Discussion thread for the Hamas Attacks Israel thread, October 2023

If this war is a genocide, then all war is genocide. World War II? Genocide. Civil War? Genocide. Both Iraq wars? Genocide. American Revolution? Genocide. The War of the Sixth Coalition? Genocide. Irish war of independence? Genocide. Korea? Genocide.

Either genocide means something very specific involving organized, industrialized, and purposeful eradication of an entire people, or it’s just a synonym for war, because a war without mass civilian casualties, displacement, famine, and disease has never happened and never will.

…strawman.

If you want to make the case that the last Iraq war was a genocide, then make that case. But make it in another thread because it doesn’t appear to be relevant here.

Yes it does. Which is why the Genocide Convention was drafted, which is why South Africa took Israel to the International Court of Justice, which is why the court issued interim measures on Israel because it was plausible they were committing genocide.

You’ve already made the case for me. The standard you and your argumentum ad auctoritate want to set for “genocide” is so vague and open-ended that it applies to every single armed conflict in human history.

…we have a standard of genocide already. Its here:

Show (preferably in another thread) that the Iraq war fits the standard here. The SA case was over seventy pages. I would expect at the very least a substantial amount of documented evidence from you to demonstrate this.

It isn’t vague. You’ve stated that you both refuse to read the South African submission nor accept the validity of the International Court of Justice. The process is there. You just choose to ignore that process.

You can’t keep pretending that it is “vague and open-ended” when the entire process and the evidence shows that it is not.

315,000 civilians killed
9.2 million forced out of their homes
4.7 million experienced food insecurity
Fallujah rendered unlivable for several years
Mass poisonings and statistically high cancer rates due to burn pits and depleted uranium
Targeted killing of journalists
Indiscriminate bombing of urban centers for “shock and awe”
Hospitals, Red Crescent centers, mosques bombed and destroyed
Looting, rape, racial and religious enmity on part of invaders
Stayements of intent by US government officials to destroy and replace local culture there and throughout the region

Sounds like “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” to me. And in such numbers! That’s like three or four Gazas all put together!

Moderating:

Yup, take this to another thread. Or drop it. If you want me to move these posts to get a new thread started, I’m happy to do so, just drop me a DM. But this is a hijack and does not belong in this thread.

Back in the day, there were seemingly contradictory situations: on one hand, Sherman wrote that “We are not only fighting armies, but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war, as well as their organized armies” and threatened his enemy that “should I be forced to resort to assault, or the slower and surer process of starvation, I shall then feel justified in resorting to the harshest measures, and shall make little effort to restrain my army”. On the other hand, after he took Savannah, he dutifully protected the (not exactly friendly) families of confederate officers who were fighting him, and orders were in force to summarily shoot on the spot anyone caught “in unsoldierlike deeds”, with the consequence that his army behaved themselves.

Jews butchered Arabs too. Killed disabled Arabs in orchards. NO hands clean.

Since that’s never going to happen, this will never be tested.

Except for all that blockade and border control and civilian-killing airstrikes, of course, they “withdrew”.

Well, there you go.

Where exactly do you think the West Bank settlements are built? Three-quarters of a million Israelis live in the West Bank.

I could - if Israel wasn’t doing all that genociding. And bragging about it.

Oh, they uprooted themselves, did they? Nothing that the proto-Israelis did had anything to do with it…

You’re just spouting denialist rhetoric , not fact. Actual history says different (my emphasis) :

A document produced by the Israeli Defence Forces Intelligence Service entitled “The Emigration of the Arabs of Palestine in the Period 1/12/1947 – 1/6/1948” was dated 30 June 1948 and became widely known around 1985.[8]

The document details 11 factors which caused the exodus, and lists them “in order of importance”:

1. Direct, hostile Jewish [ Haganah/IDF ] operations against Arab settlements.

No, you’re the one who brought up what the government says, I was posting about what you said.

Didn’t say they were. War crime and genocide aren’t synonyms.

Israel just happens to be engaged in both.

