is Hamas a terrorist organization?

[woolfe9998]

You choose to ignore any facts that are contrary to your fantasy.

You gave no facts. You made the sweeping statement that "the inconvenient fact of the Israeli state is that it was founded on violence and theft." Try digging into the historical facts, all of them, to substantiate that statement. Your so called facts are not facts - they are at the very least a gross over-simplification of the history which purposefully focuses on only one side's transgressions.

 

[JEDIYoda]

You choose to ignore any facts that are contrary to your fantasy.

You do not know what you are talking about......plain and simple!!

 

[woolfe9998]

I'm not defending anyone here, I'm making my own points.

Yes, you are. You inserted yourself into a discussion I was having with people who were making the comparison, and said this.

Once you basically imprison an entire population into an area under your control, control all supplies that go into and out of that territory, deny the free movement of that population, enact collective punishment on the people there, and use indiscriminate overwhelming force against those people it starts getting difficult not to make comparisons to other horrible regimes.

The thing is that those Palestinians being pushed by the police arent the ones firing the rockets.
In the same way its wrong to target a Jewish guy in NYC because a Jewish guy in Israel shot a kid.

No, they are not the same people. They are out protesting in very angry climate, right after Hamas fired the rockets. The Israelis are being pre-emptive because tempers have flared and they see potential for violent rioting. Are they over-reacting? Yes, they are. But they are shoving them. They are shooting at the people who are shooting at them.

So you shouldnt fight back against your territory being taken away or you should? Just for clarity, because it seems like you are saying its fine for Israel to fight for territory and security but not Palestinians.

No, you shouldn't fight for a country that was already offered to you, which you rejected in favor of fighting instead. Did you literally not understand anything I wrote previously? You don't get to choose war over being given a country, then claim you have no choice but to fight for your country. What part of that is challenging you?

Yes. Palestinians are happy to see their kids get blown up by Israeli air strikes just because they want to throw stones at the IDF.

I mean they couldn't be acting like that because of the untenable conditions that the Israelis keep them in. It just that they really, really like throwing stones at heavily armed opponents.

Conditions were far from untenable when they started the suicide bombings 20 years ago.

I'm sure they are not happy with the situation. They need to elect better leaders. If they do, maybe Israel will do the same.

 

[IronWing]

Israelis choosing to re-elect violent criminals as leaders is all the fault of the Palestinians? What rubbish.

 

[WelshBloke]

Yes, you are. You inserted yourself into a discussion I was having with people who were making the comparison, and said this.

I'm sorry for interrupting your private messages but moving on from that I totally gave you the option to compare Israel to whatever other country that had done a similar thing and your the one that stuck with Nazi Germany.

No, they are not the same people. They are out protesting in very angry climate, right after Hamas fired the rockets. The Israelis are being pre-emptive because tempers have flared and they see potential for violent rioting. Are they over-reacting? Yes, they are. But they are shoving them. They are shooting at the people who are shooting at them.

They are also blowing up entire high rise buildings full of people.

No you shouldn't fight for a country that was already offered to you, which you rejected in favor of fighting instead. Did you literally not understand anything I wrote previously? You don't get to chose war over being given a country, then claim you have no choice but to fight for your country. What part of that is challenging you?

How many of those children that Israel has killed in the last few weeks had a say in any of that?

Conditions were far from untenable when they started the suicide bombings 20 years ago.

I'm sure they are not happy with the situation. They need to elect better leaders. If they do, maybe Israel will do the same.

Yeah. Israel has all the power here. Israel is the one that can change things, the Palestinian leaders don't have any power that the Israelis can't take away at any time.

 

[woolfe9998]

How many of those children that Israel has killed in the last few weeks had a say in any of that?

None. But blaming that entirely on Israel and not at all on the Palestinians who DID have a say in it is ridiculous. Arafat and those who supported him condemned the Palestinians to misery. You don't choose to fight a war with a superior foe over a perfectly valid option for peace and expect everything will come up roses, that your children and children's children are going to have it easy.

Yeah. Israel has all the power here. Israel is the one that can change things, the Palestinian leaders don't have any power that the Israelis can't take away at any time.

It's really not that simple. Because in a democracy, power is accountable to voters. And when a country is being attacked, voters want reprisals. In those moments, they do not want leaders who want to accommodate the attackers and talk peace.

But let's assume that Israel is the one to make unilateral changes here. Suppose they elect a lefty leader who will ease up on the blockades and checkpoints, and will freeze the settlement building. What happens then when Hamas, who is opposed to any peace process and has said they will never stop attacking until Israel is gone, goes ahead and attacks again? The lefty leader will be out of a job and Likud will be right back in power. That's what.

The Palestinians do have power here: the power to remove Hamas just as they had the power to put them in place. They need to exercise it.

 

[blankslate]

Is Israel an unjust Apartheid State?

