[News] Hamas/Gaza/Israel

[WATFORD zero]

Have you not seen the demonstrations and where people are denying or ignoring what Hamas did and go straight to discussing the bombing? South American countries breaking off diplomatic ties. Implicit support via the 'river to the sea' comments.

I know the issue is complex i have been studying ff and on for 50 years and part of the issue is the constant cycle of attack and retaliation. Now was the time to show restraint on the political stage and not go into a military campaign where it stands to loose soldiers, the hostages, the deal with Saudi etc.

Going in with a military campaign will satisfy many Israelis who were shocked and angered (understatements) by the attack but it wold only lead to the mess , the political backlash and does nothing to move the situation on. As I have said a number of times it needs someone to step forward and other an alternative view.

Then you'll understand why having Netanyahu as part of the solution is always going to be problematic.

For years, Netanyahu propped up Hamas. Now it’s blown up in our faces​

For years, the various governments led by Benjamin Netanyahu took an approach that divided power between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — bringing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to his knees while making moves that propped up the Hamas terror group. The idea was to prevent Abbas — or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government — from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/

I believe that the only way to move forward is to get both sides of the divide represented by people who want a two state solution, which I would hope is what the majority of innocents from both sides currently being murdered want. However, history show us that is not what Hamas or Netanyhu want

 

[Wardy's twin]

You clearly don't know Israeli history.

I know my history of the conflicts pretty well and that Israel has always sought a strong response to any attacks be it terrorist or from another country. But that has done nothing to solve problem which to be fair might be unsolvable. This was the time to show restraint , the terrorists are stronger than they ever were especially Hezbollah which has 50k+ fighters and lots of modern equipment. Any fight with them will cause many more deaths in Israel. Right wing Israelis might argue dealing with Hamas this way has held off Hezbollah. Who knows.

 

[Wardy's twin]

Then you'll understand why having Netanyahu as part of the solution is always going to be problematic.

For years, Netanyahu propped up Hamas. Now it’s blown up in our faces​

For years, the various governments led by Benjamin Netanyahu took an approach that divided power between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — bringing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to his knees while making moves that propped up the Hamas terror group. The idea was to prevent Abbas — or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government — from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/

I believe that the only way to move forward is to get both sides of the divide represented by people who want a two state solution, which I would hope is what the majority of innocents from both sides currently being murdered want. However, history show us that is not what Hamas or Netanyhu want

Totally agree he is part of the problem because of his views and support for the settlement movement.

Interestingly Gerry Adams was/is vilified for his role in the IRA yet he was instrumental in bringing about the ceasefire.

I don't think Netanyahu is capable of that but problem is I don't think there are any other strong candidates in Israeli politics hence him dominating the last 20 years.

It needs leaders to step out and say enough is enough if there is going to be a solution.

 

[Zeberdi]

Have you not seen the demonstrations and where people are denying or ignoring what Hamas did and go straight to discussing the bombing? South American countries breaking off diplomatic ties. Implicit support via the 'river to the sea' comments.

Personally I’ve not seen any Palestinians ‘deny’ the attack on Israel or ‘ignoring’ that it happened - (although how do you verify the latter!) please provide sources for that.

As has been repeatedly stated by nearly everyone on this thread previously is that it is not the fact that Israel responded militarily but that the response proved to be very early on, overwhelmingly disproportionate , and has been declared by the UN and NGOs the world over, in violation of international humanitarian laws.

People are switching off this thread because it keeps going around in circles with the same arguments usually those propagated by people who want their one sided views validated in an echo chamber or those who simply struggle to cope with the complexities of the issues and unwittingly end up either posting inaccurate information or stereotyping the parties involved in the conflict..but ultimately it just becomes boring!

So yes, (as I pointed out a few days back any many others felt at the outset of this thread) ) admittedly there have been sensitivity issues in the early aftermath of the attack and the full scale of psychological trauma to the people of Israel was regarded by Jewish people in Israel (or round the world) as being not appropriately acknowledged by pro-Palestinian advocates - but the world has moved on, events have moved on - the perceived moral high ground for many observers of this war has changed purely because Gazans are at the receiving of a brutal form of collective punishment at the hands of a far-right government that’s left nearly 10,000 people dead, mostly women and children - ‘More children have now been killed in Gaza in the last three weeks than the total killed in conflicts around the world in every year since 2019, the nongovernmental organisation Save the Children has said.’

