The current ‘shit show’ was made possible by Bibi’s political situation, the Gaza raid and the IDF’s need to cover it’s ass for it’s failure on Oct7. I agree that it is opportunistic and poorly executed, but it fits a pattern. The West Bank, East Jerusalem, Golan Heights and Gaza are all pieces of the same puzzle.
Because they … didn’t? They just significantly ramped up what they were already doing in their prior operations.
I agree. Countries don’t have motives, people do. And there are a lot of different people who influence Israeli policy and actions. I think the best explanation is that the atrocity of Oct 7th moved the mood off the people and gave the nefarious people in the government and the IDF more leeway to do what they already wanted to do.
But at no point after the operation you linked to (or any of the subsequent ones) did Israel re-occupy Gaza and construct settlements, as @Crane alleges is Israel’s goal in the current operation.
Well, first you have to finish the destruction or the population displacement, only then can you build the settlements relatively undisturbed. The problem is Gaza is so compact and densely-populated - it just isn’t hasn’t been as easy to clear as, oh, say, the West Bank. But baby steps…
You’re still making no sense. If that was their actual goal, why wouldn’t they have actually DONE IT during the earlier operations? What would have been the point - if the goal is to ethnically cleanse Gaza and build Israeli settlements there - of stopping when they did on all of those prior occasions? Heck, it certainly would have been easier and less costly to do it sooner.
Who knows - why did the Nazis only start the Final Solution in 1942? What was stopping them before then?
It could be as simple as the Israeli government realized that being the aggressor in an attack on Gaza would not be popular internationally, so they waited until a big enough Casus Belli came along. I have no proof that that is what happened, but it certainly is believable, likely even, that Israel would have such a plans in place.
There were interpretations like, the Israeli government pounced on the casus belli to get as much done before the U.S./the international community made them stop. It was all pretty open.
Great tweet about the situation that covers my view very well:
Israel occupied Gaza and established 21 settlements with 7000 residents. They withdrew and have now reoccupied Gaza, clearing the way for resettlement.
That’s correct, they withdrew. And despite numerous military engagements since the withdrawal, they had not re-occupied, until this current instance. So if Israel’s aim was always to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians from Gaza and re-settle Gaza with Israelis, it makes no sense for them to have waited for 10/7/2023 rather than do it during one of the prior engagements.
This isn’t the great point you seem to think it is. There are numerous reasons they might have waited, some of which have already been suggested and you have ignored.
The only thing that was suggested is that there wasn’t a big enough casus belli until now. However, if starting from the premise that Israel had wanted to do this all along, I find it hard to believe that they would not have seized on these “lesser” occasions as pretexts.
How about considering that after several years of political turmoil in Israel, Netanyahu was forced to turn to far right, ultra-nationalists parties to build a coalition to stay in power. Those hard right politicians now have more power and more say in directing Israel than in previous years. If Bibi thinks that satisfying their expansionist dreams is his only shot to stay in power, this could be the result.
October 7 was by far the biggest attack against Israel in generations. It is entirely possible that it would be viewed as an opportunity by some.
…reports from Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza say that at least seven children died from malnutrition. According to the United Nations, trucks haven’t been able to get through to northern Gaza since January 23rd. There were a tiny number of food drops over the last couple of days, reportedly only one was dropped in the north.
We’ve hit the point where death from malnutrition would start to escalate, and one might expect we’d be hearing more about it over the coming days and weeks. Except, the Director of Kamal Adwan Hospital Abu Safiya announced this afternoon that the hospital was shutting down because they had run out of fuel.
And I had missed that on Tuesday, the only other hospital still operating in the north, Al-Awda, had also closed down due to lack of fuel.
So that is 26 out of 36 hospitals now out of action. And no hospitals at all are functional in the north.
The lack of reporting due to the IDF killing most of the journalists and not allowing foreign journalists in means most of this news is effectively “off the radar.” There is a daily string of atrocities, IDF soldiers shooting at people trying to get aid from food drops, detaining and disappearing all the military-aged men and boys when they raid UNWRA shelters, what sounds like a large massacre with reportedly hundreds dead that just happened in the north. So much is happening that we in the global west only hear about if you know where to look and who to trust.
This isn’t nearly over. The healthcare system had already collapsed. But what little was still remaining is being slowly shut down. Is this a genocide? Ethnic cleansing? The words don’t really matter any more. Because it’s a slaughter. Gazans trapped in a pen, nowhere to hide, nowhere to go, nothing to eat. Many more will die very slowly over the next few months. And it’s likely you won’t even hear about it. It might be years, even decades, before we know the true scale of what happened here.
I know nothing much about helicopters, but I do know the IDF have Blackhawks, which are capable of delivering food and fuel to the hospitals without much fear of being shot down.
Why not try some “good guy” actions? The IDF maybe chooses to show evidence that the IDF actually care about the humans that are dying of hunger and lack of medical supplies? It is disturbing (to say the least) that they are not.
It would be a huge propaganda win just to occasionally be nice to the Palestinian people, supposing, of course, that their aim is not complete genocide.
…they are already doing that.
I’d call that gaslighting.
Because it’s a literal drop in the bucket: a solution to a problem that Israel has caused. And it didn’t even target where the help is needed the most.
What is needed isn’t “propaganda wins.” They need to open and establish humanitarian corridors, ramp up the amount of aid getting through the borders massively, open field hospitals, get supplies to existing hospitals and get them opened up again.
The problem isn’t fear of getting “shot down.” Aid convoys to the north were originally suspended because the IDF shot at them. And when after a couple of weeks they tried to get aid convoys through again but by then the security situation had deteriorated to the point that it looks like aid convoys have been suspended for the immediate future.
When you’ve got 2.2 million people to feed, a handful of Blackhawks or a few air drops every so often is not going to cut it.
This is the problem.
Hundreds of trucks backed up: not being allowed to go into Gaza. It’s an entirely manufactured crisis.
OK, I can agree. Although I would like them to gaslight some more, with a lot, and I mean a LOT of food supplies. To the point where it is no longer gaslighting, but actual aid being given.
Of course, it would be easier by road.
Extermination, a term that is free of semantic burdens.