# Discussion for the Israel-Hamas War: A thread in the Pit **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Tags:** israel-hamas-war\ **Created:** [November 5, 2023, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653 "2023-11-05T21:57:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/261 "2024-03-26T05:25:54Z")
That’s an entirely different issue than what’s happening in Gaza, and for the record I don’t approve of the West Bank settlements, but that’s still not a genocide. And judging from the Israeli public’s mood, I don’t expect Smotrich to stay in power much longer than his master will once new elections are held. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/262 "2024-03-26T05:34:59Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > liberal democracies that respect civil rights and freedom of religion (which Israel is) Ha ha ha. “Respect civil rights” [What a fucking joke.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_violations_against_Palestinians_by_Israel). “freedom of religion” - well, unless you want an interfaith marriage… ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/263 "2024-03-26T05:40:26Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > but that’s still not a genocide At this point, AFAICT, arguing the technicalities about whether what Israel is doing officially qualifies as “genocide”, according to which particular definition of the term, is little more than an attempt at distraction. ISTM that the crucial point is that Israel’s ongoing indiscriminate slaughter of tens of thousands of Palestinians is both morally and pragmatically indefensible. I am perfectly willing to leave it up to the international experts on human rights law to figure out whether it qualifies for an official designation of “genocide”. I don’t need that word in order to say what I think of the act. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/264 "2024-03-26T06:03:44Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > “Respect civil rights” Freedom House rates Israel a 2 (1 being highest, 7 being lowest) on political rights and 3 on civil liberties. For contrast’s sake, the US and South Africa are 2/2, Canada is 1/1, and Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia are 6/6, 56/5, and 7/7 respectively. > **[Freedom in the World | World](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_in_the_World#World)** > > \* indicates "Civil liberties in country or territory" or "Human rights in country or territory" links. > PR = political rights, CL = civil liberties > [@MrDibble](#): > > - well, unless you want an interfaith marriage… Israel doesn’t have civil marriage. It’s up to your religious institution whether they’ll sanction a marriage or not. Not an ideal system, but it’s not the government deciding who’s allowed to get married. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/265 "2024-03-26T06:16:43Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Freedom House rates Israel a […] 3 on civil liberties. …along with such _bastions_ as India, Lesotho and Philippines. A _ringing_ endorsement. > [@Smapti](#): > > Israel doesn’t have civil marriage Errm, you think that’s a point _for_ them having religious freedom? > [@Smapti](#): > > it’s not the government deciding who’s allowed to get married. It very much is, since it’s the government law that says only certain religious authorities are allowed to sanction marriage (how _free_ does that make Reform Jews, BTW?) - you’re not usually _this_ dumb, is IOF boot polish lead-based or something? ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/266 "2024-03-26T06:31:31Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Errm, you think that’s a point _for_ them having religious freedom? I think it puts them light-years beyond the “follow our one interpretation of Islam or die” model that Hamas advocates. Why would I ever take the side of a theocratic death cult over a flawed but overall liberal democracy? ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/267 "2024-03-26T06:34:44Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Israel doesn’t have civil marriage. It’s up to your religious institution whether they’ll sanction a marriage or not. Not an ideal system, but it’s not the government deciding who’s allowed to get married. Yes, it is. And it’s not just up to the religious institution. The government decided interfaith marriages are taboo and thus the religions concerned can not solemnize such a marriage even if their religion would permit it. Mind you, if the religious institution is not on the list of select denominations, a minister (or equivalent) of that religious group must petition the government for permission to procede with the marriage. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/268 "2024-03-26T06:35:06Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > At this point, AFAICT, arguing the technicalities about whether what Israel is doing officially qualifies as “genocide”, according to which particular definition of the term, is little more than an attempt at distraction. The entire notion that Israel is engaged in genocide is a distraction. It’s Hamas propaganda to distract from the actual genocide they attempted to ignite on 10/7 and will certainly try again if they’re allowed to continue existing, and too many otherwise intelligent people are falling for it because it’s easy to pluck people’s heartstrings and get them not to notice how bad it would be for everyone if the fanatics responsible.for the plight of those innocent civilians got their way. Hamas could stop the killing today by surrendering. Egypt could end the famine today by opening their border to refugees. Why don’t they? ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/269 "2024-03-26T06:39:03Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > The government decided interfaith marriages are taboo and thus the religions concerned can not solemnize such a marriage even if their religion would permit it. Israel has, however, recognized civil unions for people of different religions or without religious affiliation since 2010, which is longer than some US states have allowed people to marry the person of their choice. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/270 "2024-03-26T06:39:46Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > I think it puts them light-years beyond the “follow our one interpretation of Islam or die” model that Hamas advocates Man, I didn’t think you could possibly “But, Hamas” something that was entirely about Israeli internals, I should learn not to be so skeptical of how absolutely one-track you are in your jackboot sycophancy… > [@Smapti](#): > > Why would I ever take the side of a theocratic death cult False dichotomy. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/271 "2024-03-26T06:51:50Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Hamas could stop the killing today by surrendering. Israel could stop the killing today by stopping the killing. It is not morally or pragmatically defensible for Israel to treat its ability to stop this ongoing indiscriminate slaughter as predicated on the choices that Hamas makes. The more evil and destructive Hamas is asserted to be, then the more evil and destructive it is for Israel to claim that its slaughter of Palestinians can’t stop unless Hamas voluntarily chooses to renounce evil and destruction. That’s just abdicating Israel’s own responsibilities as a moral and law-abiding entity. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/272 "2024-03-26T07:00:45Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Israel could stop the killing today by stopping the killing. They tried that already. It took Hamas 15 minutes to violate the ceasefire. > **[Hamas broke temporary truce in Gaza minutes after it began, senior IDF...](https://www.timesofisrael.com/hamas-broke-temporary-truce-in-gaza-minutes-after-it-began-senior-idf-officer-says/)** > > Speaking to ToI from wrecked town outside Jabaliya in northern part of Strip, commander of reserve battalion says 'there isn’t a single house here without weapons’ > [@Kimstu](#): > > It is not morally or pragmatically defensible for Israel to treat its ability to stop this ongoing indiscriminate slaughter as predicated on the choices that Hamas makes. If Israel were engaged in indiscriminate slaughter the war would have been over months ago. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/273 "2024-03-26T07:05:27Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > False dichotomy. And yet you ask me to take this theocratic death cult at its word when it claims it isn’t using hospitals and schools as bases, that the tunnels they’ve been keeping women and children prisoner in don’t exist, that the child soldiers they’re arming and sending into battle are just innocent civilians, that they haven’t been stealing food and medicine meant for civilians who are starving because of their jihad, and that those headless babies must have decapitated themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/274 "2024-03-26T07:07:25Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > If Israel were engaged in indiscriminate slaughter Are you saying that Israel deliberately targeted the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have died from its attacks? You can’t have it both ways. If Israel’s killing of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians is not indiscriminate, then it’s intentional and deliberate, and I don’t see how you can avoid labeling that “genocide”. If, on the other hand, Israeli forces are killing tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians without meaning to, then they’re doing a really shit job of discriminating between the people they want to kill and the people they don’t. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/275 "2024-03-26T07:14:45Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > And yet you ask me to take this theocratic death cult at its word No, I ask you to look at the evidence. Hamas is not the sole source of information coming from the area. Hell, IOF personnel are happy to document their own warcrimes on ttheir own damn social media streams. > [@Smapti](#): > > the child soldiers they’re arming and sending into battle are just innocent civilians Oh, now the 5 year olds killed by cowardly IOF snipers are “child soldiers”? Fuck off with that utter fucking tripe, shitweasel. > [@Smapti](#): > > that those headless babies must have decapitated themselves. All “40” of them? Proven lies. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/276 "2024-03-26T07:14:49Z")
Civil union is not marriage. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/277 "2024-03-26T07:16:38Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > and that those headless babies must have decapitated themselves As I think we may have discussed previously, journalist Max Blumenthal has [noted some problems with taking those gorily sensationalist claims at face value.](https://thegrayzone.com/2023/12/06/scandal-israeli-october-7-fabrications/) > [@](#): > > Founded by a serial rapist known as the “Haredi Jeffrey Epstein,” Israeli ultra-Orthodox rescue group ZAKA is responsible for some of the most obscene post-October 7 atrocity fabrications, from beheaded babies to “mass rape” to a fetus cut from its mother. […] > > From “confirming” the fraudulent story of beheaded babies found in a kibbutz to blatantly inventing others about Hamas fighters cutting fetuses out of pregnant women’s bodies, severing a little girl’s arm, and baking a baby in an oven, ZAKA and rival groups have demonstrated a remarkable gift for seeding the media with depraved tales of alleged Hamas brutality. […] > > Since its volunteers first emerged on the streets of Israel on their trademark motorbikes during the 1990s, ZAKA has engaged in a publicity war with rival ultra-Orthodox rescue groups such as United Hatzalah in a bid for millions from wealthy Jewish donors abroad. The competition between these organizations appears to be driving the stream of fake atrocity stories pouring in from both volunteer groups. There is plenty of reliably documented evidence for specific Hamas terror acts to denounce, without pruriently swallowing every clickbaity and inadequately supported horrific allegation that we happen to see. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/278 "2024-03-26T07:26:31Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Are you saying that Israel deliberately targeted the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have died from its attacks? I’m saying that collateral damage is unavoidable in any war, especially one where one belligerent uses its own population as human shields. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/279 "2024-03-26T07:32:51Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > No, I ask you to look at the evidence. The evidence indicates that Hamas invaded Israel unprovoked and deliberately murdered hundreds of innocent civilians, including babies. There is photographic proof of that that I’m pretty sure I can’t post even in the Pit. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2024, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653/280 "2024-03-26T07:37:17Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > I’m saying that collateral damage is unavoidable in any war Which is why laws of war restrict the amounts and types of warfare that a state can engage in under specific circumstances, to keep unavoidable collateral damage from becoming avoidable collective punishment. You can’t just use “collateral damage” as a magical incantation to justify whatever amount of killing you feel like inflicting. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-for-the-israel-hamas-war-a-thread-in-the-pit/992653.md?page=15)