More children’s deaths in Gaza in 3 weeks than annual total since 2019: NGO

More children have died in Gaza since October 7 than from conflicts around the world in each of the last four years.

www.aljazeera.com

I know the issue is complex i have been studying ff and on for 50 years and part of the issue is the constant cycle of attack and retaliation.

I agree of course but I hope this doesn’t sound flippant, it honestly doesn’t require 50 years of study to state what most people have understood clearly from a few weeks of news cycle - and/or common sense about armed conflict in general - tit for bigger tat is what defines escalation..

Now was the time to show restraint on the political stage and not go into a military campaign where it stands to loose soldiers, the hostages, the deal with Saudi etc.

Again, as stated in several posts in response to this point, ‘showing restraint’ in international parle means not responding in a knee jerk reaction with unmeasured revenge and with disproportionate means - it does not mean, take a passive approach and do not retaliate or carry out a limited military objective.. Your views while admirable are totally idealist, no sane Leader of any Country is going to say, ‘oh heh, let them come at us with their rockets and missiles but we will not retaliate to defend ourselves’ - that is the whole point of a ceasefire in armed conflict and why it is brokered by third parties - so the parties do have an opportunity to come to the table BUT first of all, I think it is actually offensive to suggest Israel should have been told not to make any kind of retaliatory response when she was invaded by terrorists - you would not ask that of any other sovereign nation or state in the world.

Going in with a military campaign will satisfy many Israelis who were shocked and angered (understatements) by the attack but it wold only lead to the mess , the political backlash and does nothing to move the situation on. As I have said a number of times it needs someone to step forward and other an alternative view.

Please again read at least some history of the peace process that has been going on since the 1960s in various forms - sometimes more effectively than others - it is littered with good intentions and ‘alternative views’..

The only alternative to this ongoing conflict is for the Palestinian People, now the majority of whom are refugees ( 7 million around the world) is to have a State of their own which was originally intended in the Partition Plan of 1947.

 

[Zeberdi]

I know my history of the conflicts pretty well and that Israel has always sought a strong response to any attacks be it terrorist or from another country. But that has done nothing to solve problem which to be fair might be unsolvable. This was the time to show restraint , the terrorists are stronger than they ever were especially Hezbollah which has 50k+ fighters and lots of modern equipment. Any fight with them will cause many more deaths in Israel. Right wing Israelis might argue dealing with Hamas this way has held off Hezbollah. Who knows.

Perhaps you could clarify again your earlier comments that ‘restraint’ meant taking no military action at all - because as you well know, nobody is arguing that Israel (nor any State victim of a terrorist/foreign attack on their soil) should act without restraint. You have moved your goal posts in the past few pages of arguments it seems - have you not? - and you have now expanded your argument to beyond the specifics of the 10/7 attack by Hamas when you know there is greater weight for arguing, Israel should not have responded with military solutions at all to solving ongoing Palestinian political resistance in the OPT - like killing Palestinians protesting against being dehomed for Jewish settlements. A whole different argument.

 

[abc]

People are switching off this thread because it keeps going around in circles with the same arguments usually those propagated by people who want their one sided views validated in an echo chamber

This. Shame really because initially, as someone who has limited knowledge of the many complex issues, I found this thread interesting and enlightening

 

[Wardy's twin]

Then you'll understand why having Netanyahu as part of the solution is always going to be problematic.

For years, Netanyahu propped up Hamas. Now it’s blown up in our faces​

For years, the various governments led by Benjamin Netanyahu took an approach that divided power between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — bringing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to his knees while making moves that propped up the Hamas terror group. The idea was to prevent Abbas — or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government — from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/

I believe that the only way to move forward is to get both sides of the divide represented by people who want a two state solution, which I would hope is what the majority of innocents from both sides currently being murdered want. However, history show us that is not what Hamas or Netanyhu want

Totally agree he is part of the problem because of his views and support for the settlement movement.

