Israel: We Are At War

[woolfe9998]

If civvie deaths are just part and parcel with winning, why not just drop the hammer? Nuke the whole thing, eliminate the majority of familial reprisals (cuz you killed them all).

Because they don't have to nuke the place and kill all the civilians. If you either care about preserving human life, or you just don't want the negative publicity that goes with killing too many, you're going to do the least harm while achieving your objective. In terms of what is happening now, Israel's objective is to destroy Hamas. But Hamas is distributed throughout the civilian population of Gaza, the least amount of harm is likely to be quite a lot, but then, it's nothing compared to what has happened in various historical wars and other human conflicts.

Now if you think a democratically elected leader is going to turn the other cheek here because of too many civilian casualties, you're being naive. Remember how people here felt after 9/11? Well that's what people in Israel are feeling right now.

 

[K1052]

Don't know, but my hunch is they won't stop until Hamas is a bad memory.

I'm pretty skeptical this is possible on any terms that would not make Israel basically a pariah nation.

 

[woolfe9998]

I'm pretty skeptical this is possible on any terms that would not make Israel basically a pariah nation.

Then you should ask yourself why this would make Israel a pariah when the US killed 100's of thousands of civilians in its last 3 wars alone. Many through drone strikes hitting weddings and other harmless gatherings. Sure, we were criticized for it, but we never became a pariah, did we? If you're right that Israel will become a pariah, then you've just identified the double standard I've been talking about.

 

[K1052]

Then you should ask yourself why this would make Israel a pariah when the US killed 100's of thousands of civilians in its last 3 wars alone. Many through drone strikes hitting weddings and other harmless gatherings. Sure, we were criticized for it, but we never became a pariah, did we? If you're right that Israel will become a pariah, then you've just identified the double standard I've been talking about.

As much as I think W should be cooling his heels in The Hague the US was not successful at destroying the Taliban because the measures that would have been required are several notches above what happened. ISIS also has not ceased to exist even though it does so in diminished form.

 

[akugami]

The new speaker has already stepped on his own nuts. The Dems are never going to allow offset aid and especially not the IRA funding for IRS which already saw a cut in the debt deal the Rs reneged on.

Senate will try to jam him with the big package now (Israel/Ukraine/Taiwan aid plus border security money Rs want).

https://twitter.com/x/status/1719100045125947628

So this is on-brand for republicans, who are hell bent on making sure the rich stay rich. Let's gut the IRS, and their ability to investigate tax dodgers.

 

[woolfe9998]

I completely agree with the general premise of your first paragraph; for example there are plenty of scenarios that aren't generally considered war crimes such as the US dropping two atomic bombs in Japan.

Your second two paragraphs are completely off the fucking chain though IMO, you're treating the Israel - Palestine conflict as if they were two happy countries and then one day a fuckwit in Hamas thinks for no apparent reason, "you know what we ought to do today? Attack our neighbour".

The Israel - Palestine conflict is happening largely because of Zionism: Israel thinks it's right that they should be able to steal other peoples' land and then it's the other person's fault for taking offence at that. Someone was going to take offence, and the consequences were never going to be pretty. The only conflict that I can think of that's anything like it is the UK - Ireland conflict, but it would require the UK to be continuing to bulldoze Ireland to this day "because we're entitled to it". Then if a car bomb goes off in Northern Ireland, the UK that's taking the Israeli crazy-pills would say, "you know what this situation needs? a good carpet-bombing of a nearby city!". The press taking the same crazy-pills would then criticize the IRA and tell them to "stop resisting".

While I seriously doubt that the creation of the Israeli state was ever going to sit well with their neighbours no matter how nice Israel were about it, the way that Israel is going about it displays an insane level of delusion which exacerbates the situation to the point that the extremists of their neighbours will no doubt have the loudest voice in how to deal with Israel.

I'll apologise in advance if my tone is too antagonistic; I have a headache but also to be fair I think anyone (this isn't aimed at you specifically) who talks about bombing hospitals "because any good guys in there are now all bad guys" and other such genocidal apologist bullshit really needs to be told to go fuck themselves. This thread is getting very fucking twisted.

Sorry, but you display no understanding or knowledge of the history. This isn't about "stealing someone's land." There's plenty of space for both Jews and Arabs in Palestine. Arabs turned down the two state solution in 1939, 1948, 1999, and 2003. THe first of those offers would have given them 80% of Palestine. They rejected it because they don't want Jews there. Because they were different, and because they were "infidels." This is a culture war and a religious war, not a war about land or other material grievances.