The answer to that question and the question in the original Post is yes.

So the answer is beyond any average an most above average people in wisdom and intelligence to find for the situation there.


_______________

 

[JEDIYoda]

If you all go back a few years you will find an huge thread that split this community in half.........with all the same arguments.......there is two sides to every story and some of you have already gone over the deep end making absurd allegations about the leadership in Israel while others are also making absurd observations about the Palestinians and Hamas.....
Woolfe9998 seems to have the best handle on what is transpiring!

 

[sandorski]

If you all go back a few years you will find an huge thread that split this community in half.........with all the same arguments.......there is two sides to every story and some of you have already gone over the deep end making absurd allegations about the leadership in Israel while others are also making absurd observations about the Palestinians and Hamas.....
Woolfe9998 seems to have the best handle on what is transpiring!

Negative. Wolf continues to make worthless excuses for inexcusable behaviour.

 

[mikeymikec]

I understand, but first, there is a dispute of fact over what Israel is actually doing. For example, many people around here accuse Israel of intentionally killing civilians in these strikes. But that makes no sense, as Israel knows that Hamas wants them to kill civilians so that they can use the civilian casualties to bring international pressure on Israel, yanking military and economic aid until Israel is theoretically weakened to the point where they can be conquered by the Pals. Israel knows that is what they are doing, so why would they intentionally target civilians and play right into their hands?

Why would they capture children in the night, incarcerate them in horrible conditions and terrorize them? I'm going to employ Occam's Razor here and simply say, "because they're cunts", because any other explanation that springs to mind ignores the obvious logic that Israel's actions on this point can only help to radicalise the next generation of Palestinians against them.

That sort of old world religious intolerance is not something which I, as a liberal, am required to tolerate. Any more than I am required to tolerate the religious right in America and its Islamophobia, which is yet another form of old world religious intolerance.

I'm not in the habit of tolerating intolerance either, but IMO it pales in comparison to what Israel is doing to Palestine.

 

[mxnerd]

 

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

>>ever since the British helped it take land that didn't belong to them in the first place

You need to read up on your history. The UK was actually limiting the return of Jews to what they considered to be their historic homeland, which led to a LOT of animosity between the Jews and the British. Consider the fact that the Jews had just gone through a period where some of the major powers in Europe had actually set up 'factories' to process the Jewish folks and their belongings after killing them, and you might get an inkling of why they felt a need for self determination, at least one place in the world where they weren't vilified.

Look up "night of the beatings", if you don't believe this. I can guarantee that if you went there and asked a typical Jew in 1947 if they felt like the British were helping them, at least 98% of the Jews would have said no.

 

[brianmanahan]

i think the canaanites have more claim to the area than anyone

but you know what they say, possession is 9/10ths of the law

fights over geographic areas have always been messy

but when you throw in 2 semi-related people groups with semi-related religions that hate each other, whoo boy

it's like the hatbergs and mcgoys

 

[Meghan54]

Yes, as Rommel said, what you are describing is the West Bank. It does not apply to the ~2 million Palestinian Arabs who live in Israel proper. And it did not apply in the West Bank until ~2000, when the suicide bombing campaigns started. Throughout the 80's, the situation on the ground was relatively peaceful because Palestinian protests were non-violent for the most part. When they became violent, restrictions were imposed.

If Israel really is just a viscious racist state as so many of you describe them, that same treatment would apply to all its Arab citizens, and the restrictions would have started in 1967 when Israel first took over.

When you pose this as a response to my citing evidence of rank anti-Semitism in Hamas' own founding document, and its rallying cry to kill Jews, it sounds as if you think all this anti-Semitism and homicidal intentions were somehow Israel's fault, as if this is an inevitable response to oppression. Yet the charter was written long before the restrictions were imposed. Moreover, Palestinian anti-Semitism has deep roots.

The Mufti of Jerusalem was the spiritual leader of the Palestinians in the 20's, 30's and 40's. Preached anti-Semitism from the pulpit. During WWII, he went to Germany, helped the Nazis recruit Bosnian Muslims to the SS, and discussed with Hitler and Himmler their ongoing extermination of the Jews.

It is not a coincidence that an openly anti-Semitic organization was chosen by the people of Gaza to lead it years later. Arab anti-Semitism goes all the way back like an unbroken thread as a motivation in all this. It was pivotal, just as was the anti-Semitism in Europe which drove the Jews to Palestine in the first place.

I know I was mostly referring to the West Bank’s conditions, but how is Gaza much different? Larger, continuous bit of walled enclave vs. multiple walled enclaves? OK , that’s one.