Interestingly Gerry Adams was/is vilified for his role in the IRA yet he was instrumental in bringing about the ceasefire.

I don't think Netanyahu is capable of that but problem is I don't think there are any other strong candidates in Israeli politics hence him dominating the last 20 years.

It needs leaders to step out and say enough is enough if there is going to be a solution, idealistic maybe but what hope is there with endless rounds of fighting.

 

[Zeberdi]

Totally agree he is part of the problem because of his views and support for the settlement movement.

Interestingly Gerry Adams was/is vilified for his role in the IRA yet he was instrumental in bringing about the ceasefire.

I don't think Netanyahu is capable of that but problem is I don't think there are any other strong candidates in Israeli politics hence him dominating the last 20 years.

It needs leaders to step out and say enough is enough if there is going to be a solution, idealistic maybe but what hope is there with endless rounds of fighting.

This is an exact duplicate of a post you made above - I’m happy for you to ignore my posts or the questions I posted to you but please don’t try and obscure them by posting the same post multiple times - was that supposed to be funny?

 

[Zeberdi]

Agree with your last point about stereotyping because the state of Israel contain 2.5 million non jews , many of whom prosper in the state of Israel and on 7th October Israeli Arab soldiers defended one of the Kibbutz's.

As I said stereotyping works both ways:

Do the Palestinian people want a fully independent state as part of a two state solution or do they want to wipe Israel (and the Jews) off the map as part of a one state solution? HAMAS

 

[Wardy's twin]

Sorry but your assertion that Israel should have avoided a military response altogether is quixotic - you can not expect a nation state not to respond or defend itself at all if it has been attacked on it’s own soil - that is the sovereign and inalienable right of all nations and recognised as so by the Charter of Nations BUT collective punishment and disproportionate civilian casualties are prohibited under international law - we are going round in circles here …please do some reading - some primary and secondary source material linked to below …



The principles are laid down in international treaties - ’proportionality’ is a recognised principle in international law on war crimes and in the Geneva Convention - I suggest, if you are interested, to read the salient parts (Part lV) - (see link at the end of this post)


“The rule of proportionality requires that the anticipated incidental loss of human life and damage to civilian objects should not be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage expected from the destruction of a military objective.” (Art 52)


There are pages and pages on this thread why Israel’s response can in law be regarded as disproportionate - I would suggest some back reading.


a) The world was appalled and negotiations for the hostages have been going on since the day of the attack and many States, including Qatar, Jordan, Egypt, the US, Israel and the UK have all been involved behind the scenes.

b) How do you ‘remove backing for Hamas?’ - Qatar is an independent Gulf State - are you proposing the US invades Qatar (and Turkey) to find the funding and admin offices of the Hamas leadership ? - Hamas is funded by and through the Global Muslim Brotherhood - how do you suppose destroying an ‘enemy’ that has no State, has individual sleeper cells all over the world and can not be easily be distinguished from the host population? (rhetorical Q)

c). Hamas derailed normalisation talks by attacking Israel in such a massive way that it made it impossible for Israel not to respond - it is not the fact that Israel responded that has derailed talks but that she responded excessively and by collective punishment of the whole population of Gaza.


War is not in a political tool box - war is when politics have failed and I think perhaps you would think again about dismissing the complex history with a neatly worded trope if you were to familiarise yourself a little more with the history of this long running territorial conflict and the utter failure of diplomacy and political ‘tools’ to secure a lasting peace in the region.


Reference sources:

Geneva Convention- text

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.33_GC-IV-EN.pdf

Doctors without borders | The Practical Guide to Humanitarian Law

To be honest I really don't know what your argument is anymore.

As regards reading 'more' I have a Politics and History degree from 50 years ago and have remained up to date with a lot but not all.

You keep focussing on a proportionate response as defined by the UN but that is not relevant to me because IMO Israel should have not responded with these current bombing attacks, not because it wasn't entitled to but because it has fallen straight into the trap set for it by HAMAS and Iran . The majority of world opinion is now either against the Israelis or at best neutral even though they suffered an outrageous attack. I also clearly stated that a military strike of some type could and should remain an option but the priority should be getting hostages back, keeping the status quo regards Saudi & most of the gulf states, not losing any more soldiers and winning the political war on the world stage i.e. the world of social media and public opinion.