You mean, your reading of ‘tone’ trumps what I actually post?

I’ve called the heartless murderers. I’ll call them butchers or génocidaires, whatever you like.

What I won’t do is lie about what they did, or not discuss their reasons for doing what they did as though their were sui generis.

Or use them as a smokescreen for far worse-scaled atrocities. Which is what “But, Hamas” amounts to, now.

What crossfire? Sniper fire isn’t “crossfire”. Airstrikes aren’t “crossfire”. Artillery shelling isn’t “crossfire”.

You can try and paint a picture of some hot running gun battle with civilians accidentally caught in-between, but that’s not what’s happening. And we can see that. There was no “crossfire” when that granny was sniped while under a white flag with her grandson.

Ideological motives rather than observation of the actual genocidal events occurring.

No, I’m happy to say Hamas intends genocide too.

Hamas, of course, isn’t in any position to make that happen and never was.

Israel is.

Actual genocide concerns me much more than theoretical. Which is why I talk about what Israel is doing, and don’t “But, Hamas” their atrocities.

Because victimhood has given Israel soooo much sympathy for other oppressed peoples…

Remind me, who helped Israel build their atomic bombs, again? Israel has shown they’re quite happy to oppress others or align with oppressors, despite their own experiences. And then there’s the way they founded their own country. Why the hell would I think they’re the agents of peace?

Remind me, how many UN peacekeepers has Israel deployed to help the international community in other parts of the world? As opposed to Mossad assassins? “Want peace”, my ass.

Israel doesn’t get to always hide behind the Holocaust as a cover for its own acts. That ship has sailed. What the Shoah definitely did was give Israelis trauma. History shows traumatized peoples have just as much likelihood of turning into killers when they gain the power to do so, if not more so. Revenge is a powerful motivator.

Victimhood doesn’t make people any less terrible - it might do it for individuals, but nations? Naah. All it does is feed into their national myths. Of which Israel seems to have plenty: “Palestine was barren ground”, “The Arabs moved of their own accord”, “40 beheaded babies”. Lies, lies, lies. I don’t trust liars to make peace.

Jews butchered Arabs too. Killed disabled Arabs in orchards. NO hands clean.

Jews were literally wiped out by Arabs whenever in contact with them, no quarter given.

Arab warfare against the Jews in Palestine … had always been marked by indiscriminate killing, mutilating, raping, looting and pillaging. This 1947–48 attack on the Jewish community was more savage than ever. Until the Arab armies invaded Israel on the very day of its birth, May 15, 1948, no quarter whatsoever had ever been given to a Jew who fell into Arab hands. Wounded and dead alike were mutilated. Every member of the Jewish community was regarded as an enemy to be mercilessly destroyed…

The Arab Refugee Problem, Joseph B. Schectman, Philosophical Library, New York (1952), pp. 5–6.

Since that’s never going to happen, this will never be tested.

You can thank Hamas for that

Except for all that blockade and border control and civilian-killing airstrikes, of course, they “withdrew”.

Because they kept lobbing rockets into Israel proper

Where exactly do you think the West Bank settlements are built? Three-quarters of a million Israelis live in the West Bank.

Last time I checked plenty of Palestinians lived there

I could - if Israel wasn’t doing all that genociding. And bragging about it.

Except they don’t

Oh, they uprooted themselves, did they? Nothing that the proto-Israelis did had anything to do with it…

You’re just spouting denialist rhetoric , not fact. Actual history says different (my emphasis) :

Emphasis on your omissions from that list:

Orders and decrees by Arab institutions and gangs [irregulars].

Fear of Jewish [retaliatory] response [following] major Arab attack on Jews.

The appearance of gangs [irregular Arab forces] and non-local fighters in the vicinity of a village.

No, you’re the one who brought up what the government says, I was posting about what you said.

What did I say exactly

Didn’t say they were. War crime and genocide aren’t synonyms.

Except when you talk about Israel

Israel just happens to be engaged in both.

No they’re not

You mean, your reading of ‘tone’ trumps what I actually post?

