…if you are going to cut off access to hospitals to food, water, fuel, and allow premature babies to just die, I think we need to rely on something a bit more than trust.
But trust is the only option we’ve been given. I don’t trust Hamas.
I do trust the doctors and nurses, both the Palestinians who are risking their lives and the international medical care workers who are along side them, who have not stopped working since the start of the siege, who have been making impossible decisions for weeks, who have worked around the clock to try to keep people alive.
Have these people swept the place for Hamas militants? If they knew there were Hamas militants staged behind the fucking incubators, would they tell you that?
You have no way of knowing reliably what is going on. That you choose to believe one side (while strenuously denying that you do) and categorically disbelieve the other side, is pretty telling.
I’d say we bombed both Germany and Japan into submission. By the time the Russians entered Berlin it was a smoldering ruin. The bombing of Tokyo was as bad or worse than the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Yes the reality of nuclear bombs accelerated the process but Japan was getting chewed up with no end in sight either way.
If Hamas and the cultural infrastructure supporting it aren’t dismantled then this will repeat until it is dismantled.
…I very strongly suspect, and please, by all means, feel free to correct me here, but ths hospital workers are too busy saving lives to be concerned about “sweeping the hospital.”
But all of the international humanitarian aid agencies have been in regular contact with the people in the hospitals when they can, up until the start of the hospital siege a few days ago.
And the humanitarian aid agencies have no qualms in calling out either side in the conflict. And there isn’t even a hint of what you suggest of going on. What the aid agencies are telling us, almost uniformly, is that their people are working alongside the Palestinians in a desperate attempt to keep people alive.
There are three sides to the conflict in Gaza. You’ve got the IDF. You’ve got Hamas.
And you’ve got the people in between. You can go read what the doctors from Doctors without Borders have reported.
I’m listening to the humanitarian agencies who are talking to the people that are stuck in the middle. I’m not siding with Hamas.
An estimated 12,000 people have died in Gaza. An estimated 5000 children. It is still under siege. No food, no water, no fuel. Most of the hospitals out of action. 1.7 million people displaced according to Israeli numbers.
And yet: the conversation here today was largely about “bombing them into submission.” I think that’s abhorrent. And I wish people were as angry at those that have tabled those suggestions as they are angry at me.
Huh? I showed two HUGE governments with exceptional intelligence apparatus that said Hamas was hiding in hospitals. You chose to ignore that.
Not to mention, it is Insurgency-101 to hide among the populace and especially in places like hospitals and schools. This is nothing new. Insurgents simply cannot face-off in battle against military powers like the IDF. The very base of how they work is to blend into the local population so the powerful militaries do not have an easy target and get people to complain when the local populace gets hurt.
…can you explain what “exceptional intelligence” means? Is that some sort of objective metric? How well was this “exceptional intelligence” prior to 9/11, or on October 7th? Or on WMD’s? How do you measure it? How do we independently verify it?
I won’t ignore any evidence. Feel free to present it. But the testimony of people working at the hospitals now doesn’t support it. And those testimonies are evidence.
This just isn’t good enough. “Insurgency-101” isn’t a real thing. Even if they are “hiding among the populace” there are still obligations on the part of the occupying power, and one of those obligations is not to cut off food, water and power.
And “hiding” isn’t enough to remove protected status from a hospital. This is explicit in the conventions. If you think that the conventions should just be ignored, then thats fine. You aren’t the first to say that in this thread. But if you are fine with Israel being able to ignore the conventions, then everyone else should be allowed to as well.
First: This whole discussion as to whether Israel is intentionally targeting Palestinian civilians (as distinct from killing civilians who happen to be near military targets) and the closely related topic of whether Israel’s attack on hospitals is proportional to whatever military target might be in, near, or under the hospitals, belongs in the pit. While I recognize that this is a central question to discussing the war, I don’t believe that it can be discussed by people who care deeply and passionately for either side while following the rules of MPSIMS.
So please stop discussing it in this thread. That means everyone. You may discuss it in the linked thread (or some other pit thread, I suppose):
@Babale , you are banned from this thread until further notice. I am going to discuss this with the other mods tomorrow (it’s night time for most of the mods right now) and there will be an update on this after the discussion.