Palestinians living within Gaza cannot leave without permission, rarely granted. They cannot boat offshore…6-12 mile exclusion zone (depending upon who is currently defining the zone) preventing Pal fishing/boating/port facility except by exclusive permission of Israel, which again almost never happens. Almost 20% of arable land in Gaza taken by Israel for the “exclusion” zone/buffer around Gaza. All resources going into Gaza under complete Israeli control…food, elect, water, etc.

Just don’t see the functional difference for Palestinians living in either Gaza and West Bank…both could be considered prisons or concentration camps much like our Japanese internment camps.

C’est la guerre.

 

[Panino Manino]

No.
Hamas has a military side, Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, that exercises the right to resist against an oppressor.

 

[KMFJD]

Just to re-iterate the claim that Hamas uses civilians as human shields, Israel does the same thing....i haven't seen Hamas use white phosphorous on civilians yet, i have seen IDF do this though, when was the last time Hamas blew up a childrens hospital? IDF just did that

U.N. report accuses Israeli forces of using Palestinian children as human shields, abusing children in custody

U.N body on child rights makes explosive accusations; Israel dismisses as old news

www.cbsnews.com

IDF and it's supporters have murdered 66 children so far...meanwhile

https://twitter.com/x/status/1395435437771137027

https://twitter.com/x/status/1395480699159949312

 

[JEDIYoda]

So we are back to this.....my how things never change......
What is fascinating is all the different views of the same thing by so many people who are for or against Israel or the Palestinians or Hamas....
Especially the so called people who quote history according to how they perceive things......

Here is the start of an article....

The terrorist organization Hamas explicitly calls for the destruction of Israel in its group covenant, which also says that “peace initiatives … are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement.”

“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it,” The Covenant of Hamas preamble states, according to Yale Law School’s Lillian Goldman Law Library.

“[Peace] initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement…Those conferences are no more than a means to appoint the infidels as arbitrators in the lands of Islam. There is no solution for the Palestinian problem except by Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are but a waste of time, an exercise in futility,” the covenant states.

The Hamas Covenant goes on to say that Muslims must “fight Jews and kill them,” and that “Jihad becomes the individual duty of every Muslim. In the face of the Jews’ usurpation, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised.”

“The Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight Jews and kill them. Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out: ‘O Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him,” Article 7 of the covenant says.

Beginning Monday last week, Hamas sent more than 1,000 rockets into Israel by Wednesday morning, prompting Israel to counter-strike. On Friday, Israeli tanks and other ground units were deployed along the nation’s border in an effort to prevent militant groups from crossing into the country.

There is more to this article... Hamas terror group's charter explicitly calls for Israel's destruction: 'Fight Jews and kill them' | American Military News

 

[JEDIYoda]

>>ever since the British helped it take land that didn't belong to them in the first place

You need to read up on your history. The UK was actually limiting the return of Jews to what they considered to be their historic homeland, which led to a LOT of animosity between the Jews and the British. Consider the fact that the Jews had just gone through a period where some of the major powers in Europe had actually set up 'factories' to process the Jewish folks and their belongings after killing them, and you might get an inkling of why they felt a need for self determination, at least one place in the world where they weren't vilified.

Look up "night of the beatings", if you don't believe this. I can guarantee that if you went there and asked a typical Jew in 1947 if they felt like the British were helping them, at least 98% of the Jews would have said no.

actually you need to go read up on your history.......the Palestinian people have been an outcast people with no country to call home for centuries.....

The Truth about the Palestinian People (targetofopportunity.com)

A brief except from a very involved article....

In 1922, the British declared that the boundary of Palestine would be limited to the area west of the river. The area east of the river, called Transjordan, which is now the country of Jordan, was made a separate British mandate and eventually given independence. The British maintained control until 1948.

There was always a Jewish population in the region, most of them resided in the religious communities in Jerusalem, Tz'fat, Tiberius, and Hebron. With Jewish immigration suddenly on the rise from the 1880's on, the economy of this very under populated and very poor country began to rise dramatically, attracting a parallel stream of Arabs from the surrounding countries who came in looking for jobs. At the same time, Arab/Muslim nationalism and extremism began to rise, spurred by the influx of what they considered "Infidel Jews" and the breakup of the Turkish Empire followed by the occupation by European countries of much of the Middle East.

 

[pauldun170]

So we are back to this.....my how things never change......
What is fascinating is all the different views of the same thing by so many people who are for or against Israel or the Palestinians or Hamas....
Especially the so called people who quote history according to how they perceive things......

Here is the start of an article....

The terrorist organization Hamas explicitly calls for the destruction of Israel in its group covenant, which also says that “peace initiatives … are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement.”

“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it,” The Covenant of Hamas preamble states, according to Yale Law School’s Lillian Goldman Law Library.

“[Peace] initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement…Those conferences are no more than a means to appoint the infidels as arbitrators in the lands of Islam. There is no solution for the Palestinian problem except by Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are but a waste of time, an exercise in futility,” the covenant states.