They’re one and the same to anybody bothering to read it.

I’ve called the heartless murderers. I’ll call them butchers or génocidaires, whatever you like.

What I won’t do is lie about what they did, or not discuss their reasons for doing what they did as though their were sui generis.

So you’ll make exceptions for their brutality because ‘It doesn’t happen in a vacuum’ That’s your rationale?

Or use them as a smokescreen for far worse-scaled atrocities. Which is what “But, Hamas” amounts to, now.

Always a caveat

What crossfire? Sniper fire isn’t “crossfire”. Airstrikes aren’t “crossfire”. Artillery shelling isn’t “crossfire”.

Rounding up families to be shot in Sderot isn’t crossfire either.

You can try and paint a picture of some hot running gun battle with civilians accidentally caught in-between, but that’s not what’s happening. And we can see that. There was no “crossfire” when that granny was sniped while under a white flag with her grandson.

No crossfire when Hamas murdered civilians in Sderot either,

Ideological motives rather than observation of the actual genocidal events occurring.

There isn’t a genocide occurring though, Hamas is an Islamic militant organisation on a par with ISIS, an ideology I have to base on the fact their ideological contemporaries would do the same to me as they did to Israeli civilians, so why should I ‘Both sides’ This conflict?

No, I’m happy to say Hamas intends genocide too.

Took long enough

Hamas, of course, isn’t in any position to make that happen and never was.

Except showing an example of what they’d do writ large in Sderot

Israel is.

5 million Palestinians still exist

Actual genocide concerns me much more than theoretical. Which is why I talk about what Israel is doing, and don’t “But, Hamas” their atrocities.

But there’s no actual genocide other than what you think is going on in your head

Because victimhood has given Israel soooo much sympathy for other oppressed peoples…

You mean the oppressed peoples who have routinely tried massacred them?

Remind me, who helped Israel build their atomic bombs, again? Israel has shown they’re quite happy to oppress others or align with oppressors, despite their own experiences. And then there’s the way they founded their own country. Why the hell would I think they’re the agents of peace?

Oh just like Palestinians were happy to align with Saddam when he was invading Kuwait, or Gaddafi when he was oppressing his own people, or destabilising Jordan and Lebanon this kind of realpolitik isn’t a uniquely Israeli phenomenon.

Remind me, how many UN peacekeepers has Israel deployed to help the international community in other parts of the world? As opposed to Mossad assassins? “Want peace”, my ass.

Why would it give up precious resources having peacekeepers when the entire Muslim world has been in lockstep wanting their destruction?

Israel doesn’t get to always hide behind the Holocaust as a cover for its own acts. That ship has sailed. What the Shoah definitely did was give Israelis trauma. History shows traumatized peoples have just as much likelihood of turning into killers when they gain the power to do so, if not more so. Revenge is a powerful motivator.

No, Israel has the view that if it doesn’t make peace from a position of strength they will be slaughtered yet again by another anti semitic driven enemy so why would it be motivated to do so after Hamas demonstrated what peace meant to then on October 7th?

Victimhood doesn’t make people any less terrible - it might do it for individuals, but nations? Naah. All it does is feed into their national myths. Of which Israel seems to have plenty: “Palestine was barren ground”, “The Arabs moved of their own accord”, “40 beheaded babies”. Lies, lies, lies. I don’t trust liars to make peace.

You mean lies like ‘Israel is doing genocide’ Or Israel is an ‘Apartheid’ State, yeah can’t make peace on lies like that.

Considering the current leadership of the Israeli government, this is ridiculous statement. Netanyahu and his allies are, quite clearly, motivated by their own political survival, as well as fantasies of Greater Israel (which would require genocide and/or apartheid, whether or not they would admit it), not some pragmatic realpolitik view of the defense of Israel.

I’m not going to trust a 1952 book written by a Revisionist Zionist with an agenda about anything, TYVM:

His work on the Palestinian refugee problem[7] was heavily criticised by Erskine Childers[8][9] and Steven Glazer[10] for misquoting, carefully selecting words, and taking statements out of context to fit his narrative.

