your points then:

> Did the IRA kill around ten thousands of Brits in one day and kidnapped a few thousands (I'm adjusting to population size here) ?

The IRA in total killed some 2000 people, representing some 0.2% of the Protestant population of Northern Ireland. Hamas killed in total ~2600 people since 2008 (where I found simple data on Wikipedia), which represents about 0.04% of the population of Israel, taking a very small estimate for the total population. So, in percentages, the IRA was about 5 times as vicious as Hamas (edit: accidentally wrote 50 earlier).

> Did the IRA have the sworn objective to eliminate England?

Yes, the IRA had the objective to eliminate British rule in Northern Ireland entirely, which is quite similar to Hamas's goal of eliminating Israeli rule in all of Israel. I'm not sure if the IRA was as happy to kill any loyalist civilians as Hamas is in killing Israeli civilians, to be fair.

> Did the IRA join forces with another terrorist organization and a superpower bent on destroying England to encircle England from all directions and join the war?

I'm not sure what superpower you refer to here (are you calling Egypt a superpower? Edit - oh, you mean the USSR...). Regardless, Ireland did have some amount of implication in the Troubles, though of course immeasurably less. I'm also not sure why it's more legitimate to bomb civilian buildings or not based on whether those civilians were once supported by outside countries, 50 years ago.

So 650 civilians in around 30 years, that's less than what Hamas did in a couple of hours on October 7th. Btw Hamas is not only active in Gaza, it was a big part of the terror campaign that derailed the Oslo peace initiative and later Camp David - mostly in the West Bank. Hamas' reach is all across the Palestinian territories and it has hit Israelis in all kinds of ways - suicide bombings (in the West Bank), rockets (Gaza) and recently full on invasions and massacres. The death toll, destruction and disruption to the economy and civil life it had on Israeli society is orders of magnitude larger than what Britain has ever experienced.

> Yes, the IRA had the objective to eliminate British rule in Northern Ireland entirely, which is quite similar to Hamas's goal of eliminating Israeli rule in all of Israel. I'm not sure if the IRA was as happy to kill any loyalist civilians as Hamas is in killing Israeli civilians, to be fair.

So there's a major difference here I think, Britain could have simply left Northern Ireland or reach some compromise to meet some of the IRA's demands (which has actually eventually happened) and still remained Britain. For Israel to meet Hamas demands it needs to commit national suicide, cede control to a group that hates it (happy to kill Israelis - your words) and wants to take revenge and as a result probably have the majority of its population flee the region completely (where to? perhaps to the West, which is also not the most hospitable environment for Jews/Israelis).

> I'm not sure what superpower you refer to here (are you calling Egypt a superpower? Edit - oh, you mean the USSR...).

I am talking about Iran which is considered a regional superpower and about the fact Israel is surrounded by Iranian made armies (Hezbollah to the North, Yemenite Houtihs and Iraqi militais to the East) that are now occasionally bombing its civilian population or trying to force a naval blockade on it. England never had to face anything remotely similar to this with the IRA. The last time England had something similar to this was WW2.

However, the more important issue is not to get distracted by these sort of things. We can tit-for-tat this endlessly and never get anywhere, and the only way to solve this is to move beyond that. That's what they did in NI.

If we strip away all the violence, forget who did what to who, and all of that, then the inescapable conclusion remains: the IRA was right to protest the treatment of Catholics. Even Ian Paisley later admitted as much. And similarly Hamas is ... right to protest the treatment of Palestinians. That does not mean I condone the violence, like the general rhetoric of Hamas, or anything else. It's just an acknowledgement that 1) at the core of an issue are genuine grievances, and 2) as long as these grievances exist there will always be a Hamas.

You don't need to like these facts to accept it exists. You also don't need to just shrug and do nothing about Hamas. But you DO need to actually solve the rot cause (while you're also fighting Hamas). And for decades Israel has not just flat-out refused to do almost anything, it generally has made things worse. The violence of Israel is not as spectacular as the violence of Hamas, but it absolutely exists.

The reality is much more nuanced and quite frankly contradictory to this simplistic viewpoint. What are Hamas' goals - some kind of peaceful solution or the violent destruction of Israel and expulsion of most Jews from the area? I tend to say the latter. Also, calling what Hamas did on October 7th 'protest' seems weird to me. It committed a massacre and knew damn well it was starting a war.

The problem people have with Israel is not that they're killing Hamas fighters or that IDF soldiers are being killed. It's that they're killing civilians (amongst other war crimes and crimes against humanity).

It's a completely different situation.

Edit: just to flesh out my position here a bit. Civilian deaths are unavoidable in war. But the attacker _must_ take measures to prevent that as much as possible. Israel have not. In fact they've done the opposite.

There is also a deliberate propaganda effort to blur the distinction between Hamas and Palestinians. Look at every conservative news source that reports on pro-Palestinian protests. Every one of them uses the term "Pro-Hamas protestors" instead, even though you'll find very few people there who support Hamas terrorists. This is clearly deliberate.

See also the deliberate conflation of IDF = Israeli government = Israeli people = the Jewish Ethnicity = Judaism. So, thanks to propaganda, if you oppose one of them, they think you oppose them all and are antisemitic.

Likewise, EVEN IN THIS VERY POST, anything about Hamas and Palestinians is deliberately left out. You see, the ICJ has 3 demands, not one.

1) immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, ("living and dead" has been added in this release)

2) delivering the guilty to the court (even though they haven't named individuals, in other words, they're giving Hamas yet another chance to stop this by just throwing a few of their members under the bus)

3) Israel must make sure it's operation in Rafah doesn't devolve into genocide

Israel is mad that these demands are independent, and not connected (in other words, they're saying they're perfectly happy to stop the war immediately and even rebuild Gaza if 1 and 2 happen)

(and then of course the implicit fourth demand that Hamas, and everyone else, respect UN agreed international borders and stops attacking Israel, now and forever)

The court made these demands knowing full well that there is ZERO chance that anything will happen on demand 1 and 2. And they modified their own laws (illegally) to allow for 3 to even be demanded (they modified their own jurisdiction because Palestine is a member without territory, which means 6 months ago, Gaza was outside of ICJ jurisdiction).

What's illegal about that change? Only the security council has the right to change their statutes, and of course, that's not happening.

This is a court that illegally modified it's own rules in order to convict Jews. Frankly ... after that I'm just not reading any further.

And if you do think further, Palestine is a signatory of the Rome statute. Which means Palestinians agreed to do what the court demands, which in this case is deliver the hostages and the leaders of Hamas. Hamas, going for elections, agreed to this too, btw. Neither Hamas, nor the PA, nor Palestinians obviously have ANY intention to comply, and yet, the court is not throwing them out, and "their" complaint is still getting treated. How is this fair?

And there you get to the issue of enforcement. Hamas agreed to uphold international treaties in order to participate in the election in 2006, and obviously, it didn't take a week before the first large-scale warcrimes (Palestinian-on-Palestinian). The UN didn't do anything. After the Israel-Lebanon war, the UN even sent soldiers to Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah. Well, Hezbollah isn't disarmed in case you didn't notice. Nobody is demanding enforcement, not on the street, not in the UN.