I notice you have made some pedantic comment about your understanding of the word 'restraint' vis a vis proportionate response whereas my clearly stated use of the word was for Israel to do nothing military in the immediate short term and maybe longer.

Any attack on Gaza was going to cause civilian casualties and at that point the Israelis have a problem , you can't have a proportionate response if you have a densely populated area, with military infrastructure embedded in 'civilian' areas even when using smart bombs. It was always going to end in a mess. Maybe Israel will wipe out Hamas but it will be costly for them and in terms of civilians. That still leaves Hezbollah who are much larger and also creates a vacuum in Gaza where some other extremist group will appear possibly even Hezbollah and that would be worse..

I've previously supported Israel's positioning where they have made a strong military responses but ultimately that has got them nowhere but another fight and their enemies have got stronger. This is not fighting small groups of terrorists training in the Bekaa valley these are large numbers of well trained , battle experienced soldiers. and that doesn't take into account the 50k+ Hezbollah fighters in the north.

I am not ignoring history of the area but focusing on it just muddies the water and time has moved on whereas an attempt to define the current problems would be more much useful to identifying solutions. I would assume anyone looking to solve the problems would have a good understanding of the history anyway.

Their my opinions , I am entitled to them. In another post you mention this debate is going round in circles , you too have contributed to that. For my part I accept I have said a lot so I will back out of the debate.

 

[Wardy's twin]

Perhaps you could clarify again your earlier comments that ‘restraint’ meant taking no military action at all - because as you well know, nobody is arguing that Israel (nor any State victim of a terrorist/foreign attack on their soil) should act without restraint. You have moved your goal posts in the past few pages of arguments it seems - have you not? - and you have now expanded your argument to beyond the specifics of the 10/7 attack by Hamas when you know there is greater weight for arguing, Israel should not have responded with military solutions at all to solving ongoing Palestinian political resistance in the OPT - like killing Palestinians protesting against being dehomed for Jewish settlements. A whole different argument.

see my other comments

 

[Wardy's twin]

As I said stereotyping works both ways:

And ?

see my other comments

 

[Wardy's twin]

This is an exact duplicate of a post you made above - I’m happy for you to ignore my posts or the questions I posted to you but please don’t try and obscure them by posting the same post multiple times - was that supposed to be funny?

Exact? really?

that was a response to a direct post made to me about one of my previous comments why are you getting involved.

You don't seem to like what I have said which is fair enough but you seem to be wanting to shut down any debate that military action might not be the best immediate response.

 

[Bakero]

Exact? really?

that was a response to a direct post made to me about one of my previous comments why are you getting involved.

You don't seem to like what I have said which is fair enough but you seem to be wanting to shut down any debate that military action might not be the best immediate response.

You posted the same comment at about 1:30 and again a couple of hours later. Maybe a computer glitch?

 

[Wardy's twin]

You posted the same comment at about 1:30 and again a couple of hours later. Maybe a computer glitch?

thanks.... certainly not an intentional double post. I have been having a couple of technical problems, desktop keyboard froze, then switched to my laptop which decided to die. Both back working for now.

 

[Zeberdi]

thanks.... certainly not an intentional double post. I have been having a couple of technical problems, desktop keyboard froze, then switched to my laptop which decided to die. Both back working for now.

 

[Zeberdi]

You don't seem to like what I have said which is fair enough but you seem to be wanting to shut down any debate that military action might not be the best immediate response.

Um - you are the only one arguing that Israel had a military option not to respond to a terrorist attack on her own soil.

If you want to argue a theoretical antI- war stance that’s fine - we can all agree war is generally bad and it would be better if people didn’t do it.

How am I shutting down your debate though? Because I have corrected factual errors and pointed out some stereotyping and some factual inconsistencies in your argument? - are you sure you want to debate or are you trying to get someone to agree with you that Israel shouldn’t have killed the Hamas terrorists that invaded her soil and murdered 1500 or so people. I find that an extraordinary position to take and don’t agree with you. Nor would the majority of the world over and certainly not any Jewish person I can think of.