Hamas isn’t the group who’d be holding on to settlements until their last breath.

So, did they “withdraw”, or didn’t they?

Not in the bits where Israelis do. Less and less Palestinian territory, every year.

Except they do.

You had to go down to number 4. Once again: ‘lists them “in order of importance”

This is not “uproot themselves” in any way shape or form. They were pushed out. The IDF themselves said so. Were you there in 1948, that you’re going to say the IDF was wrong?

I already quoted you, feel free to scroll up to my first reply to you.

Yes, except in the case of the group currently doing both.

Yes, they are.

The words “heartless murderers” reads as me trying to “minimise their barbarism” to anybody, does it?

Yeah, projection.

What about anything I said makes exceptions? Not lying about what someone does isn’t making an exception for them. Pretending all this started on Oct 7 isn’t “making an exception” either.

Pretending that Hamas sprung up new-formed on Oct 7, 2023 and just started butchering, would be making exceptions for all the Israeli behaviour leading up to that.

Always a smokescreen.

I’m not the one excusing any murder as crossfire.

Oct 7 was terrorist murder. And…?

“But, Hamas!”

Irrelevant to what’s happening now, but “But, Hamas!” away. It makes it obvious you have no other defence for the ongoing murder.

Except there is.

… aren’t the only ones who’s being slaughtered, starved and killed by disease.

There are more than two sides to this conflict.

Unless you think all Palestinians are Hamas, which it is becoming abundantly clear you do.

Nobody asked me before. I thought “heartless murderers” got the point across well enough.

What they’d like to do and what they could do are entirely different.

Meanwhile - Israel is doing both.

15.7 Jews still exist. I guess the Shoa wasn’t actual genocide, either.

But there is.

I mean the ones they’ve massacred, tortured, raped, displaced.

Never said it was. “Tu quoque!” isn’t a magic spell that absolves evil.

Israel seems to have resources and to spare, Training Mossad agents and making long-distance attack drones has got to be more expensive to field than just painting some IDF helmets blue.

Paranoia.

Nothing you wrote after this in any way addresses what you were supposedly responding to.

What peace? There was no peace before Oct. 7. Hamas didn’t violate some ceasefire or peace treaty that day.

The genocide is well-documented. As are the Israeli lies - I’ve cited where the IDF and the Israeli census authorities themselves showed the last two to be lies.

Meanwhile, the self-documented war crimes and the ICJ ruling back up that it’s now genocide.

As for “Apartheid State” - at one point, I was persuaded by Alessan that calling Israel an Apartheid state wasn’t accurate.

Then the settlements continued unopposed by the government, more evidence of Israeli illegal detentions, torture and murder came to light, and the Israeli government got decidedly more Right Wing and Greater Israel-favouring than I could ever recall.

All that before Oct. 7.

So I’ve definitely reversed on that reversal. Israel isn’t just an Apartheid state. It’s so much worse. Just being an Apartheid state would be an improvement. It’s now a fascist, genocidal one.

There has been a lot of arguing here recently about whether or not the Israeli actions in Gaza constitute genocide. Personally, I don’t care if it does or not. I believe that the Israeli response in Gaza has gone beyond what is necessary to defend itself and to try to eliminate Hamas, and has become a retribution against the Palestinians. I don’t feel the need for something to be genocidal in order for me to think it is wrong and worthy of opposition.

To clarify my personal position, I believe that Israel has the right to exist and to defend itself from attack. The terrorist attacks by Hamas was horrible, and Hamas is a dangerous entity that is a threat to to well being of both Israel and the vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza who are not active members of Hamas. Hamas needs to be eliminated, and doing so will necessitate the use of military force that will cause the deaths of Palestinian civilians, and damage to Gaza.