Oh, I get that. Hamas is one of the cancers that must be removed to allow civilization to live. I question if the IDF is going about it in the best way given the inevitable collateral damage. On the other hand, I don’t have a better answer, either.
Still - when the dust settles the only road to peace is through swallowing down the need for revenge. Some will always be unwilling to do that, just as some have been trying to do it for decades now.
I fear that there won’t be a reckoning because so often there isn’t and men like Netanyahu seem to so often die in bed still surrounded by power and luxury. I would be delighted to be wrong.
Agreed.
Gee, it only took America a century and a half to get to that point. I have no illusions that any form of peace is going to paper over the cracks between groups in that part of the world. A lasting peace, a truly lasting peace, is work that’s going to take generations.
^ This.
Is this like “the beatings will continue until morale improves”?
I grew up in a heavily Arab/Muslim part of the US. I’ve known and interacted with Palestinians during my lifetime. Because of this I know that they are not all rabid, fire-breathing haters lusting to kill. Quite a few of them now living in this country are glad to be away from the killing and violence. Of course, it doesn’t help prospects for peace in the Middle East if those who want peace emigrate to other countries, leaving the rabid behind.
While acknowledging that the current war is necessary (even if I am appalled by some of the methods) continuing to tighten the screws down ever tighter on Palestine and Gaza is not going to moderate anyone’s position. Yet Israelis are going to do what they feel they have to do to defend themselves.
But is it still one they’re willing to pay? I’m pretty sure some of them see no price as too high and that’s a tough crowd to deal with.
Meanwhile, the people who are willing to consider peace are caught in the crossfire. Hamas is happy to see those who they’d consider appeasers and traitors die horribly, and in that sense they’re entirely on board with Israel bombing hospitals, schools, mosques, etc. - that’s exactly why they set up their hidey-holes in such places.
^ This.
We burned people alive for months with napalm and bombs generating firestorms in cities then capped it off with two atomic bombs. Is that what you want to see happen in Gaza? Because, sure, Israel is headed in that direction with the way they’re seemingly blowing up every building in Gaza. I’d prefer NOT to re-run WWII. I don’t think most Israelis want to either. Positive most Palestinians don’t.
But - and this is important - the rebuilding involved a genuine rebuilding to make Japan a sovereign and functional state again. Not continual punishment. The US sank a lot of money and effort into rebuilding Japan. Don’t fool yourself - after the surrender the Japanese did not welcome the Americans with open arms. It took a generation of hard work to rebuild that nation and there are still people there who deeply, deeply resent the changes imposed.
That’s why people are asking what the plans are after Israel decapitates Hamas in Gaza. Bibi says he doesn’t want to get involved, he doesn’t want to administer the ruins. Then who will? The US took responsibility for destroying Japan and bringing it to its knees. We provided medical care to bombing victims. We provided fuel so they could keep warm in winter. We fed the country for years to keep it from starving because we’d caused so much destruction Japan couldn’t feed itself. We didn’t abandon Japan. That effort - which cost us money and was far from universally popular back in the US - is why the US and Japan are allies these days.
Yet Israel’s current government are saying they aren’t going to do jack after they are finished destroying Gaza. They plan to walk away from the rubble and ruin even as those trapped underneath are still crying out for rescue. That will not win Israel any friends.
I agree that would be the wisest course but Netanyahu is on record that he wants nothing to do with Gaza after he’s finished destroying it, he wants it to be someone else’s problem.
The Marshall Plan and rebuilding Japan are what I mean by breaking the cycle of revenge. Instead of further punishing the nations that started WWII the Allies rebuilt them, genuinely rebuilt them. That requires involvement after the shooting and bombing stops, it requires money and effort, and it requires giving a damn about human beings, being humane even to your enemies.
I don’t think Netanyahu & Company are capable of that.
Yes. Exactly. That is why war is hell.
Me, too.
^ This.
And yet Netanyahu doesn’t want to do the hard work required. He wants to smash Gaza then walk away.
I just want to say I get your frustration @Babale - it reminds me of the years when my nation’s government was busy killing a third of a million Iraqis and I had to keep saying that I had been opposed to that war built on lies from the beginning. It’s frustrating on a level that’s hard to understand unless you’ve been there. I can’t change the reality, but I do understand your frustration, if that understanding is worth anything.
