velcrohn

Well, she probably watched lots of videos about Holmes and read a lot about her in preparation for her role. IIRC Tina Fey talked a lot about Sarah Palin. And “the point” is that it is an interesting twist to have an actor who portrayed a public figure actually interact with that figure.

Since you brought it up... The population of Gaza has been going up since 1948. Before Hamas attacked, tens of thousands of Gazans had work permits in Israel, and many Gazans were treated in Israeli hospitals.

After Hamas started a war, Israel provided food, power, water, fuel, and medicine with intermittent interruptions. They had ceasefires to provide vaccines for children. Israel warned civilians of imminent attacks, and generally gave them time to move. That rarely happens in a war, never mind a genocide.

It is absolutely true that tens of thousands of civilians were killed, although it is difficult to quantify because Hamas soldiers do not wear uniforms and has 100% of its military capabilities around and below hospitals, mosques, schools, and apartments. Also, Gazan authorities have never distinguished military and civilian casualties in their reporting. And despite having the world's largest bomb shelter, i.e. 500 km of tunnels, Hamas did not allow a single civilian into them during the war.

But stipulating tens of thousands of civilian deaths during an intense urban fighting, there is a name for that. The name for that is "war". Genocide is an entirely different phenomenon. You seem to conflate the two.

Respectfully, have you ever actually repaired a hole bigger than a couple of cm, then sanded it and painted it to match the rest of the wall? Yes,the materials and tools cost less than a TV. What cost more than the TV are the materials, tools, and time needed to master the proper skills if you don’t already have them.

If I am going to attack a military installation under your house and I warn you to leave, that is not genocide.

If I see your house, miles from any military installation, and I destroy it in order to kill you, and I do that over and over and over, that is genocide.

In both cases, the house is destroyed. In one case, your life is saved.

In the legal definition, you ignore the ICJ requirement. Please address that.

You left out a lot of things. You are trying to make a point. I don’t expect you to put in all the things that go against your point, but you left out so many that maybe your point is not worth making.

But in your example, the unstated premise is that the opposition leader is not in fact a terrorist, so his killing is wrong.

In the case of Hamas, they are in fact terrorists. So the analogy fails.

Sources?

Sources? Are these officials who have any power or authority, or are they the Israeli equivalent of MTG?

What does de-escalation look like in Gaza? Allowing Hamas to regroup and re-arm, so they can repeat October 7 as they publicly promised to do?

Just to address one of your points: 2 in every 10,000 people are dying daily. With a population of 2.1 million, that fraction is 420 people a day. Can you provide a source for that claim? Your link to the Guardian has roughly 20% of that number, which was provided by Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health

There is certainly hunger. It is an active war zone. But your numbers are grossly exaggerated.

When you mention the relatively small amount food entering between March and June, you neglect to mention the 6 months supply of food that was provided in January. That seems to be an important factor.

Also of note - there have been warnings of imminent mass starvation in Gaza since October 2023, and none of those warnings came about until recently, at which point Israel increased the amount of food entering Gaza.

From an emotional standpoint, these are the things that mean genocide: -actively gathering large numbers of civilians of a group, then bringing them to an area where they dig their own graves, and are shot en masse -transporting large numbers of civilians of a group to death camps where they are executed -otherwise killing large numbers of civilians of a group with no military objectives whatsoever

There are many terrible things happening in Gaza. Terrible things happen in wars that are not genocide. Israel is responsible for some of the terrible things. Hamas is responsible for many of them too. But nothing like what I described above is happening in Gaza at any meaningful scale. If a soldier decides to take potshots at civilians, that is a war crime. It is not genocide.

From a legal standpoint, genocide requires intent. The International Court of Justice has said “intent to destroy the group, in whole or in part, must be the only reasonable inference which can be drawn from the pattern of conduct.” https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/118...

When there are military facilities under schools, hospitals, and apartment buildings, then it is a reasonable inference that the destruction of the civilian infrastructure is to destroy the military facilities, not to commit genocide. I do not think anyone can deny that. Yet every claim of genocide on the part of Israel ignores this point, or finds some frivolous reason to dismiss it.

Furthermore, when civilians are warned of imminent attacks, when civilians are provided with 1 million tons of aid, and when there are cease-fires to provide vaccines for children, then intent to commit genocide is contradicted.

Again, horrible things happen in war. But this is not genocide.