Acknowledging all of those things, I still believe that the current Israeli military actions in Gaza have gone too far. Part of my belief is based on the physical situation in Gaza both before the war and now. With the wall around Gaza there is no where for civilians to get out of the way, even putting aside the notion that Hamas is trying to hide within the civilian population. Many people followed the IDF warnings to go south, and now they are all penned in against the Egyptian border. This concentration of civilians is not only a health crisis in and of itself, but greatly increases the likelihood of civilian casualties, because Hamas and the civilian population are now helplessly intertwined.

Another part of my opposition is based on my belief that Hamas will not be eliminated by military actions in Gaza alone. There is no way for Israel to get every Hamas fighter in Gaza without reporting to tactics that I believe everyone here would agree are genocidal. That is before considering that Hamas leadership isn’t even in Gaza to begin with. Trying to defeat a terrorist organization with standard military operations has never worked, unless the military force in question has been willing to resort to wholesale slaughter.

My third objection is this. I do appreciate and understand that one way of eliminating Hamas, or a the very least making them fully understand that attacking Israel just is not worth it, is to cause a certain level of pain, death, and destruction among the Palestinian people. Which sucks, but I get it. However, with the number of deaths in Gaza now approaching 30,000, I believe that point has been made. And to those in Gaza who haven’t felt enough pain yet to see that Hamas is a losing proposition, I don’t believe another X0,000 deaths is going to change their minds.

Finally, I don’t believe that a lasting solution will be won on the battlefield. Starting from those beliefs, I would like to see Israel take a change in tactics, cutting back on widespread shelling and bombing. I would also like to see an increase in humanitarian aid being allowed into Gaza. I recognize that taking those steps will also make it more difficult to defeat Hamas in the short term, but I honestly believe will help reach the goal of a long term solution more quickly. And I say that appreciating that it may also lead to more IDF and possibly civilian Israeli casualties in the short term. However I am of the belief that this could be an opportunity to prevent further losses in the future.

I appreciate that this is not up to Israel alone, but they are the dominant player in this relationship. I also believe that other nations, and/or the UN will likely need to play a role in this, up to and including a peace keeping force that would require other nations to risk the lives of their soldiers.

One final statement: above I declared my belief that Israel has the right to exist and defend itself. My belief does not extend to Israel having the right to do anything it wants to, nor do I believe that the current government of Israel has some inherent right to exist in perpetuity. If the current government of Israel continues to take steps that will kill and otherwise endanger the civilian population of Palestine with no end in sight, I would support steps being taken to stop them, up to and including military action. That would certainly not be my preferred option, and I don’t foresee that ever happening. However, it would not be off the table for me if Israel continues to follow it’s current tactics of wholesale slaughter in Gaza.

And to the Israeli supporters here who have no problem with innocent Palestinians being killed as part of military operations to eliminate an evil Hamas and protect innocent Israelis, I would regretfully accept a certain level of Israeli civilian deaths of that is what it would take to stop an out of control Netanyahu government. Cold blooded, realpolitik works all ways, and in my mind Israel is not an exception to that. It is up to Israel to stay on the side of justice and good. If they allow hatred and fear to pull them across the line, then Israel would need to be treated the same as any other rogue nation.

FTR, I feel the same way (also, the rest of your post).

The thing is, I figure Israel knows that cold-blooded realpolitik can work like that. And, if so, then I figure the reasoning has to be going as follows: yes, there’s some point X that’d lead to a military operation, with a certain number of Israeli civilian deaths, to stop an out-of-control Netanyahu government — and, if we stop short of X, well, figure it won’t.

