[Chance]

Maark Abbott, on 17 October 2023 - 07:02 AM, said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Hamas originally funded by the Israeli government?

To my best ability to find info this is not true. It started as a branch of the muslim brotherhood but seems to have changed into a more militant path around 1984, well before it was actually called Hamas from 1988 and it did its first kidnap murdering in 1989.

At the same time in more recent days they have probably been a comfortable bogeyman to keep palestinians split between radical islam in gaza and corrupt cleptocracy (what is the correct term when they mostly creatively steal foreign aid from your own people?) in jerusalem. Israel has fairly recently allowed transfer of money from gulf states to Hamas for them to run the goverment in gaza...which I guess they regret by now.

This post has been edited by Chance: 17 October 2023 - 07:53 AM

[worry]

Cause, on 17 October 2023 - 01:11 AM, said:

The IDF kills civilians but its not the goal.

Chance, on 17 October 2023 - 05:41 AM, said:

One side elected terrorists

We're gonna have to disagree on these two things. I'm not sure how they could make it any clearer that that is the goal of Israel's right wing powers-that-be, and that this is indiscriminate collective punishment. Is that what citing the Gaza election is supposed to wave away? Cuz I don't think the civilian victims of the October 7 massacre deserved their horrors just cuz Netanyahu is Prime Minister, and he's a butcher. And again, the population of Gaza is 50% children, so who did they elect? The United States elected Bush/Cheney -- twice -- and their (thus our) civilian death toll is absolutely staggering. None of it excuses what's happening and what's about to happen, just like 9/11 -- a gut-wrenching, horrifying act of terrorism that took thousands of civilian lives -- excuses the hell on earth that Bush/Cheney enacted. You may disagree it's a genocide -- time will tell, I suppose, and there are blessedly pressures against it happening even if they're not the world's most powerful people -- but you're never gonna logic your way into 'collective punishment is justice' -- for either side of this conflict.

Speaking of 9/11, one of the best things I've seen written on the macro level of these events.

[Chance]

worry, on 17 October 2023 - 07:43 AM, said:

I'm not sure how they could make it any clearer that that is the goal of Israel's right wing powers-that-be, and that this is indiscriminate collective punishment.

I'm sure your right here, a relative minority that the current goverment of Israel needs to stay in power would like nothing better than pushing all palestinians out of gaza into egypt or the sea for all they care and put jewish settlers in all of gaza. These people are just as bad as their palestinian counterparts with one exception they are slightly less inclined to terrorism from being better feed, employed and owning more stuff.

For the most part these politicans aren't the IDF and I'm pretty damn sure that the IDF isn't shooting any civilians deliberatly as a planned genocide. We might want terrible things that happen to be a war crimes but mostly they aren't and the rules aren't there to limit death it is there to limit deliberate atrocities. Maybe it should be but people in general aren't ready for that and won't be in our life times.

This post has been edited by Chance: 17 October 2023 - 08:31 AM

[worry]

I would rather be wrong than right, for sure. And I'm also sure the IDF is like any soldiery -- which is to say, multi-faceted, especially in the rank and file, particularly when participation is compulsory.

It's just that the ground war hasn't even started yet. Right now we're talking about bombs -- 6,000+ in a week, dropped across an area the size of like Seattle, in one of the most densely populated areas on earth. Evacuation orders under impossible circumstances, leading to safe zones that are also being bombed. I continue to hope for better than what I fear, for everyone, I just think the alarm bells are justified.

[Chance]

worry, on 17 October 2023 - 09:15 AM, said:

...I just think the alarm bells are justified.

Completely agree but going for warcrimes and genocide directly is a bit of going directly for the nuclear option?

I'm actually surprised there aren't more dead with probably quite a bit above 6000 bombs by now what is that 0.5 deaths per bomb, 1.5 injured per bomb? Does to me seem like they aren't indiscriminatly bombing large gatherings at least especially since I would be very inclined to belive that much of Hamas losses are in those figures given the source.

worry, on 17 October 2023 - 09:15 AM, said:

It's just that the ground war hasn't even started yet.