But NOW, when these warcrimes have forced a response from Israel, NOW you want enforcement? And not against Hamas/Hezbollah, but against Israel?

Fuck that.

And there is a basic legal principle, namely that one-sided enforcement of law by a court is not allowed. A court cannot, not even implicitly, punish one party to a crime without punishing the other party too. This court, or any court, cannot be allowed to punish Israel without punishing Hamas (and quite a few others).

And then there's yet another legal principle, that a court is not allowed to make judgements or demands it has zero hope to execute. In other words: if the court has no options for enforcement, it should stay out of it.

Like always we come to the only possible conclusion: this can only be stopped by Hamas, Hezbollah, and maybe Iran. This court, like everything else the UN does, is a joke.

The basic problem with war in general is always the same. If ONE party believes they are at war, TWO parties are at war. Just ask the Ukrainians, they can explain it better than I can.

And I'd argue there are many more militarily involved people in Gaza than you'd like to admit. Any random person on the street is more likely than not a sympathizer that Oct 7 was justified. On Sept 12, 2001 in the US that would be enough to call you an enemy, for sure.

Of course, this is completely insane logic and I don't believe so at all. Killing a civilian is abhorrent, whether that civilian might support an atrocity or not, as long as they weren't actually involved in it.

1) Do you attack people who kill civilians this? (Who actually does the military attack?)

Congrats, you're now doing what Israel does in it's place.

2) Do you do nothing?

Well, then you might as well shut up. At least have the decency to state, not just that "it is wrong" but that you have zero intention to help. If you don't, you're making things worse, not better.

3) ...

I'm sure A LOT of people are dying, including literally, to hear any ideas.

That this principle is a good idea ... I think everyone, including every Israeli and even Hamas members, no matter how crazy they otherwise are, agree that it is a good idea in General.

Obviously you find Hamas, PA, and muslim countries in general (and in number, they are the largest faction in the UN general assembly) ... extremely opposed to any enforcement, because they blatantly violated international law again and again and again.

Their [the Palestinans] story is they didn't have a choice once others violated it and they had to defend themselves, and they make a very strong case. Obviously you find Christian countries in general (and in number, they are the largest faction in the UN general assembly) ... extremely opposed to any enforcement, because they blatantly violated international law again and again and again.

*There are overwhelmingly more Christian-majority countries as compared to Muslim-majority countries. Also non of the Muslim counties have veto power. If you make an argument please base it on facts: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Coun...

I find it fascinating how lies can be so complicated, even if I suck at it. But yes, I've seen many times with dishonest politicians: you can purposefully lie by saying nothing but the truth, and just leave out a few facts.

https://www.un.org/en/model-united-nations/groups-member-sta...

See what it has to say about the OIC. I'll repeat it here: "The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the 57-member-state that constitutes the largest voting block in the United Nations" ...

They mean the general assembly, of course. "Strange" how you totally leave out the general assembly (especially given how the ICJ is organised).

I mean, are you even going to pretend it's missing for any reason other than outright deception and lying? It's clear from your post, after all, that you know exactly what you're hiding. Which is what makes it a lie: it's a direct attempt to bring over a specific idea, which is not true, and you know exactly what you're doing.

And, once again, it's "not a good sign" that a pro-Palestinian is so deliberately hiding facts. It always seems to be the same side doing this.

This is roughly what the Palestinians did when they found themselves attacked by the Israeli settlers, back at the formation of Israel. It's important to always remember that in this conflict, Israel has been the first aggressor, not the defense. And since Israel had the full support of the UN, and later of the USA, the Palestinians really couldn't spend too much time waiting for those to fix their problem (though they are actively engaged even today).

Now, for Israel to stop these attacks on their own people, especially before October 7th, the solution is actually relatively simple: stop attacking the people of Palestine, and they will stop attacking back. Recognize Palestine as a state, including a corridor to link Gaza and the West Bank, give back the territory stolen by illegal colonists in the West Bank, stop blockading their borders. Condition this on a free cross-Palestinian election, maybe even explicitly blocking Hamas from it.

The problem is that Israel's goal is not simply to stop the attacks on their civilians. Israel's goal, as many top leaders in Israel, including Netanyahu, openly declare, is to expand Israel's borders while excluding Palestinians from being Israeli citizens. Netanyahu has been supporting Hamas for more than a decade, and has many times openly admitted to this, as a great ally in ensuring that a two-state solution will never be reached.

So, what if a few Israeli citizens are killed every year? That's a price that Israel's government is willing to pay to keep the status quo and not get their hands too dirty with Palestinian blood. Of course, Oct 7th changed that: it challenged them and showed they are not all powerful, and that is not acceptable, so the people of Gaza had to be punished.

And just one final note - Israel performed two October 7th-level attacks just in the last twenty years - 2004's Operation Cast Led (1200+ civilians killed), and 2014's Operation Protective Edge (2200+ civilians killed). Except of course those were much worse, since Israeli bombs also destroyed many thousands of homes, displacing tens of thousands of civilians atop those killed.

Except this: "Of course, Oct 7th changed that: it challenged them and showed they are not all powerful, and that is not acceptable, so the people of Gaza had to be punished."

Yes. That's how it works. The argument made by the UN was that since Hamas is totally powerless, it's not moral to attack them to stop them from killing. Indeed, Oct 7 showed that that is true, but ONE stupid and sufficiently serious mistake on the Israeli side and ...

So of course the status quo was destroyed. By Hamas.

And you're masking your demand, namely that Israel just accept the rockets (and the constant Palestinian deaths the Hamas dictatorship/pseudo-sharia-state causes). So the answer is simple. EITHER:

1) you're against killing, and Hamas must be stopped.

2) you're not against killing, you're just a racist, only demanding Israel stops, and that Hamas be allowed to keep killing Jews. In that case: fuck your racism. Your complaints about Palestinian deaths will be treated in EXACTLY the same manner you treat Hamas killings. No-one cares.

The reason this is clear is also because killing Hamas achieves nothing, if you also destroy so much of the livelihood (and lives) of those living there. Even if Israel kills each and every last Hamas operative, in 5 years time at the worse, there will be new fighters taking their place, even more radical: what other reaction would anyone expect from people whose families you murdered, whose house you destroyed, whose entire future you've erased?

And again, the solution to all of this was (and still is, in the long term) to stop killing the people of Palestine and stealing more and more of their land. If Israel just accepted the victory they've already achieved in their conquests in the 1940s and later, and allowed Palestine to be an independent, functional country, as almost achieved in the Oslo accords (before Israel sabotaged that process), then Palestinians would have also stopped attacking Israel, a long time ago.

And please remember that Netanyahu has prouded himself for a long time in his ability to prevent a two-state solution, and considers Hamas a good ally in this goal. When, after this war, a new terrorist organization rises up instead of Hamas as a reaction to the slaughter, you can bet that Netanyahu or another similar Israeli politician will again favor them and seek to allow them to control Gaza, so that no dialog can ever happen and they get to keep the people of Gaza living in inhuman conditions.