When the only options are to either leave or to die I’m not sure the word “choice” enters into it. I’m a child of refugees who had to flee halfway around the world to survive, when they spoke of it they didn’t describe that as a “choice”. The fact that they were able to survive and even thrive in their new home in no way erased the trauma of that forced move.
That’s not at all what I meant but by all means keep interpreting what I say incorrectly if that’s you doing you.
I have pointed out that the Marshall Plan and rebuilding Japan are both examples of breaking the cycle of revenge. That’s why Europe has been mostly peaceful for the better part of a century instead of racked by tit-for-tat wars like most of its history. That’s why Japan and the US are allies these days.
Something was learned from the Treaty of Versailles and its long-term failure. Continuing to punish the losers after a ware just generates more war. At some point you have to break the cycle which is hard and it’s painful to many but it’s the only way to end an endless war.
If the defender then becomes the aggressor in turn then you just perpetuate violence. What happens after the shooting stops matters. At some point someone has to stop the aggression.
How that plays out is crucial to what happens in the future. A Marshall Plan for Gaza is desperately needed. I don’t trust Netanyahu and his followers to do that.
The American right is full of religious fanatics who are salivating in hopes this signals the start of their end-times myth, in which the destruction of Israel plays a very important part. They are not your friends.
In that case no one is willing to get off the merry-go-round. I think it’s in part because other Arab states are happy to have the Palestinians be the fall guys.
Aside from no radiation yes, the firebombing of Tokyo from March 9-10 in 1945 was worse than either atomic bomb. I’m not convinced conventional bombing, which was slower and took more effort for the perpetrators, was not going to cause Japan to surrender. Slow starvation, which they were facing, might have done so. But even the US didn’t think bombing alone was going to win the war which was why they were planning a massive invasion of the Japanese islands.
There’s no denying the atomic weapons vastly accelerated the end of the war.
Well, after reading and answering posts in order on this thread I get to the end and see the mod note. I really hope my responses didn’t cross a line and if they did so I’m sorry. It’s too late for me to go back and edit.
But does that cut both ways? Someone posted upthread that: “Apparently you can’t bomb a population into submission. That was one of the lessons of WWII.” If you want to argue that Gaza in 2023 is worlds removed from Japan in 1945, then maybe it’s that ostensible lesson — if it had been the case in that ‘worlds removed’ example — that’d cloud rather than clarify.
There are no innocent bystanders in Hell. War is chock full of them - little kids, cripples, old ladies. In fact, except for some of the brass, almost everybody involved is an innocent bystander.
Some people wish it was hell, because then that would mean that only those who deserve it are the ones suffering, but that is not the case here.
If that’s not what you meant, then that was an odd context to post it in and I did just read through the thread to double-check. However, if you meant to apply your statement not to the current, still-being-fought situation, but to a future in which Hamas and similarly-inclined groups have been eradicated from Gaza and the remaining citizens of Gaza have no capacity or inclination to initiate violence against Israel, then I will agree that violence by Israel against the Palestinians at that point would be revenge rather than justified, and the quote would be fairly applied.
I can agree with that, but the current conflict is far from that point, and as I said above, that seemed to still be the context of your original remark.
I’d be thrilled for some form of Marshall Plan for Gaza. Strangely enough, that’s pretty much what Israel DID do to Gaza and the West Bank after getting stuck with them in 1967. Before the first intifada, Palestinians in those territories had the second-highest per capita income of any national group of Arabs in the Middle East, the highest being Arab citizens of Israel proper. History demonstrates that when Israeli citizens are not being directly endangered from the Arabs in the Occupied Territories, Israeli’s attitudes toward them is not vengeful, but helpful and hopeful. But that point on non-violence needs to be achieved first.
Israel post-Gaza invasion is in a bit of a catch-22. On one hand, if you go in a completely wreck a state to remove the standing government from power, the right thing to do is to remain behind and help rebuild. On the other hand, if Israel does precisely that, there will be no end of accusations that Israel’s plan all along was to take that territory back for themselves. A better solution I think will be for a coalition of Arab nations and moderate West-Bank Palestinian officials to do back their rhetoric up with action and help rebuild Gaza and install a non-terroristic government actually willing to move the ball toward a two-state agreement, with significant financial contribution from Israel.
This might be my last post in this thread since Babale has been banned; I’m moving over to the Pit thread.