Israel declares war on Hamas

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by Bagor

Waa Waa.... Antisemitism card.

Her argument is that Israel should be exempt because it's Jewish.

I pointed that out but you of course try the antisemitism card.

No, her argument is that genocide means the deliberate complete extermination of a specific group of people. Hamas has that stated goal, Israel does not, no matter how brutal their response to the attacks has been.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Snuffleupagus

Dumb comment, they killed soldiers to get thru the fence and para-trooped to the soft targets.

And were quite successful in these operations.

But to clarify where we are at right now with this thread.

First, Israel has no right to endanger civilians even though there is literally irrefutable proof that Hamas uses civilians as human shields, sets up military centers in civilian areas, launches rocket attacks from civilian areas, uses hospital resources to hide soldiers, etc, etc. But no, ISRAEL is at fault for endangering civilians when they attack Hamas in these areas.

And secondly, Hamas didn't actually want to kill as many Jews as possible. In fact if they wanted to do that, they would have carried out their attacks in a different manner. You know, different from the barbaric rape, murder and terror that they employed.

And then on top of that, those of us who call out this #### are muddying the waters.

What a mess.

[Bagor]

Originally Posted by edslunch

No, her argument is that genocide means the deliberate complete extermination of a specific group of people. Hamas has that stated goal, Israel does not, no matter how brutal their response to the attacks has been.

Sure. Of course they don't.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1735757431077036088

[Winsor_Pilates]

Originally Posted by Leondros

Holy sh*t thats wild. I had no idea.





Just goes to show just how off guard the IDF was... They did not have a handle on this thing and clearly did not have rules of engagement nor structure of command.

Is this a legitimate source, never heard of this site before?
The next article on the site:
https://www.globalresearch.ca/there-...ndemic/5841105

Not saying there wasn't any collateral damage killings by the IDF on Oct 7th, but articles like this might be greatly exaggerating the information available.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Hamas are jihadists. Religious fanatics. Their founding documents and ongoing propaganda are full of religious text and imagery. Their aims are religious. Their motivations are religious. The Oct 7 attackers filmed themselves shouting “God is Great!” as they carried out their atrocities. The Palestinians who passed around the bloody corpses of women slain in the attacks were shouting “God is Great!” as they rejoiced.

I suppose it’s difficult for people who aren’t religious fanatics to imagine the thought process of people who are. This seems to be especially true of foreign movements. If a group of Christian fundamentalists in Alberta wrote a founding charter full of litany from the Book of Revelations, promised to bring on the End Times in a bloodbath, and shouted “Judgement day is upon you!“ as they gunned people down in the street, would Canadians be attributing subtle (and often sympathetic) political agendas to them?

I think all religious people - whether fanatics or not - are completely off their rocker. I don't understand how they get a pass to believe abject nonsense and are - in many cases - praised for their faith in the impossible instead of ridiculed like they should be. It's absurd and frustrating to watch.

But, again, I think most of us are consistent. Whether you are a violent Muslim extremist or a violent Christian extremist I view you the same way: you're a fkn blight on the world.

Would I attribute sympathetic political agendas to them if they were white/Christian/Canadian? Of course not, that's ridiculous. If, however, you wanted to bomb the three or so churches in Bonavista because they were taking part in violent Christian extremism, but you decided to carpet bomb my street, the Safeway, Avenida and the daycare, then yeah, I'd have a little fkn sympathy because I'm not a moron, I can think, I'm not blinded by stupidity and indoctrination and I have a degree of empathy. My sympathy would be with the innocent Bonavistians in the same way my sympathy is with the innocent Palestinians who are victims of a murderous Israeli war machine.

[Azure]

The problem is that you say Israel should stop endangering civilians, but say nothing about Hamas using civilians as human shields.

Can't have one with the other, and given what the Geneva Convention says about human shields, it is actually quite pathetic how you frame Israel as the murderous war machine, but say little to nothing about Hamas and their use of human shields.

In fact, in your stated view on what each side has consistently said, which I assume speaks for yourself as well, there is literally nothing said about this exact issue.

Hamas are terrorists and the attack on October 7 was evil
Israel has the right to capture or kill Hamas leadership and members
Israel does not have the right to kill, starve, displace or endanger civilians

Literally nothing about Hamas needs to stop using civilians as human shields, hide their military resource among civilians, and launch attacks from civilian areas, but at the same time Israel should stop endangering civilians.

I mean its so pathetic its laughable.

[Wormius]

Does it say anywhere if human shields are being used, you can just dispatch them indiscriminately?

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Does it say anywhere if human shields are being used, you can just dispatch them indiscriminately?