If you want a slight positive, if we are lucky there won't be a big land war and occuptation. Personally I think no one wants the nightmare of occupying gaza except those insane right wing radicals that don't care about life at all. I think if they where going in full speed ahead they would have done so already but that is a random internet guess

This post has been edited by Chance: 17 October 2023 - 11:10 AM

[Maark Abbott]

Chance, on 17 October 2023 - 07:30 AM, said:

Maark Abbott, on 17 October 2023 - 07:02 AM, said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Hamas originally funded by the Israeli government?

To my best ability to find info this is not true. It started as a branch of the muslim brotherhood but seems to have changed into a more militant path around 1984, well before it was actually called Hamas from 1988 and it did its first kidnap murdering in 1989.

At the same time in more recent days they have probably been a comfortable bogeyman to keep palestinians split between radical islam in gaza and corrupt cleptocracy (what is the correct term when they mostly creatively steal foreign aid from your own people?) in jerusalem. Israel has fairly recently allowed transfer of money from gulf states to Hamas for them to run the goverment in gaza...which I guess they regret by now.

Fair. I am way too used to Western(isd) governments funding extremist groups (see: the UK and ISIS) so I am admittedly a little lot jaded on this specific point.

worry, on 17 October 2023 - 09:15 AM, said:

I would rather be wrong than right, for sure. And I'm also sure the IDF is like any soldiery -- which is to say, multi-faceted, especially in the rank and file, particularly when participation is compulsory.

It's just that the ground war hasn't even started yet. Right now we're talking about bombs -- 6,000+ in a week, dropped across an area the size of like Seattle, in one of the most densely populated areas on earth. Evacuation orders under impossible circumstances, leading to safe zones that are also being bombed. I continue to hope for better than what I fear, for everyone, I just think the alarm bells are justified.

This is the core of it for me. Hospitals, evactuation routes, these would all be things I put in the box of 'do not bomb these things'. Why then would someone drop bombs on these things? Within a walled open air prison? The only logical conclusion I can come to is extermination.

[Lady Bliss]

Who could have seen THIS happening? *eye roll*

https://www.cnn.com/...-hnk/index.html

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Chance, on 17 October 2023 - 07:30 AM, said:

Maark Abbott, on 17 October 2023 - 07:02 AM, said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Hamas originally funded by the Israeli government?

To my best ability to find info this is not true. It started as a branch of the muslim brotherhood but seems to have changed into a more militant path around 1984, well before it was actually called Hamas from 1988 and it did its first kidnap murdering in 1989.

At the same time in more recent days they have probably been a comfortable bogeyman to keep palestinians split between radical islam in gaza and corrupt cleptocracy (what is the correct term when they mostly creatively steal foreign aid from your own people?) in jerusalem. Israel has fairly recently allowed transfer of money from gulf states to Hamas for them to run the goverment in gaza...which I guess they regret by now.

Quote

Listen to former Israeli officials such as Brig. Gen. Yitzhak Segev, who was the Israeli military governor in Gaza in the early 1980s. Segev later told a New York Times reporter that he had helped finance the Palestinian Islamist movement as a “counterweight” to the secularists and leftists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Fatah party, led by Yasser Arafat (who himself referred to Hamas as “a creature of Israel.”)

[...] “Hamas, to my great regret, is Israel’s creation,” Avner Cohen, a former Israeli religious affairs official who worked in Gaza for more than two decades, told the Wall Street Journal in 2009. Back in the mid-1980s, Cohen even wrote an official report to his superiors warning them not to play divide-and-rule in the Occupied Territories, by backing Palestinian Islamists against Palestinian secularists.

Blowback: How Israel Went From Helping Create Hamas to Bombing It (theintercept.com)

The blockade is certainly collective punishment and if Israel doesn't relent it will be mass genocide. Granted, Israeli officials have claimed they will only keep it up until Hamas releases the hostages, but I think they know that that's not going to happen, so it just ends up being a justification for genocide---unless Israel is bluffing. Experts agree that Hamas would have prepared for it with electric generators and ample supplies of food, water, and fuel safely stored down in their extensive networks of tunnels, so the effect on Hamas itself is probably minimal.