Anyone who sincerely wants more lives to saved can only want a two-state solution to be achieved as soon as possible. The killing will quickly stop once that truly happens. The only reason to not believe that is if you follow the far-right Israeli position that sees Palestinians as sub-human beasts.

Funny you mention the Oslo accords. After all, hamas was created to prevent the formation of a Palestinian state through that accord, by massacring Palestinians, and when that didn't do enough, Israeli. That's not conspiracy, that's fact.

(That's fact, UNLIKE you're "brilliant reading" of Israel's hidden agenda, which ... shall we say, generously, MIGHT exist, might not. Since the only thing Israel needs to win is the two-state "solution", I don't understand why Israel would resort to such complicated plans that can go very wrong a dozen ways till Sunday)

No two-state solution will EVER satisfy hamas. They will massacre their own people, and anyone they can reach, to prevent it. They have done that before, and they scream to anyone willing to listen they'll do it again.

Your conclusion is dead on arrival, and if by some chance you manage to get anywhere, like Clinton did, Hamas will massacre again, and again, and again to kill it. And Oct 7 (and the 90s) prove: isolation will not work. There is no escaping the conclusion: if you want a two-state solution, Hamas must end, FIRST.

Frankly, the two-state solution is a trap for Palestinians. It's one of the VERY few things hamas is actually right about, I think. Their methods are abhorrent, their tactics ... well with their tactics, what exactly is the point of "saving" Gaza? MAYBE Gaza can have some amount of economic life (though nothing like what UNRWA gives them), but the west bank cannot even sustain it's population without constant help, mostly from Israel. If they become independent, they will be poorer than Zimbabwe. More importantly: it is similar for both Palestinian billionaires (both Hamas and Fatah) and the people, and at least the billionaires seem to understand this. I cannot fathom why Palestinians would accept a two-state solution.

This “conspiracy theory” which you are claiming as such, is actually believed by most people. Dozens—if not hundreds—of humanitarian organizations, international organizations, and states, are calling this a genocide. Polls done in most of the world—including the USA—show a plurality—if not a majority, or and is some cases an overwhelming majority—of the general public believes Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza. That is, they believe Israel intents destroying Palestinians in Gaza in whole or in part.

We even have the world’s highest court ordering Israel to stop military operations in Rafah, because they believe the risk of genocide is too high, and just to make it abundantly clear that Israel does not care if a genocide is occurring, Israel commits yet another massacre in Rafah, killing dozens of civilians in a place which Israel had ordered civilians to evacuate to.

> if you want a two-state solution, Hamas must end, FIRST.

Massacres are occurring. When you posted this, you probably had already heard the news of the Rafah tent camp massacre, and you probably knew that Israel had killed at least 35 civilians in a designated safe zone. You also knew that this massacre was but the latest in a series of massacres committed by Israel. Last Sunday, there was another massacre in An Nuseirat where 31 Palestinians were killed when an Israeli air strike hit a residential house, the day before that, on May 18th, 28 Pelestinians were killed on a public square near Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya in a single Israeli airstrike. And if we go just 3 months back in time we have the Flour Massacre, which killed at least 118 Palestinians who were trying to get some food after having been deliberately starved by Israel for many many weeks.

By your logic, Israel must also end for the massacres to stop.

Look, I’m no fan of the two state solution. Zionism is a racist ideology and has no place in the modern world. IMO there should only be a single democratic states with equal rights for all citizens. But I’m willing to admit that the current situation of this apartheid abomination of a Zionist Israel, and its never ending occupations, is not working. If a two state solution was on the table (even if one of the states remains an apartheid ethnocracy; denying civil rights to Palestinians) it would still be better than current. Will it stop the violence? Of course not, just like the two-state solution of Ireland and Northern Ireland did not stop the violence. Palestinians will keep fighting for civil rights while they are denied them, and they will use violent means as long as they are not given political means to achieve them. But it will still be better than the currently. There probably wouldn’t be an ongoing genocide in Gaza, if we had two states.

> You also knew that this massacre was but the latest in a series of massacres committed by Israel

Hamas also decided to react to the latest peace proposal with an attempted massacre, that was only stopped through the military capabilities of Israel. Again such "details" don't matter to you.

> even if one of the states remains an apartheid ethnocracy; denying civil rights to Palestinians

I'll point out that Palestine is no better. Neither the PA nor Hamas. It is an apartheid state. It has separate laws for different religions, denying civil rights to everyone.

Likewise you don't seem to care that Israel is actually pretty nice to Palestinians. Yes, really. Jordan did worse. Kuwait did worse. Syria did FAR worse to Palestinians. Lebanon didn't and Egypt didn't but that wasn't for lack of trying (and like in Israel, these responses were to Palestinians attacking).

Frankly, I wonder why you demand Israel do better than Jordan or Kuwait (who both just threw all Palestinians out forcibly, not caring they had nowhere to go. They emptied entire cities of people, forcing them to leave the country, mostly on foot through the desert). Since you're not complaining about these, clearly find this acceptable treatment of Palestinians, except when Israel does it.

Which brings the question "what is it about Israel that makes you hate them so much?". We all know the answer.

> By your logic, Israel must also end for the massacres to stop.

No. Israel really, really wants a two-state solution. For the reasons stated: it is economically completely untenable and unrealistic for the Palestinians. Palestinians economy is a business model: promises of killing Jews and a steady stream of dead Palestinians in trade for close to 11 figures dollars yearly.

You neglected to mention that if a two-state solution happens, those 11 figures disappear. What is to replace them? I would note that especially WB is a desert. You need 10 figures just to keep it livable for humans.

Please find one quote on the matter from one Israeli politician currently in power that doesn't directly oppose this. I'll wait.

Also, stop insisting people are racist. Neither Syria nor Jordan have killed >35,000 Palestinians in the last 5 months, so we are not currently discussing them, we're discussing the country that is doing it, today.

Edit: let me start at the very top with Netanyahu's position [0]:

> The prime minister added that “everyone knows that I am the one who for decades blocked the establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger our existence.”

Also see this article [3] about how Netanyahu and the head of the Mossad, Barnea, have been encouraging the continued funding of Hamas specifically to achieve this goal.

And from the more moderate president [1]:

> What I want to urge is against just saying two-state solution. Why? Because there is an emotional chapter here that must be dealt with.

National security minister Ben Gvir [2]:

> The war presents an “opportunity to concentrate on encouraging the migration of the residents of Gaza,” Ben Gvir told reporters and members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party, calling such a policy “a correct, just, moral and humane solution.”

> “We cannot withdraw from any territory we are in in the Gaza Strip. Not only do I not rule out Jewish settlement there, I believe it is also an important thing,” he said.

Finance minister Smotrich [also 2]:

> The “correct solution” to the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict is “to encourage the voluntary migration of Gaza’s residents to countries that will agree to take in the refugees,” Smotrich told members of his Religious Zionism party, predicting that “Israel will permanently control the territory of the Gaza Strip,” including through the establishment of settlements.

[0] https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-boasts-of-thwarting-...

[1] https://apnews.com/article/israel-war-hamas-herzog-president...