So far as the Jews are concerned, they fled genocides in Russia and later in Europe as a whole, which destroyed over a third of the Jewish population of the world. They went to Palestine to survive, not to steal people's land. But then, that doesn't concern you at all, does it? Gee I wonder why.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Because they don't have to nuke the place and kill all the civilians. If you either care about preserving human life, or you just don't want the negative publicity that goes with killing too many, you're going to do the least harm while achieving your objective. In terms of what is happening now, Israel's objective is to destroy Hamas. But Hamas is distributed throughout the civilian population of Gaza, the least amount of harm is likely to be quite a lot, but then, it's nothing compared to what has happened in various historical wars and other human conflicts.

Now if you think a democratically elected leader is going to turn the other cheek here because of too many civilian casualties, you're being naive. Remember how people here felt after 9/11? Well that's what people in Israel are feeling right now.

Alright, so what ratio of civilian to terrorist death is acceptable? At what point does it become terrorism? Remember that Hamas killed Israeli military members too, as well as a bunch of civilians.

 

[woolfe9998]

Alright, so what ratio of civilian to terrorist death is acceptable? At what point does it become terrorism? Remember that Hamas killed Israeli military members too, as well as a bunch of civilians.

The ratio is not how this is analyzed. Israel has an objective of destroying Hamas, because if they do not, it's 100% certain that Hamas will continue attacking Israeli civilians, and will find new ways of doing it. It may surprise you to learn this, but leaders of countries are considered accountable for keeping their own citizens safe, while the safety of others not their citizens is a secondary consideration. Sounds terrible, but in the real world that is how nation states operate. All of them.

I have to wonder why we never analyzed these "ratios" after 9/11. I mean, come ON, they only killed 3000 on 9/11 and we went and killed 100's of thousands of people over it. So we're terrorists, eh? Just as we were in WWII, Vietnam and every other war we ever fought.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

The ratio is not how this is analyzed. Israel has an objective of destroying Hamas, because if they do not, it's 100% certain that Hamas will continue attacking Israeli civilians, and will find new ways of doing it. It may surprise you to learn this, but leaders of countries are considered accountable for keeping their own citizens safe, while the safety of others not their citizens is a secondary consideration. Sounds terrible, but in the real world that is how nation states operate. All of them.

I have to wonder why we never analyzed these "ratios" after 9/11. I mean, come ON, they only killed 3000 on 9/11 and we went and killed 100's of thousands of people over it. So we're terrorists, eh? Just as we were in WWII, Vietnam and every other war we ever fought.

Did we kill 100's of thousands of civilians or military members/terrorists/enemies? Also, you're very close to getting it, just 'bout got bit by it.

 

[woolfe9998]

Did we kill 100's of thousands of civilians or military members/terrorists/enemies? Also, you're very close to getting it, just 'bout got bit by it.

Estimates of civilian casualties in the Gulf War alone range from 100K to 200K. As distinguished from military, of whom we killed ~30,000. Lots and lots of civilians die in aerial bombings. Welcome to the ugly world of war.

Remembering The Gulf War: Key Facts And Figures About The Conflict

It was the biggest deployment of the UK Armed Forces since the Second World War.

www.forces.net

But wait, Iraq didn't even attack the US, let alone civilians on our own territory, did they? Nope, they attacked another country that wasn't even a formal US ally. Now ask yourself this: are those Iraqi civilian lives less important than Palestinian lives, simply on account of who is doing the killing?

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Estimates of civilian casualties in the Gulf War alone range from 100K to 200K. As distinguished from military, of whom we killed ~30,000. Lots and lots of civilians die in aerial bombings. Welcome to the ugly world of war.

Remembering The Gulf War: Key Facts And Figures About The Conflict

It was the biggest deployment of the UK Armed Forces since the Second World War.

www.forces.net

So what separates our war from Hamas' terrorist activities?

 

[woolfe9998]

So what separates our war from Hamas' terrorist activities?

There are lots of differences, but if you're looking for differences that are actually relevant to this discussion, the primary is that we killed more civilians with less justification. But these deaths are so important that you didn't even know about it, did you? I bet you'll know exactly how many civilians died in Gaza though, and probably remember it for a long while.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

There are lots of differences, but if you're looking for differences that are actually relevant to this discussion, the primary is that we killed more civilians with less justification. But these deaths are so important that you didn't even know about it, did you? I bet you'll know exactly how many civilians died in Gaza though, and probably remember it for a long while.