[worry]

[Werthead]

Hamas was "elected" (the fairness and transparency of that election was and remains disputed) in 2006, winning 43% of the vote. It has refused to hold further elections, even after its original mandate ended in 2014, and pursued vigorous policies of murder that effectively drove other Palestinian political groups out of Gaza. Since 2006, Gaza's population has more than doubled. That means less than 21% of the current population of Gaza voted for Hamas (and more than half is under the age of 17). Hamas has faced serious internal opposition, including major street demonstrations in the last couple of years expressing anger against their perceived mistreatment of the population and their funnelling of aids and civic administration funds towards weapons. Hamas has had to use more moderate tactics to deal with these demonstrations, as it lacks the capability to overcome large-scale resentment on the ground: Hamas has an absolute maximum of 40,000 members, although this is believed to include local militias who refuse to attack Israel but have agreed to help defend Gaza, and it also includes large numbers fighting alongside al-Qaeda and ISIS-linked rebels in Syria and Egypt. Even if all Hamas members were in Gaza, the ratio would be something like 60 civilians (maybe 15 of whom or less ever voted for Hamas) to 1 member of Hamas.

[Abyss]

Genocide is the violent act of attempting to wipe out a people. Not go to war, not deny resources, not root out an enemy concealed among civilians...
Wipe. Out.
Armenia, early 1900s. The Rwandan conflict. The Holocaust. Cambodia 1970s. Those were attempted genocides. There are more.

Various Palestinian groups including Hamas and the PLO have actively stated their goal is genocide. They are on the record as stating their goal is to kill every Jew in Palestine. The whole 'from the river to the sea' thing. They have never, ever, revoked this goal.
Yes, very angry/frustrated/upset/stupid people... Israelis, Palestinians, Jews, Arabs, and others, now and in the past have called for similar treatment of each other.
But let's be clear... there is an absolute violent tragedy in progress and i hate every aspect of it.... but if genocide were Israel's intention, there wouldn't be a Palestinian left alive in Gaza and the Occupied Territories. And if Hamas had Israel's resources and the positions were reversed, there wouldn't be an Israeli left alive in the Middle East.

[worry]

That’s certainly one definition, probably the most cut and dry. The one cited in the article I posted is that used by international law: the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such.

Obviously Israel isn’t homogenous, nor is its government. But its current head of state and other key figures sure seem to be testing the limits as they stand, both in rhetoric and in action.

Anyway, all I can say is I believe what I’m saying. I’m not trying to make a semantic argument, nor do I think are you, we’re just reading the situation somewhat differently.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Attempting to prevent a group of people from getting the resources necessary for life so that they die is still genocide. Just as keeping someone in a prison and not allowing any food in so that they starve to death is still murder. Even if the primary aim is something else---for example, 'purifying' the German people, or stealing indigenous peoples' land---that's still genocide. If they wanted to kill all the members of Hamas in Gaza by killing everyone in Gaza they'd still be committing genocide. And that's as true for starvation as it would be for absolutely indiscriminate bombing.

It's true that most of Israel's political leaders are not explicitly calling for genocide. But since Hamas is almost certainly much better provisioned than the rest of the population, they would be the last to die from the complete blockade.

Apparently the restoration of water was only brief and extremely inadequate:

Quote

Fears grow people are dehydrating to death in Gaza as clean water runs out

An Israeli water pipeline was opened for three hours in Khan Younis on Monday, serving half of the town’s population [...] It appears to have had little effect, however, as a lack of fuel and damaged pipelines have made it difficult to transport and pump.

[...]

Dehydration quickly leads to fatigue, dizziness and confusion before organs such as the kidneys shut down, causing coma and death. Severe dehydration must be treated quickly for patients to recover. It can cause permanent brain and other organ damage.

[...] “Because of the large number of people, there’s no water. So I thought I would volunteer, come with a rickshaw and carry the water from the far away areas, the dangerous areas. Now, we’re filling in salt water, I’m ready to drink from the salt water – what else can we do?”

Fears grow people are dehydrating to death in Gaza as clean water runs out | Israel-Hamas war | The Guardian

[HoosierDaddy]

I think the fog-of-war is just that, and many people will be shown to have rushed to judgment on many things and on every side.

Play-by-playing a situation as murky as this is a recipe for so many wronghoods.