[2] https://www.timesofisrael.com/ministers-call-for-resettling-...

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/10/world/middleeast/israel-q...

You must hate the UN then, or at least UNRWA. Either that, or you're a racist.

You must hate Qatar then.

You must hate Iran then.

You must hate Hezbollah then, too.

You must hate Syria then, too.

Shall I keep going? I mean, I realize you're a racist and you only ever are going to say what Jews do and did wrong, but it's funny to just keep exposing your blatant doublespeak. And I get that "just lie" propaganda technique works on idiots, but I think this is probably not the right forum to count on that one working. I could point out who came up with your "just lie" technique, or at least popularized it ...

When it comes to people who pay money to keep this situation going, there is A LOT of blame to go around.

And of course, that money is the real cause of the conflict from the very beginning. Now Hamas picked up on the business model. A steady stream of dead Palestinians, preferably kids, and fantasies of massacring Jews, in arabic (because western people frown on that sort of thing, and just refuse to believe just how racist the entire middle east is, despite how obvious it is) for 10 digits of US currency yearly, mostly direct from the US government (plus what we don't know about).

Hamas has already shown how they deal with their long term problems because it keeps getting harder to have Jews kill Palestinians, and there is less and less willingness of Palestinians to sacrifice themselves ... Take some statistics and you'll see this is happening. They switched to the rockets, of course, with UN help, but even that is failing badly.

So when hamas' need for money is high and Jews are unwilling to kill the Palestinians Hamas throws at them, or Palestinians warn them, or they decide that Jews are offering help ... and they take it (like the North Gaza aid convoy). Well, then Hamas just fires into the crowd, or drives a car bomb into their own people.

First of all Israel hasn't called civilians in most cases, hence why 10s of thousands of them have been killed in bombings.

Secondly, Israel is not just killing civilians via bombings. It has cut off water and electricity and is causing a famine by preventing aid entering the area. It has destroyed Gaza's health infrastructure completely: countless people with treatable diseases are dying needlessly.

> Any random person on the street is more likely than not a sympathizer that Oct 7 was justified. On Sept 12, 2001 in the US that would be enough to call you an enemy, for sure.

This is a disgusting attempt to try and justify the murder of civilians, and you should feel ashamed.

If all innocent civilians are equal, then it's not acceptable to kill 35,000 Palestinian ones to avenge <2,000 Israeli ones, or even to prevent another <2,000 future Israeli casualties. That math makes no sense from the outside perspective, unless one discriminates based on race, or otherwise believes Israel civilians are somehow more valuable than Palestinian civilians.

As for "sympathizers": someone disagreeing with you doesn't justify exploding them, either.

Also if Israel were to back off, it would validate Hamas' tactics of embedding soldiers within the civilian population, leading to more widespread use of such tactics in the future. It seems like endgame there is that Western militaries can simply no longer conduct counterinsurgencies.

https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/hrbodies...

Despite that, Israel is not using this excuse.

Specifically international law protections do not apply to civilians, unless they stay away from both involvement in military clashes and stay away from the clashes themselves. This even goes for the even more protected classes like doctors or even the red cross.

The only real violations of international law apply to an army purposefully going, unprovoked, into a civilian area and starting to shoot everyone. Hamas does that, as they've proven on many occasions (including their own civilians), Israel doesn't. And no serious organization is even disputing that.

Israel has been shown to do this on multiple occasions. Take, for example, them doing exactly this to their own surrendering hostages, which they mistook for surviving, surrendering Palestinian civilians as they combed through the rubble of their bombings. Or maybe there was no mistake.

Given Israel's assault on the free press in Gaza (ranging from shutting off power and communications to literally shooting and bombing press workers), we may never know the true extent of these cleansings, especially when it really is "just" surviving, surrendering Palestinian civilians.

I’m also thinking about the massacres during the great march of return[2], where Israeli soldiers fired indiscriminately at unarmed protestors. In the protests, and the ensuing conflict, Israel killed 223 people, by far majority of whom were unarmed civilians. You can argue that mass demonstration is provocative, but the response of indiscriminately killing unarmed protestors is not a proportionate response.

And finally, I’m also thinking about the flour massacre[3], where the Israeli army purposefully went, unprovoked, into a civilian area and started to shoot everyone. At least 118 civilians were killed and 760 were wounded when the Israeli army shot at people trying to gather food after having been deliberately starved by Israel the months before.

The parent (who I’m trying not to engage with) is also just wrong when they claim no international law is broken by Israel. They currently have one ICJ case ruled against them, that of the illegal border (or apartheid) wall in the west bank, which the ICJ ruled illegal in 2004[4] and demanded they take down (which Israel hasn’t). The have several condemnations by a pletora of international humanitarian organizations. There are two ongoing ICJ cases against them, one for genocide, and their leaders stand recommended for indictments at the ICC.

There are many more examples than the three above of Israel blatantly violating international humanitarian law. Which is why the UN general assembly overwhelmingly voted to press charges at the ICJ to find out what the consequences of these gross violations should be[5].

1: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/30/middleeast/israel-undercover-...

2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_Gaza_border_...

3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour_massacre

4: https://www.icj-cij.org/case/131

5: https://www.icj-cij.org/case/186

I know you are trying to hold onto the position that these events were taken out of context, and that the IDF has a different story, which somehow excuses these events. But just so you know, there is international consensus that the IDF versions don’t survive scrutiny. Israel has been under investigation for human rights violations for a long time. Multiple human rights organizations have come to the same conclusion that Israel is a serial human rights violator, and unlike Israel, these human rights, and international organizations, have evidence which support their claims, evidence which actually holds up to scrutiny.

You keep reminding us about international consensus, well both HRW and Amnesty have accused Hamas, and HRW also Fatah, of kidnapping, torturing and intimidating Journalists in Gaza. There is international consensus that both Hamas and Fatah have also murdered journalists. So your only source of information is more than a little biased. No mention of this. And, of course, no mention that this is the society that you're defending. AND, of course, no mention that this obviously means your information is wrong, and extremely biased towards Palestine, and no discussion of what that means for your claims.

One example is "Mohamed al-durrah". TLDR: Palestinians attacked and killed THOUSANDS of people because Israel shot a kid hiding behind his father. Of course, it was then proven that not only Israel didn't do that, but Hamas ACTUALLY SHOT AND KILLED THE KID AND THE FATHER in order to make that video. The people who attacked and murdered thousands with that as justification killed a father and child in order to CREATE that justification. The explicitly given reason for thousands of murders by Palestinians turned out to be a deliberate false flag attack. How many times has that happened in this conflict? How many of your complaints are similar? How many of these massacres were deliberately caused by Hamas? How many times did Hamas just outright massacre their own people just to blame Israel? Because it's not zero. How many times did they force children to attack? Because it's not zero. How many times did they use women and children as human shields and literally shoot at soldiers hiding behind children? Because it's THOUSANDS OF TIMES MINIMUM. How many UN buildings did they use as military depots? How many schools? How many hospitals? Because there's 3 extremely well documented cases for hospitals alone, and one about the UN headquarters in Gaza. How many hospitals turned out to be military hamas bases, with UN doctors helping Hamas build those military bases inside hospitals? Because there's at least 5 documented cases.