I mean at some point the mental gymnastics to try and remove all burden of responsibility from Hamas, and their use of human shields which obviously results in more civilian causalities in any conflict, not just this one, and place that burden entirely on Israel, to the point where people are outright saying Israel has no right to endanger civilians, and SAY NOTHING about Hamas using human shields must be exhausting and mentally unsettling.

But hey, muddying the waters.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

Is this a legitimate source, never heard of this site before?
The next article on the site:
https://www.globalresearch.ca/there-...ndemic/5841105

Not saying there wasn't any collateral damage killings by the IDF on Oct 7th, but articles like this might be greatly exaggerating the information available.

Oh, #### dude, I'm sorry. I should have researched the source. For some reason my brain thought that was a legitimate site. I'm going to edit my previous post and flag that.


Sorry folks.

[flylock shox]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

It's gotta be an intelligence failure on a greater scale than 9/11. Wild they had no idea. Or did they?

They did. The NYT has a piece on it that I posted earlier in this thread.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Azure

I mean at some point the mental gymnastics to try and remove all burden of responsibility from Hamas, and their use of human shields which obviously results in more civilian causalities in any conflict, not just this one, and place that burden entirely on Israel, to the point where people are outright saying Israel has no right to endanger civilians, and SAY NOTHING about Hamas using human shields must be exhausting and mentally unsettling.

But hey, muddying the waters.

I understand that you believe anything that doesn’t boil an issue down to black and white simplicity for your personal ease of understanding is considered “muddying the waters” now, but there is a fairly significant gap between “Israel can bomb civilians indiscriminately” and “Hamas has no burden of responsibility.”

But hey, I’m sure using the eye-roll emoji every time you’ve successfully made a dense, unintellectual point feels a lot better than it reads.

[flylock shox]

Also, there are a number of accounts circulating online from various sources of IDF actions being the direct cause of some civilian deaths on October 7. The challenge of course is that most of the witnesses who could account for this are either dead, are IDF members, or are survivors who are not likely inclined to speak openly or critically about IDF actions. All the more reason i don't think the full truth will out for a long time, but some Israelis are pushing for the investigations that would allow that to happen, which is promising:

https://abcnews.go.com/International...lies-106294129

[blankall]

Originally Posted by Azure

The problem is that you say Israel should stop endangering civilians, but say nothing about Hamas using civilians as human shields.

Can't have one with the other, and given what the Geneva Convention says about human shields, it is actually quite pathetic how you frame Israel as the murderous war machine, but say little to nothing about Hamas and their use of human shields.

In fact, in your stated view on what each side has consistently said, which I assume speaks for yourself as well, there is literally nothing said about this exact issue.



Literally nothing about Hamas needs to stop using civilians as human shields, hide their military resource among civilians, and launch attacks from civilian areas, but at the same time Israel should stop endangering civilians.

I mean its so pathetic its laughable.

Apparently anyone who isn't willing to accept:
1. that the true intention of every Israeli is represented by a fringe far right party; yet also
2. read into Hamas' mainstream statements about genocide that they what they really want is peaceful co-existence along 1967 borders

suffers from some kind of "Cognitive Dissonance"?

[Pointman]

Just to clarify, the whole argument revolves around whether Israel should or should not do more to protect Gaza civilians? Nobody is defending Hamas and everyone agrees that Israel has every right to eliminate them? And there's no doubt that irradicating Hamas will lead to "some" civilian casualties. Tge whole argument is that there should be less of them?

[Fuzz]

No, that's not the entire argument at all. Part of it is that this will achieve none of their goals. It's killing innocent civilians, and will make Israel no safer in the long run.

[Azure]

I have no problem admitting that Israel likely gives approval to military actions that they know will result in civilian casualties.

Its war. Happens all the time.

But if one really wants to eliminate civilian deaths, Hamas needs to start following basic rules of military conflict, such as not intentionally using human shields.

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by edslunch

No, her argument is that genocide means the deliberate complete extermination of a specific group of people. Hamas has that stated goal, Israel does not, no matter how brutal their response to the attacks has been.

That is not the definition of genocide. The UN definition of genocide is as follows:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

Killing members of the group;
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group

Hamas also does not, in its current iteration, state that their goal is the complete or partial extermination of the Jewish people. This Israeli government, however, does state that they want to eliminate the people of Gaza. They have been very explicit about it. This is from South Africa's ICJ application.