[QuickTidal]

HoosierDaddy, on 18 October 2023 - 04:02 PM, said:

I think the fog-of-war is just that, and many people will be shown to have rushed to judgment on many things and on every side.

Play-by-playing a situation as murky as this is a recipe for so many wronghoods.

I don't know that you can take back (as a literal social media mouthpiece for Netanyahu) basically being like "We bombed Hamas in a hospital, yay!" and then deleting that once you realized how many civilians died...as "fog of war" or "every" side.

But maybe that's just me?

[HoosierDaddy]

I know people fuck up in their jobs every day. There are all sorts of ways to screw up reacting to events happening in real time. If Biden doesn't have intelligence supporting his assertion, well then he put a massive foot in his mouth and screwed it up.

The verbiage used is idiotic. There are no "teams" here. That had to be off the cuff..

[Cause]

Too much to catch up on everything.

My biggest concern is the water.

In regards to the hospital I wonder if we (the world) have enough spy satellite imagery or drone footage, cameras etc to prove it definitely one way or another. I await more information. Bombing the hospitals would have been retarded. However we know for the dozens of times this conflict has happened before something like 10-15% of all fired rockets land in Gaza itself. I think they previously accidentally once hit their own power station. My search fu is weak right now because googling anything just gives me the current conflict because its obviously getting so many web traffics hit and I dont have the time to dive into that rabit hole right now but I am sure I remember that story.

In regards to the spokesperson, the real battlespace of this conflict these days is in public perception. The tweets are the real goal. I doubt the spokeperson for Netanyahu is briefed on military matters anymore than Karine Jean-Pierre is by the Pentagon. Did his tweet come before or after the news reported it? He may have just been trying to do get ahead of the news with a PR spin. In one of the prior conflicts it was well established by the foreign press that Hamas was suing a different hospital as their HQ. So I dont dismiss it as impossible that he would have just thought to quickly post that as doing his job. For me I find it incredible that the Press moved so quick to report this issue, which is a hugely inflammatory news-bite before they fact checked anything. I watched CNN revise the headline and body count 5 times in a few hours as they just reported the figures by Hamas, and than the health ministry and kept learning more. The headline started as Israel bombs hopsitals and than because they couldnt verify anything except that the hospital was bombed they had to change it to both sides blame each other.

If Israel did it, and did it on purpose to destroy a hospital then quite a few people would need a courtmartial asap. Fuck em.

To me the crazy thing about all this is that we would not be here, none of this would be happening if Hamas did not strike first. If you depend on your enemy for water, fuel and food why would you attack them? I dont say that to condone the cutting off of the water. I beleive that was a humanitarian mistake, a tactical error and a PR fuck up all in one. However, again, what was the god damn point of the Hamas attack. How did point A lead to a point B to a point C to a free Palestine in their minds. I cant believe they had such a plan. It was violence for violence's sake. They brought suffering into Israel and they brought even more upon their own people. A Palestinian "Ghandi" would accomplish more in 5 years than 1000 Islamic Jihadists and Hamas operatives. However this ends we can count on being back on this forum within 2-3 years and trading these same posts and this whole conflict will end up as a sub-section on the Israel-Gaza conflict wiki page called 2023.

[QuickTidal]

HoosierDaddy, on 18 October 2023 - 04:34 PM, said:

I know people fuck up in their jobs every day. There are all sorts of ways to screw up reacting to events happening in real time. If Biden doesn't have intelligence supporting his assertion, well then he put a massive foot in his mouth and screwed it up.

It would not be so bad if he just deleted it realizing the optics....but after the deletion he assumed that none one saw it or Screeshotted it....and then they tried to make the official Israel line "Hamas bombed that hospital, not us"....like yes the wet is a fuckup, but covering it up with a blatant lie that entirely contradicts your original assertion? Guh.