And of course, the big question: how will you prevent this in the future? Because if you can't, obviously shooting at those places is unavoidable (hell, Hamas started their reign in Gaza by committing a massacre in the emergency ward of Al-Shifa hospital. No protests. Nobody thinks there is any problem with what happened, in fact that got them extra support).

And I'd even say ... fine. Fine if they ONLY attack their own people. But asking Israel (or Lebanon, or Jordan, or Egypt, or ... because let's not pretend Palestinians are only attacking Israel) to just endure the attacks is not reasonable.

For the other half, fact is that Palestinians have, time and time again, made it clear: their ONLY goal is to eliminate Israel and it's people. You know, the thing Putin keeps assuring us that if even a single attack of that kind happens, if he even SUSPECTS a single such attack happens, he'll respond with nuclear weapons, not just on the attacking party, on everyone. Of course, zero protests from anyone, hell, I've seen a leftist demonstration SUPPORT this (before Putin, well, he was there, not yet president).

Iran is threatening nuclear attacks if Israel merely defends itself. Yet, again, I have to point out, zero protests on your side. Somehow there's never any complaints from you if Jewish lives are at stake. They just have to let themselves be killed.

And there is the racist one-sidedness of your argument. Palestinians are currently committing constant warcrimes. And you accuse Israel of ignoring the ICJ? Are you serious?

In case you don't know, UNLIKE Israel, Hamas and Palestinians have signed the Rome statute. They are not carrying out the demands of the ICJ (arrest Hamas leaders, stop attacking Israel, return the hostages (they added "alive and dead" this time they demanded it), stop the rockets, disarm). Same with Lebanon, Iran, Hezbollah, ... yet you keep screaming about Israeli violations. One side must follow the law, the other side gets to ignore it.

You "neglect" to mention Palestinians have, for over 20 years, committed constant warcrimes. I'd list the people they have committed warcrimes on, but it goes from LGBTQ people to Kuwaiti, so let's just summarize: "against EVERYONE". You not only don't complain about this, you don't even talk about preventing this going forward. The only warcrimes you complain about are (alleged) warcrimes by Israel, not even proven ones. Yet the constant Palestinian warcrimes, a lot of which are proven (and not disputed by Palestinians), you don't care about.

Then there are the obvious international law violations. Hamas, who are Palestinians, is hiding among civilians, and committing dozens and dozens of these warcrimes every day. You don't care. They keep getting accused of forcing civilians to stand before their fighters. They are holding, raping, torturing, starving and killing hostages. They constantly (in fact, almost exclusively) attack civilians, including their own. You don't care.

Same argument as before. You not only don't mention this, or the fact that the UN has failed (and by that I mean they do NOTHING) to prevent constant warcrimes by these people for 40 years ... you demand they be allowed to continue these warcrimes.

Well, here's my argument:

Obviously you don't care about people committing warcrimes. You've made that ABUNDANTLY clear. So stop complaining about what Israel does. I see your argument as demanding that people are allowed to constantly commit warcrimes, over DECADES. Well, I demand you stop being racist, and simply allow the same on both sides.

You complain about bombardment of civilians. At minimum three Palestinian terrorist organizations you demand they are allowed to bombard Israel, without consequences. Well, I ask for fairness: allow Israel the same, or PREVENT Palestinian warcrimes.

You complain about firing into civilians. Palestinians have fired into civilians on about 700 separate occasions in the last 20 years (in fact, if you count ... it's already more than 100 years), and you demand nothing be done about this. Well, I ask for fairness: allow Israel the same.

Frankly, you are making one huge pro-warcrime argument, and badly mask it by pointing to the obvious fact that warcrimes have victims.

And, lastly, there's the strategic argument. The VERY BASIS of international law is that borders aren't allowed to move. That is the central basic thing the UN, and the "international order" is founded on. Even if a country can conquer another, they aren't allowed to. Not even if they're bigger and they can do it. Not if a holy book "justifies it". Not if there's "historical justification" (as if such a thing even exists). Not even if they have economic reasons to do so. Not ... Never. Palestinians refuse to abide by this, and somehow you fail to see what will happen if that is allowed. Obviously, the result will be 1000 wars starting across the globe, as there are 1000 situations where one country feels justified conquering another.

> These allegations of Hamas violations of international humanitarian laws—even if true—does not devalue the lives of Palestinians, nor does it give Israel an excuse for further violations.

When I said that, I was referring to my parent’s allegations of Hamas’ use of human shields, hiding among civilian populations etc. But this also applies to your accusations of Hamas’ terrorist actions.

But let’s step back and see what you are doing here. You are claiming that because of Hamas’ atrocities, International humanitarian laws does not apply to Israel. However, there is no such clause in International Humanitarian law. It applies to everybody, even if your enemy breaks them.

So basically what you are saying here is that Israel—a state actor—is as bad as Hamas—a terrorist organization. This argumentation does not look good for Israel. That said, Israel is a state actor and should not be held to the same standard as a terrorist organization. We can expect Hamas to continue committing as long as the Palestinian people are treated unjustly. Hamas is a resistance movement, and they will resist. Israel, however, is a state actor, and is bound to international treaties. In the ongoing conflict, they are the oppressors, giving unjust treatment of other peoples. They are fighting to keep oppressing, to prevent justice for Palestinians. And they are bound by international law to not do that.

See https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... for past explanations of this point. As well as https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html of course.

Regardless of which side you're on in a conflict, and regardless of how right you are or feel you are, you simply can't abuse this forum and break its rules this way.

If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email [email protected] and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Having said that, none if it justifies the crimes or racial discrimination I mentioned above. As I said: If all innocent civilians are equal, then it's not acceptable to kill 35,000 Palestinian ones to avenge <2,000 Israeli ones, or ——>even to prevent another <2,000 future Israeli casualties.<—— That math makes no sense from the outside perspective, unless one discriminates based on race, or otherwise believes Israel civilians are somehow more valuable than Palestinian civilians.

If you don't buy that though, it still seems reasonable enough for Israel to prioritize their own security. It may not be morally correct from a utilitarian perspective, but it's what pretty much any country would do, just as any parent would save their own child first in an emergency.

What we do have data to support is that bombing apartment blocks and hospitals and refugee camps and aid convoys and aid warehouses all full of innocent civilians is illegal, even if you shout "human shield!" first, even if you really want to achieve your political or military aims, even if you claim you're saving more innocent civilian lives by doing so, even if you really want to "prioritize security". It's all still illegal, hence the court cases.

Would Israel tolerate the IDF killing innocent Israeli civilians in as great a number as they have killed innocent Palestinian civilians, to achieve the same aims? Likely not, which would make the behavior discriminatory based on race, religion, and/or national origin, too.

> it still seems reasonable enough for Israel to prioritize their own security. It may not be morally correct from a utilitarian perspective, but it's what pretty much any country would do, just as any parent would save their own child first in an emergency.