You prefaced your remark there with this: “If the current government of Israel continues to take steps that will kill and otherwise endanger the civilian population of Palestine with no end in sight, I would support steps being taken to stop them, up to and including military action. That would certainly not be my preferred option, and I don’t foresee that ever happening. However, it would not be off the table for me if Israel continues to follow it’s current tactics of wholesale slaughter in Gaza.” My remark would be that (a) Israel is engaging in its current tactics because they’ve chosen them for a reason, and (b) if, as you say, Israel continues to follow its current tactics, that’d also be for a reason…

…and if you’re right about cold-blooded realpolitik, and if I’m right about Israel knowing what you know about cold-blooded realpolitik, then I figure the reasoning takes place in this context: they’re using these tactics because they don’t think that worse consequences will ensue; they’ve decided to limit themselves to stuff that falls short of X, and they figure this approach is, uh, X-minus-Y. And they realize that someone who thinks the way that you do may well say, “no, that’s not X-minus-Y; that’s X, and so I support military action” — but they’re figuring that, when it comes to those who’ll actually make that call, the answer will be, “yep, that’s X-minus-Y.”

Because: why else are they doing this? Why are they doing this, and not something different? I can’t explain it otherwise; but it seems to fit all the facts if, correct or incorrect, that’s the idea.

I get your take, and I do appreciate that we are probably a long way from a place where other nations steps in with military force. A few things that I disagree with in your position:

  1. I am fairly certain that there are several posters in this thread who can’t even conceive of a reality where non-Arab nations would line up to punish an out of control Israel. That there is no possible X Israel would need to stop short of, because Israel is a special place that has a special right to exist and a special right to protect its existence that other western nations will always support. I am putting forth the idea that every nation, including Israel, and including the US, needs to maintain certain levels of control on what they do during wartime. I am also saying that for me, Israel has already reached X, where X equals they have gone too far.

  2. You and I have danced around this issue earlier, but I believe that the Netanyahu government has an interest in keeping the Gaza War going in order to stay in power. It has been mentioned by several people in this thread and many other places that they expect the Netanyahu government to fall once the war is over. So when you ask why else are they doing this, it may be a pure unbridled power play.

But even if I were to assume that arguendo, your first point seems too obvious: yeah, some people might figure that “there is no possible X Israel would need to stop short of, because Israel is a special place that has a special right to exist and a special right to protect its existence that other western nations will always support” — but you don’t think that, and I don’t think that, and I don’t think the folks in the Netanyahu government are under that particular illusion either — and so, even if it were a pure unbridled power play, it’d still be taking place in the context of saying “but if we reach X, we lose power and, y’know, our own lives.”

In 1973, the Soviet Union moved a ship loaded with tactical nuclear weapons to Egypt, not to mention all the other forces, and America reached DEFCON 3. Both countries acted to keep a lid on things. Do people have a short memory or something?

You asked why else are they doing this and I provided one possiblity. You don’t like that one. We could keep playing this game with me providing more possibilities,but this thread has gone down too many sidetracks already.

You believe that the current government of Israel is acting in good faith. I think that they are blood thirsty warmongers. We can agree to disagree there, and we aren’t changing each other’s opinions. Instead of us trying to agree on some random value of X, I will leave it with this. I believe that the Netanyahu government places little or no value on the lives of Palestinians, and has no qualms about spilling their blood, and I am have reached the point where I believe they have gone too far.

Secondly, unlike some others here, I don’t value Israeli lives more than Palestinian lives. So arguments of X-Y where the end result means more dead Palestinians do nothing for me. And I find it degrading and insulting to the Palestinians to speak of their lives in such terms.

It’s not that I don’t like that one; it’s that — as I said — even if I assume for the sake of argument that it’s 100% accurate, it still seems to come up against the same conceptual hurdle: even if it’s a pure unbridled power play, I don’t see that they’d have an incentive to cross over from X-Y to X, because things would get so bad for Israel and for them at X.

This isn’t about me then adding a rhetorical flourish by saying something like and, from the lack of such a response, well, gosh; they clearly haven’t reached X. I’m saying that — whether they’re out for Israel’s best interests or, as you say, their own — as far as I can tell, it’d make sense for them to not reach X. It’d seem to make sense to stop short of X regardless of if there’s a lot to like about your possibility.

Thank you. It is entirely reasonable to argue that Israel’s response has been disproportional and that Netenyahu is attempting a Senator Palpatine by prolonging the war in order to stay in power without using snarl words like “genocide” that cheapen the word to the point of meaninglessness.