I can only reiterate the central argument from everyone on this thread has been to acknowledge that Israel has a right to defend herself - that meant opening fire on Hamas and a limited, proportional military response that did not target civilians- Israel’s response however has been horrific and against all laws of reason and convention.

So let’s agree to fundamentally disagree.

 

[Krafty]

To be honest I really don't know what your argument is anymore.

As regards reading 'more' I have a Politics and History degree from 50 years ago and have remained up to date with a lot but not all.

You keep focussing on a proportionate response as defined by the UN but that is not relevant to me because IMO Israel should have not responded with these current bombing attacks, not because it wasn't entitled to but because it has fallen straight into the trap set for it by HAMAS and Iran . The majority of world opinion is now either against the Israelis or at best neutral even though they suffered an outrageous attack. I also clearly stated that a military strike of some type could and should remain an option but the priority should be getting hostages back, keeping the status quo regards Saudi & most of the gulf states, not losing any more soldiers and winning the political war on the world stage i.e. the world of social media and public opinion.

I notice you have made some pedantic comment about your understanding of the word 'restraint' vis a vis proportionate response whereas my clearly stated use of the word was for Israel to do nothing military in the immediate short term and maybe longer.

Any attack on Gaza was going to cause civilian casualties and at that point the Israelis have a problem , you can't have a proportionate response if you have a densely populated area, with military infrastructure embedded in 'civilian' areas even when using smart bombs. It was always going to end in a mess. Maybe Israel will wipe out Hamas but it will be costly for them and in terms of civilians. That still leaves Hezbollah who are much larger and also creates a vacuum in Gaza where some other extremist group will appear possibly even Hezbollah and that would be worse..

I've previously supported Israel's positioning where they have made a strong military responses but ultimately that has got them nowhere but another fight and their enemies have got stronger. This is not fighting small groups of terrorists training in the Bekaa valley these are large numbers of well trained , battle experienced soldiers. and that doesn't take into account the 50k+ Hezbollah fighters in the north.

I am not ignoring history of the area but focusing on it just muddies the water and time has moved on whereas an attempt to define the current problems would be more much useful to identifying solutions. I would assume anyone looking to solve the problems would have a good understanding of the history anyway.

Their my opinions , I am entitled to them. In another post you mention this debate is going round in circles , you too have contributed to that. For my part I accept I have said a lot so I will back out of the debate.

Some really interesting ideas being expressed here. We want a peaceful solution to this conflict, but is there one? I fear that this ongoing issue, which has already lasted several decades, will continue for many more - likely beyond our lifetimes.

The majority of the world is against Israeli authorities (BN), and rightly so, but I would argue that they are also against Hamas. This is a horrible conflict caused by two authorities on both 'sides' which should be held responsible, but what we are doing is showing solidarity to those stuck in the middle - the innocent civilians who are caught in the crossfire.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

88 UN Aid workers killed since 07.10.23, in Israel's carefully targeted attacks on Hamas commanders.

MSN

 

[Zeberdi]

To be honest I really don't know what your argument is anymore.

My position is the same as it has always been - to defend the rights of both Israeli’s and Palestinians to live in peace, free from discrimination and with equal civil rights to civil freedoms and self-determination- that means an independent state of Palestine. My position on the war has not changed since day 1, civilians should not suffer collective punishment and the attack by Hamas on Israel was horrific (especially for those with a direct Holocaust history). My position has also been to counteract stereotypical thinking, inherent bias and extremist views regardless of which direction they lean. That has meant a critique of Netanyahu’s government and an honest response to the issues around the Occupation and responding to generalisations and unhelpful characterisations in our thread discussion .

As for argument, I think if you read back on this thread, it has all been to the above purposes and I am neither pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian, just anti-violent extremism regardless of who perpetuates it.

We can all agree that what is going on is horrendous but please don’t keep suggesting (to this Jewish person at least) , that Israel had no right to defend herself against a paramilitary invasion and should have unilaterally laid down her arms as a response - it is the way she is responding that I am wholeheartedly AGAINST.