This makes it sound like you recognize Palestine as a different country (and thus deserving of international recognition, freedom, independence, self-determination, safety, and security). If so, good on you :) If not, Israel is obliged to protect Palestinian civilians under its rule equally to Israeli civilians under its rule. I wish I could say "there's no 3rd option where Israel abuses Palestinians under their rule for decades while taking no responsibility for their well-being", but we've all seen the past decades.

Every country "discriminates" based on nationality; to expect otherwise would be unreasonable. If a country truly valued all human interests equally, there would be no reason for citizenship.

If Israel was governed by moral saints, they might reach a conclusion that any military response would lead to negative net utility, so it's better to allow Hamas and Hezbollah to attack with impunity until they eventually conquer Israel and cleanse it of Jews. Moral sainthood isn't a reasonable expectation, though, and it's certainly not a standard anyone applies to other countries.

> Every country "discriminates" based on nationality;

You've twisted my words: I said race, religion, or national origin, not nationality. Their national origin is Palestine. Their nationality is either Israeli or Palestinian. If Palestinian, that means Palestine is a different country (and thus deserving of international recognition, freedom, independence, self-determination, safety, and security). If Israeli, that means Israel is obliged to protect Palestinian civilians under its rule equally to Israeli civilians under its rule. Israel believes Palestine is not an independent country, therefore they are bound to the obligations of the latter, and cannot discriminate against their national subjects based on national origin.

Let's be clear here: Nobody expects Israel to admit any wrong here, or to do any good here, despite the international condemnation. This is just explaining that condemnation.

> it's better to allow Hamas and Hezbollah to attack with impunity until they eventually conquer Israel and cleanse it of Jews.

Please, we're being serious here. Hamas' latest attack, after years of planning, was their most successful in history, and it killed some 95% fewer than Israel has cleansed in the months since then, on a moment's notice. One cannot discuss this "threat" as anything other than a joke -- it's simply unrealistic given Hamas' means and history. Even so, as mentioned above, it's not an excuse for Israel's literal genocide of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians so far, with millions more in the crosshairs.

Even if you want to make the argument that Israel is occupying (Hamas-controlled parts of) Gaza, that wouldn't make Gazans Israeli citizens, and realistically every country prioritizes the safety of their citizens; it wouldn't be reasonable to expect otherwise.

> One cannot discuss this "threat" as anything other than a joke

You're ignoring the role of asymmetric warfare and human shield tactics. The IDF is struggling to make progress as is, despite obvious military superiority. If they caved to demands to e.g. stay out of Rafah, then Hamas terrorists would essentially be untouchable, an noone can fight an untouchable enemy.

Israel treating their Palestinian-born subjects as stateless would be illegal, so a decision must be made by Israel between the two options I described, with the respective consequences I described. By effectively exerting rule over Palestinians (especially in the West Bank), they have chosen the route that doesn't recognize Palestine as a country, and thus are obliged to treat Palestinian-born subjects equally to any other subjects under their rule. The fact that Israel denies citizenship to the millions of Palestinian-born subjects under their rule, is particularly gross.

> You're ignoring the role of asymmetric warfare and human shield tactics. The IDF is struggling to make progress as is, despite obvious military superiority. If they caved to demands to e.g. stay out of Rafah, then Hamas terrorists would essentially be untouchable, an noone can fight an untouchable enemy.

That, in turn, ignores that Israel's actions are still illegal. Put simply, the defense you cite isn't good enough to justify Israel's actions. They tried that defense, it did not succeed, here we are. The reason is that the laws were made with the possibility of "human shields" in mind, and they still made the actions illegal. It's not some novel occurrence excepted from the rules.

It does sucks to be IDF right now, but their lives aren't worth more than civilian Palestinian lives, and thus it is immoral for them to take many civilian lives to reduce their own risk of loss, and illegal for them to do so to the extent they have, even if it means they get to kill a terrorist in the process.

Here's the most important metric (superceding any Israeli desire): Fewer civilians will die if Israel withdraws and simply secures the border than will die if Israel invades. You don't have to trust me: An independent court actually evaluated both sides here and came to the same judgement, as described in the article we're discussing. Israel will either accept that they can't do whatever they want, up to and including genocide, just because they want to, or continue to parallel Russia's and North Korea's international pariah journey while angrily feigning ignorance and righteously pointing fingers at everyone but themselves. Probably the latter.

I was never commenting on legality. It seems unreasonable to expect a country to essentially give up on its own defense, whether or not such defense is deemed illegal and/or leads to more deaths overall.

> Hamas' aggression has unfortunately made that impossible for now.

On the contrary: as the world has expressed on multiple occasions in multiple ways, Israel's genocide of Palestinians is what has made that unfortunately impossible for now. After all, the world sees how Israel abused Palestinians for decades before October 7th. Israel can't say the world didn't warn them as they spiral into the same pariah status as Russia and North Korea.

> It seems unreasonable to expect a country to essentially give up on its own defense

The "abiding by international law means essentially giving up our defense" claim was put forth by Israel and judged not to be the case. It was expected, both when the law was drafted, and when the case was brought against Israel, given their frequent repetition of the now-debunked claim. It just wasn't credible: neither the court nor most countries or people actually believe Hamas is going to somehow conquer the state of Israel. Indeed, it's inconceivable that over their entire remaining existence Hamas will ever deal out even a small fraction of the damage Israel has dealt to innocent Palestinian civilians over the course of less than 1 year.

If, however, one isn't interested in discussing the legality of Israel's behavior (in an HN post about precisely that), and the topic is reduced to whether Israel will say "whatever, I do what I want" a la Putin or Cartman, then I will submit a bet that they will, and leave it at that.

Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one.

Indeed my point was never about law; this thread began with your argument which seemed to be about utilitarian ethics. So the ICJ order isn't related to my point, unless we consider the ICJ an arbiter of morality.

Not Gaza, Palestine. That includes Gaza and the West Bank, which has been under Israeli apartheid for a long time. There is rarely an unrestrained right to self-defense of a country engaging in apartheid and genocide, against those upon whom they are perpetrating it. Does Israel grant Palestinian-born subjects in the West Bank (a territory Israel dominates) freedom, self-determination, safety? Does it treat them equally to Israeli-born subjects? No, and that's illegal (and apartheid).

The "self defense exception" was cited by Israel, and the court judged that their illegal actions go beyond legal self defense. If we take a moral perspective rather than a legal one, it would be immoral to substitute Israel's judgement for that of the ICJ, a less biased and more informed body. From a utilitarian objective standpoint, we arrive at the same conclusion: It's unlikely Israel has some magical higher understanding that all other countries lack. Plus, legitimizing claims by defendants like Putin, Bibi, Sinwar, Kony, Gallant, or Haniyeh et. al, that they somehow know better than the court, would kinda defeat the purpose of the court.

From a moral perspective, it seems like you're saying the ICJ would be a better arbiter of morality than Israel, but my point didn't involve an appeal to any authority; that just doesn't seem necessary when discussing morality.

> [consensus] just doesn't seem necessary when discussing morality.