I mean was it yesterday that the official Israel PM twitter tweeted: "This is a struggle between the children of Light and the children of darkness, between humanity and the law of the jungle"....bearing in mind that this was tweeted as they bomb Gaza killing many civilians in the "hopes" that they get a few Hamas terrorists? Like the tone deafness is insane...it was ALSO deleted after the fact.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

QuickTidal, on 18 October 2023 - 05:03 PM, said:

HoosierDaddy, on 18 October 2023 - 04:34 PM, said:

I know people fuck up in their jobs every day. There are all sorts of ways to screw up reacting to events happening in real time. If Biden doesn't have intelligence supporting his assertion, well then he put a massive foot in his mouth and screwed it up.

It would not be so bad if he just deleted it realizing the optics....but after the deletion he assumed that none one saw it or Screeshotted it....and then they tried to make the official Israel line "Hamas bombed that hospital, not us"....like yes the wet is a fuckup, but covering it up with a blatant lie that entirely contradicts your original assertion? Guh.


I mean was it yesterday that the official Israel PM twitter tweeted: "This is a struggle between the children of Light and the children of darkness, between humanity and the law of the jungle"....bearing in mind that this was tweeted as they bomb Gaza killing many civilians in the "hopes" that they get a few Hamas terrorists? Like the tone deafness is insane...it was ALSO deleted after the fact.

fwiw:

Quote

[... US officials claim that their] intelligence includes satellite and other infrared data showing a launch of a rocket or missile from Palestinian fighter positions within Gaza. American intelligence agencies have also analyzed open-source video of the launch showing that it did not come from the direction of Israeli military positions, the officials said. Israeli officials have also provided the United States with intercepts of Hamas officials saying the strike came from forces aligned with Palestinian militant groups.

"While we continue to collect information, our current assessment, based on analysis of overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information, is that Israel is not responsible for the explosion at the hospital in Gaza yesterday," [...]

Other U.S. officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive information, cautioned that the analysis was preliminary and that they were continuing to collect and analyze evidence.

Early Intelligence Suggests Hospital Blast Caused by Palestinian Fighters, U.S. Says - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

... though it would be much more convenient for the Biden administration if the IDF didn't do it.

Quote

Independent analysts [how independent are they really though?] poring over publicly available images [...] say the blast site doesn't bear the hallmarks of a strike with a bomb or missile of the types usually used by Israel.

The amount of damage also appears inconsistent with the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry's assertion that 471 people were killed.

"We have none of the indicators of an airstrike—none," said Michael Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, an expert on military and security issues.

U.S. Says Intelligence Shows Islamic Jihad Militants Behind Gaza Hospital Blast - WSJ

Cause, on 18 October 2023 - 05:00 PM, said:

To me the crazy thing about all this is that we would not be here, none of this would be happening if Hamas did not strike first. If you depend on your enemy for water, fuel and food why would you attack them? I dont say that to condone the cutting off of the water. I beleive that was a humanitarian mistake, a tactical error and a PR fuck up all in one. However, again, what was the god damn point of the Hamas attack. How did point A lead to a point B to a point C to a free Palestine in their minds. I cant believe they had such a plan. It was violence for violence's sake. They brought suffering into Israel and they brought even more upon their own people.

Quote

If Israel inflicts massive death and destruction on the Palestinians in Gaza, Hezbollah and the West Bank militants may feel compelled to intervene. A three-front war could be disastrous for Israel—and would be a humanitarian catastrophe for the region, regaess of how it ended.

[...] this may be Hamas' intention. "Either we die slowly or we die taking the occupation with us," it quotes a Hamas official as saying, referring to Israel. In other words, as the article sums up Hamas' hopes, "Fighting [or worse] in the densely populated strip will exact a steep humanitarian toll that could sway global public opinion against Israel and draw sympathizers elsewhere in the region into the fray."

Biden's Israel speech shows he's walking a tightrope—and the stakes are high. (slate.com)

... and probably the same logic that leads to suicide bombings and disregard for the lives of innocent Palestinians... I guess Hamas believes they'll mostly just go to Heaven.


[Edit: And that any deaths in pursuit of the cause are 'righteous'. Even if Allah doesn't directly intervene to help them....]

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 18 October 2023 - 05:53 PM

[Abyss]

Cause, on 18 October 2023 - 05:00 PM, said:

... none of this would be happening if Hamas did not strike first. If you depend on your enemy for water, fuel and food why would you attack them?...

Because Hamas.
Doesn't care.
About Palestinians.