The Hamas Covenant goes on to say that Muslims must “fight Jews and kill them,” and that “Jihad becomes the individual duty of every Muslim. In the face of the Jews’ usurpation, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised.”

“The Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight Jews and kill them. Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out: ‘O Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him,” Article 7 of the covenant says.

Beginning Monday last week, Hamas sent more than 1,000 rockets into Israel by Wednesday morning, prompting Israel to counter-strike. On Friday, Israeli tanks and other ground units were deployed along the nation’s border in an effort to prevent militant groups from crossing into the country.

There is more to this article... Hamas terror group's charter explicitly calls for Israel's destruction: 'Fight Jews and kill them' | American Military News

Lots happened between Hamas's founding in 1987 during the intifada and the current century. It's understandable how a bunch of guys might use fiery language in forming a group that came about in response to dudes pissed off at Israel using live rounds on protestors. Protests over Israel occupation and heavy handed bullshit during the 80's.
The Charter was updated in 2017

Hamas in 2017: The document in full

Hamas explains general principles and objectives in 42-article document

www.middleeasteye.net

If you are going to post a charter, at least post the current charter.

 

[sandorski]

actually you need to go read up on your history.......the Palestinian people have been an outcast people with no country to call home for centuries.....

The Truth about the Palestinian People (targetofopportunity.com)

A brief except from a very involved article....

In 1922, the British declared that the boundary of Palestine would be limited to the area west of the river. The area east of the river, called Transjordan, which is now the country of Jordan, was made a separate British mandate and eventually given independence. The British maintained control until 1948.

There was always a Jewish population in the region, most of them resided in the religious communities in Jerusalem, Tz'fat, Tiberius, and Hebron. With Jewish immigration suddenly on the rise from the 1880's on, the economy of this very under populated and very poor country began to rise dramatically, attracting a parallel stream of Arabs from the surrounding countries who came in looking for jobs. At the same time, Arab/Muslim nationalism and extremism began to rise, spurred by the influx of what they considered "Infidel Jews" and the breakup of the Turkish Empire followed by the occupation by European countries of much of the Middle East.

There's always a long list of grievances. Actions matter more than Reasons.

 

[woolfe9998]

I know I was mostly referring to the West Bank’s conditions, but how is Gaza much different? Larger, continuous bit of walled enclave vs. multiple walled enclaves? OK , that’s one.

Palestinians living within Gaza cannot leave without permission, rarely granted. They cannot boat offshore…6-12 mile exclusion zone (depending upon who is currently defining the zone) preventing Pal fishing/boating/port facility except by exclusive permission of Israel, which again almost never happens. Almost 20% of arable land in Gaza taken by Israel for the “exclusion” zone/buffer around Gaza. All resources going into Gaza under complete Israeli control…food, elect, water, etc.

Just don’t see the functional difference for Palestinians living in either Gaza and West Bank…both could be considered prisons or concentration camps much like our Japanese internment camps.

C’est la guerre.

I wasn't referring to the Palestinians living in Gaza. I was referring to the 2 million Palestinian Arabs who live in the State of Israel. The ones who are Israeli citizens. That is who I was contrasting with the West Bank Palestinians.

 

[woolfe9998]

nm

 

[woolfe9998]

Negative. Wolf continues to make worthless excuses for inexcusable behaviour.

And you continue to fail to justify clearly false statements you have made.

Calling statements "worthless" is a handwave, a trifling piffle of nothing, for someone who has shown himself unable to debate with facts.

 

[mikeymikec]

>>ever since the British helped it take land that didn't belong to them in the first place

You need to read up on your history. The UK was actually limiting the return of Jews to what they considered to be their historic homeland, which led to a LOT of animosity between the Jews and the British. Consider the fact that the Jews had just gone through a period where some of the major powers in Europe had actually set up 'factories' to process the Jewish folks and their belongings after killing them, and you might get an inkling of why they felt a need for self determination, at least one place in the world where they weren't vilified.

Look up "night of the beatings", if you don't believe this. I can guarantee that if you went there and asked a typical Jew in 1947 if they felt like the British were helping them, at least 98% of the Jews would have said no.

What I said was essentially correct, your straw men aside. I did not imply that they were steadfast allies or anything like that.

 

[rommelrommel]

Lots happened between Hamas's founding in 1987 during the intifada and the current century. It's understandable how a bunch of guys might use fiery language in forming a group that came about in response to dudes pissed off at Israel using live rounds on protestors. Protests over Israel occupation and heavy handed bullshit during the 80's.
The Charter was updated in 2017

Hamas in 2017: The document in full

Hamas explains general principles and objectives in 42-article document

www.middleeasteye.net

If you are going to post a charter, at least post the current charter.

The 2017 charter is no better, Israel still is not a thing, nor will they ultimately accept anything short of from the river to the sea...