That would not be an entirely unexpected claim from any given person who doesn't like the humanitarian consensus, Just like it was not entirely unexpected to see Israel claim that international laws don't seem necessary when violating international laws they don't like.

I think we're both smart enough to realize what would happen if each person on earth decided that they were the true arbiter of law and morality, and had the right to do whatever they wanted, regardless of the law or what anybody or almost everybody else thought. So it is good that the consensus is that consensus is indeed necessary when writing and enforcing and judging the laws we wrote, around such moral standards as "don't genocide people".

By rejecting the concept of this consensus, which you call an "appeal to authority", it seems this topic is indeed being reduced to whether Bibi will say "whatever, I do what I want" like Putin or Cartman or Kony or Sinwar, while his country continues to spiral into international pariah status. So, I will submit a bet that he will, and leave it at that.

For example, parts of international law come from UN security council resolutions, which are passed based on 9/15 security council votes, and no vetos from the 5 permanent members. The permanent members include Russia and China, and non-permanent members often include other authoritarian states, like UAE until recently. Trump may soon have authority over US votes. Do you trust these political entities as bastions of morality?

I understand Israel disagrees with this consensus. I understand you may disagree with this consensus. I accept that if global consensus hasn't already changed your minds, I might not, either. That is okay. Consensus doesn't require buy-in from any single particular person or country. But as a general rule of thumb, if a great majority say you're in the wrong, and you say they're all in the wrong for saying you're in the wrong, that means you're probably in the wrong, so it's worth seriously considering the possibility.

Your latter observation doesn't seem to apply here, as it seems the ICC and ICJ based their findings and rulings on laws and ethics, not politics or bias, and it doesn't seem like the laws themselves are biased against Israel in particular, either.

There's no evidence the opposition is driven by antisemitism. The large amount of jewish people who oppose the Israeli genocide of Palestinians should give a clue that judaism isn't the issue here. Russia is trying to do the same thing to Ukraine as Israel is trying to do with Palestine, and receiving equal condemnation worldwide. Only they exclaim "russophobia!" when criticized, rather than "antisemitism!"

So, food for thought: a lower ratio of civilians to military and security personnel was killed on October 7th (according to Israeli published figures) than tends to be killed in even precision bombings.

Note: I can only fairly say "tends to be killed" because it can be difficult to truly get accurate data on military bombing casualties -- but one can absolutely find many individual cases of dozens of civilians being considered valid collateral for 1-3 military targets.

Source on deaths: https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20231215-israel-social... > 695 Israeli civilians, including 36 children, as well as 373 security forces

If we use sources like Times of Israel, which ignores police and other emergency personnel, claims become https://www.timesofisrael.com/14-kids-under-10-25-people-ove... > 859 civilians 274 soldiers

So notice that these figures are looking between 1.86 and 3.13 civilians per soldier dead.

That means an essentially random massacre which deliberately TRIED to target civilians, but which was primarily performed by individual soldiers, couldn't even cause nearly as many deaths as precision bombings do.

And note that, from what I could gather, those figures on Israeli deaths don't include government workers as being valid combatants, when I doubt any Hamas pencil pushers that may exist would get the "luxury" of not being counted as non combatants.

The can of worms opened up here only gets messier still if you then start going more philosophical issues like how they seem to have spent the last few decades uncertain if Palestine is basically a mini case of Escape From NY, under outright Israeli military occupation, or an entirely independent country. I'd want to ask the Israeli government if this is a war or a policing action.

A minor counterpoint to something you wrote though: I don't think this is often something in terms of their civilians being less valuable, at least not publicly due to the obvious bad optics. I rather think it's a case presented more like a need for some civilians to die now to prevent more from dying later or being "oppressed under illegitimate government" type concerns, etc.

Israel has no ethical response because there is no ethical means by which one can maintain apartheid. History did not start on Oct 7, 2023. It’s like pondering where the line is between legitimate and illegitimate responses to the Warsaw ghetto uprising, or to Haitian revolution.

Where should we start?

When the arabs colonized the levant? or the many massacres of native jews? The wars of aggression by arabs? This conflict is awfully messy and each side has a laundry list of legitimate grievances.

The fact is the British/UN gave a bunch of land to people that wasn’t really theirs to give. Nakba happened (which is illegal to even talk about in Israel) which was already a mass genocide/forced displacement). People alive today saw this happen. Watch the documentary Tantura to see some of the horrors by early Israelis (rapes, torture, killing people and feeding them their own genitals).

The point is: throughout most of modern history “Israel” has been invading Palestine. The fact that the UN recognized Israel in 1949 doesn’t matter… because that recognition required mass displacement and horrors to actually materialize.

Arab wars etc are a consequence of this. Sure maybe Israel won some of those. But one has to accept that the very conceptualization of Israel is rooted in genocide and displacement from the start. Many (or maybe most) states throughout history were formed this way I guess … Israel had the bad luck of doing it during a time that the human rights and morality of modernity was beginning to fully form.

This is very inaccurate, the actual law is described here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba_Law#Provisions

So you are not allowed to call it the Nakba, or describe it as anything but something to celebrate as long as you receive funding from the government.

I don’t know how the media, libraries, schools or other institutions work in Israel, but in Iceland this would pretty much amount to a ban, as almost all media, and institutions receive at least some funding from the government, and the most important ones actually depend on it.

I also find it curious how this flies in Israel’s participation in Eurovision. Russia was banned for using state media to spread misinformation. Meanwhile Israel has laws which bans their state media from recognizing previous state atrocities, and is not banned.

skill issue.

Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide

You can call it a "small" genocide if you want. But you won't get anywhere denying either the facts of what has been happening to the Palestinians, or their relation to genocidal acts as defined above.

-- Defense Minister Yoav Gallant

You're catching on! The Nakba is as fresh as ever. Just ask these folks -- who are definitely in a position to know:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40372975

As the Minister for Foreign Affairs instructs us: "Remember 48".

And he sure ain't kidding. It is all very much an ongoing process.

The genocidal intent of the Nakba was as clear in 1948 as it is with the Nakba in its current form today.

Oh, absolutely. If the Nakba falls under the modern definition of genocide (as per the Convention), then the MENA expulsions and of course the Oct 7 pogrom do as well, in my view.

My intent is not to isolate blame on one side for this mess (which I see as ultimately symbiotic, the result of provocations by both sides). But to identify the common fabric between these events -- in the hopes of finding some way to stop if from continuing perpetually, ever forward.

Are Jews living through an ongoing holocaust now? Perhaps, since the term genocide lost all meaning why not.

Neither side is going through a true Holocaust in the sense of what happened to the European Jews (and certain other groups at the time), of course. We are very far from that, and I see your point here about a possible dilution of the term, and of the (nearly but not entirely unique) trauma and anguish related to those events (which I spent a certain phase of my life obsessively studying, BTW).

Again the overall intent is to identify sources of harm done to people, at scale and on the basis of group identity -- intended to diminish their numbers, destroy their spirit, and threaten their long-term survival as a people.

I just want it all to stop.

I don’t think this is fair, nor helpful. It is kind of like saying that the ongoing Gaza Genocide is another Holocaust. The Nakba is a unique historic event, by calling other historic events the same name it kind of reduces the effectiveness of giving names to events, and what made them unique enough to be named in the first place.