Israeli Minister for National Security: On 10 November 2023, Itamar Ben-Gvir
clarified the government’s position in a televised address, stating: “[t]o be clear, when we say
that Hamas should be destroyed, it also means those who celebrate, those who support, and
those who hand out candy — they’re all terrorists, and they should also be destroyed.”456
— Israeli Minister of Energy and Infrastructure: ‘Tweeting’ on 13 October 2023, Israel
Katz stated: “All the civilian population in Gaza is ordered to leave immediately. We will win.
They will not receive a drop of water or a single battery until they leave the world.”457 On 12
October 2023, he ‘tweeted’: “Humanitarian aid to Gaza? No electrical switch will be turned on,
no water hydrant will be opened and no fuel truck will enter until the Israeli abductees are
returned home. Humanitarianism for humanitarianism. And no one will preach us morality.”458
— Israeli Minister of Finance: On 8 October 2023, Bezalel Smotrich stated at a meeting
of the Israeli Cabinet that “[w]e need to deal a blow that hasn’t been seen in 50 years and take
down Gaza.”459
— Israeli Minister of Heritage: On 1 November 2023, Amichai Eliyahu posted on
Facebook: “The north of the Gaza Strip, more beautiful than ever. Everything is blown up and
flattened, simply a pleasure for the eyes … We must talk about the day after. In my mind, we
will hand over lots to all those who fought for Gaza over the years and to those evicted from
Gush Katif” [a former Israeli settlement].460 He later argued against humanitarian aid as “[w]ewouldn’t hand the Nazis humanitarian aid”, and “there is no such thing as uninvolved civilians
in Gaza”.461 He also posited a nuclear attack on the Gaza Strip.462
— Israeli Minister of Agriculture: On 11 November 2023, Avi Dichter in a television
interview recalled the Nakba of 1948, in which over 80 percent of the Palestinian population of
the new Israeli State was forced from or fled their homes, stating that “[w]e are now actually
rolling out the Gaza Nakba”.463
— Deputy Speaker of the Knesset and Member of the Foreign Affairs and Security
Committee: On 7 October 2023, Nissim Vaturi ‘tweeted’ that: “[n]ow we all have one common
goal — erasing the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth. Those who are unable will be
replaced.”

The document contains 6 pages of this stuff, I suggest you have a look through it.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by flylock shox

Also, there are a number of accounts circulating online from various sources of IDF actions being the direct cause of some civilian deaths on October 7. The challenge of course is that most of the witnesses who could account for this are either dead, are IDF members, or are survivors who are not likely inclined to speak openly or critically about IDF actions. All the more reason i don't think the full truth will out for a long time, but some Israelis are pushing for the investigations that would allow that to happen, which is promising:

https://abcnews.go.com/International...lies-106294129

People underestimate the true chaos of October 7. Literally thousands of militants running around just destroying whatever they could. Certainly a few civilians were caught in the cross-fire of were inside structures and vehicles occupied by Hamas militants.

There's, however, zero evidence to show that the IDF was responsible for any significant share of the casualties on Oct 7 though.

Once again, interesting that there's so much effort put into this argument, yet no mention of the fact that about 1/3 of all missiles launched by Hamas fall inside of Gaza. We also had multiple pages debating the physics of gravity after a clear video emerged of a Palestinian rocket hitting a Palestinian hospital.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by blankall

People underestimate the true chaos of October 7. Literally thousands of militants running around just destroying whatever they could. Certainly a few civilians were caught in the cross-fire of were inside structures and vehicles occupied by Hamas militants.

There's, however, zero evidence to show that the IDF was responsible for any significant share of the casualties on Oct 7 though.

Well I am for one am glad we have moved beyond the completely ridiculous theory that the IDF was responsible for any significant share of civilian casualties on Oct 7.

Again, taking some serious mental gymnastics to come up with these completely baseless theories. Its amazing to watch.

[Pointman]

Originally Posted by _Q_

That is not the definition of genocide. The UN definition of genocide is as follows:


Hamas also does not, in its current iteration, state that their goal is the complete or partial extermination of the Jewish people. This Israeli government, however, does state that they want to eliminate the people of Gaza. They have been very explicit about it. This is from South Africa's ICJ application.



The document contains 6 pages of this stuff, I suggest you have a look through it.

Those are all post-Oct 7th comments. Before the war Israel didn't have a goal of destroying Gaza in any means.

Hamas actually does have a stated goal of destroying Israel as a state. They call it "Zionist project" and call it "illegal". Also they, being government of Gaza, refused to recognize Israel. They mention 1967 borders without saying that it is Israel, rather than some other Muslim state, should be across that border. They state a goal of a complete liberation of WHOLE Palestine from " the occupation by Zionist project".