The Palestinian exodus from Kuwait for example was nothing like the actual Nakba. To begin with the victims were already refugees, so they had a place that they could flee to. Second the exile orders were a limited time (I think a week), as opposed to permanent in the case of the actual Nakba. The exile orders were not enforced with terrorism and military occupation.

While the exodus from Kuwait was a terrible human rights violation, it is actually much more like ongoing refugee evacuations from Europe and North America than the actual Nakba. Calling it a Nakba is either denying the horrors of the the Nakba, or exaggerating the Palestinian exodus from Kuwait.

Since this is just a rhetorical point, I don't think it's much worth arguing. I could come back at you with the Holocaust comparison, but what do we get out of that?

So, I'm going to continue using the wording I'm using, but with respect to your objection: heard.

I think this is valid because the same government entity keeps these practices and policies onto the same victims. There is also a distinction to be made on the original event which we call The Nakba and the ongoing policies which followed. It is kind of like saying that the Korean War never ended. We have this original event, and then we have the aftermath which is still unresolved (not making a comparison though granting the right of return to displaced Palestinian is a million times less complicated than the Korean reunification).

I also hear people talking about the Gaza Genocide as a second Nakba. I also think this is valid (although The Gaza Genocide is a descriptive enough name IMO) since it mirrors the original event in scope and horrors, in policies. This would be akin to calling a second world war following The Great War World War II.

The Palestinian exodus from Kuwait, or the Syrian reign of terror against Palestinians are, however, not a direct followup or a continuation by the same entity of the same practices and policies of the original Nakba.

At most I can understand the use of the word Counter-Nakba as the Jewish hostile policies of e.g. Iraq were a direct response to the original Nakba. However the scale and horrors of that policy were nowhere near that of the original Nakba (even though the scale of the results [somewhat] did). And the practices and policies of Muslim majority countries did not mirror those of Israel during the Nakba, quite the contrary.

But we have to keep in mind that none of those people would be forced to live in such inhospitable places were it not for the bold, decisive actions of that man who got an airport named after him.

The MENA expulsions (which we have already acknowledged) didn't have anything to do either with Nakba '48 or the expulsions of Palestinians in other countries in subsequent years. Let alone with the topic of subthread we've all jumped in at here. (Which started with the Nakba after all; I didn't introduce it to make some broader moral point).

I don't think my thesis is "Israel is right". My awareness of Israel started with them killing that activist with a bulldozer, and didn't go better places from there. I'm guessing we 80% agree about Israel.

I think my thesis is "no simple argument about Israel or Palestine will ever be true". Which is, to me, kind of fascinating, if you can get past the horror, which I understand people (on both sides) not being able to do. Also: I sound like a Bond villain right now.

So ... if Palestinians are still going through what they're going today, at home or abroad, it's ultimately (or to large extent) a delayed result of the MENA expulsions, and the slight electoral tilt among the descendants of those affected (we're talking 2 full generations later, heading up on a 3rd by now) within Israeli electoral politics?

That is to say, ultimately an outgrowth of -- external antisemitism?

That's your thesis here?

It is a fallacy to assume that governments are driven by hatred and are unable to control their state’s response to unethical acts.

And yet, you have ZERO demands on Palestinians following international law, or Iranians, or ... You also have ZERO options for how to make them, in fact when attempting to discuss how to respond to violations of international law, you keep refocusing on past guilt of Israel in this or that event.

This, despite the fact that Palestinians and Iranians have actually signed the international treaties that they will respect international law, including the Rome Statute, which means Palestinians, to respect international law, now have to destroy Hamas, and deliver it's leaders to the authorities. They also signed that they would not take hostages, and now should deliver the hostages without any conditions. So enforcement is a valid thing to ask about, isn't it?

> It is a fallacy to assume that governments are driven by hatred and are unable to control their state’s response to unethical acts.

Again, how does this apply to Palestinians? And, how will you enforce their behavior to change?

In reality, everyone is responsible for their own unethical acts, and it's completely unethical to respond to an unethical act with an unethical act of your own.

I'm sure most criminal suspects and their supporters [0] feel the same way, and would love for their personal judgement to be so favored. Putin, for example.

0: This is a sensitive topic, so to be extra clear, I am referring to the criminal case against Bibi in the ICC and the genocide case against Israel and Hamas in the ICJ, and those who support the defendants in the 1st of those and half or more of the defendants in the other.

Israel also has tons and tons religious extremism but it wouldn't be fair to say that Israel fights for religious reasons. It just comes down to an extreme and probably unsolvable fixation on the land from both sides.

All sides of the Palestinian conflict have strong groups of influence who base their demands on religious grounds, because when you cannot deny facts or do not want to start a long, hard road to peace and reconciliation saying "my made up deity told me so" is apparently reason good enough to start killing people.

Religion is a red herring here. What must be done first and foremost is Israel, the party with all the power here, treats all people equally, with equal rights. Doing so will take the wind out of the sails of Hamas. If Israel's goal is genocide, an independent investigation of Israel's actions will show that they are different*.

* - An independent investigation of Israel's actions shows that they are different.

Because of this, anyone involved in the Israeli abuse and genocide of Palestinians is as extremist, if not moreso, than those involved in the attack that killed 95% fewer innocent civilians last year.

Either way, the first step is that Israel must stop treating Palestinians as half-people. It's the right thing to do, and it will take the wind out of the sails of Hamas, as well as the global condemnation of Israel.

> They took Palestinians hostage and used them to turn the world against Israel.

This is the gaslighting language of spousal abusers: "You made me hurt you". Israel did both those things, and is (unsuccessfully) attempting to gaslight others with abuser language, because they are abusers of Palestinians.

As the International Court of Justice points out, ending this humanitarian catastrophe is the most urgent priority – even more urgent than Bibi's desire to keep it going for his own reasons.

Thus, when Israel stops exploding Palestinian civilian men, women and children, stops exploding aid workers, stops blocking and exploding aid, stops destroying hospitals and patients and homes and families, stops displacing millions of civilians and takes proper responsibility for their health (Israel claims Gaza and the West Bank as theirs, after all, making Palestinians their charge), _that_ will be a time to discuss the issue of the broader conflict. But first we must stop the ongoing slaughter of innocent civilian Palestinians.

tl;dr: the world ending genocide of Palestinians > Israeli political desires.

People would care less if israel was not actively supporting illegal settlers and that extremists killed ytzak rabin that was looking for peace. Or that netanyahu was on camera saying he wants to make palestinian civilians suffer as much as possible while he negociates in bad faith and doesnt respect the usa that are 'easy to manoeuver".

Its not just about hamas

The situation with Gaza is very different. There aren't perfect answers, and fifty years of being kettled under military occupation has only made everyone involved hate each other that little bit more.

Whatever the exact numbers are, it's clear that normal people have suffered unduly as a result of military action, in a way that has extended far past self defence, with documented actions that seem barely human.

A comparison to the Falklands war —as unnecessary as that was— seems perverse.