So the people that we kill are less important than the people that Hamas kills? Or Israelis are more important than Iraqis/Afghans?

 

[woolfe9998]

So the people that we kill are less important than the people that Hamas kills? Or Israelis are more important than Iraqis/Afghans?

I see you did not get my point. I am talking about the hand wringing that is going on right now over Palestinian deaths, and comparing that to the lack of hand wringing over civilian deaths caused by the US. If one is posturing themselves as a humanitarian and opposing Israel's response to this attack for that reason, well then a humanitarian ought to be assigning equal value to all life. But they are not, and that requires an explanation.

 

[Charmonium]

Oh man, Bibi has GOT to be the worst possible person to be in charge right now.

Yes, Hamas "seduced" the Palestinians with vulgar desires like free healthcare, "education," other social services. And yes, a lot of those "innocent" civilians probably celebrated Oct 7th.

But . . . Netanyahu HAS to understand that Hamas wants to kill Palestinians even more than he does - even more than Israelis want to level Gaza and take outright ownership of the West Bank.

So who's the audience for slowly leveling what amounts to a "kinder, gentler" concentration camp.

Of course IDK the logistics of what's going on. Maybe what they're doing really is necessary. But it's starting to sound like a lot of BS rhetoric.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I see you did not get my point. I am talking about the hand wringing that is going on right now over Palestinian deaths, and comparing that to the lack of hand wringing over civilian deaths caused by the US. If one is posturing themselves as a humanitarian and opposing Israel's response to this attack for that reason, well then a humanitarian ought to be assigning equal value to all life. But they are not, and that requires an explanation.

I don't disagree. What I'm asking you (apparently) though, is, is it okay to kill off civilians in the pursuit of enemies, regardless of which country is doing it? Cuz I'm hearing a lot of 'hell yes, sucks to be a civvie if someone tells me there's an HQ underground' right now, when I expect to hear 'actually civilian deaths should be avoided at all costs. Beyond the reprehensible moral implications, it also only serves to bolster a dedicated zealous enemy into bolstering their ranks'.

 

[Dr. Detroit]

A real pillar of the Palestinian community! After lamenting it took him 30-minutes to find cell service he posts this...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1718743186393223398

 

[manly]

I don't disagree. What I'm asking you (apparently) though, is, is it okay to kill off civilians in the pursuit of enemies, regardless of which country is doing it? Cuz I'm hearing a lot of 'hell yes, sucks to be a civvie if someone tells me there's an HQ underground' right now, when I expect to hear 'actually civilian deaths should be avoided at all costs. Beyond the reprehensible moral implications, it also only serves to bolster a dedicated zealous enemy into bolstering their ranks'.

It's a horseshit argument to say "collateral damage" was tolerated throughout history, so it must be tolerated now due to Hamas' terrorism. I guarantee you WW2 style firebombings of major cities would not be acceptable to NATO today. If we condemn Russia's unprovoked bombings of Ukrainian cities, we must similarly tread very carefully as to how Israel conducts its war. Notice that originally the U.S. strongly stood by Israel's side with very specific language: Israel has the moral "obligation" to defend itself and its citizens (by any means necessary). This is obviously true, but the U.S. took every opportunity to remind everyone we were not giving Israel any instructions on how to conduct its military operations.

More recently, Biden is privately cautioning Israel against excessively punishing civilians in retaliation, even in the course of legitimate operations. This is the reasonable approach as thousands perished in the first few weeks of bombings.

If history is our guide, then there would be no modern rules of war. The Mongols gave their targets only one opportunity to surrender; else they simply sacked and destroyed cities.

Finally, what level of collateral damage is deemed acceptable is in the eye of the beholder. We may have excused civilian deaths in the Iraq War, but I guarantee you the people who suffered through it have a very different opinion of the lives lost or ruined.

 

[MrSquished]

The only "kleenex" needed in this thread is to clean up all the big steamy stinky ass dumps you drop in these threads. And ooohhh!! , i got some "likes" atta boy!... Like people really gives a shit about "likes"... lol... Other than an attention whore troll. The only person "whining" here is you being called out on your call outs and broad generalization's "snarl" words that you label on people in this thread that you won't name. AGAIN! ...Who are all these people in this thread who have "dehumanized the Palestinians" and are "all pro in just giving it to Gaza"??

Again, if you can't understand the shit being said in this thread that is essentially defending this genocide and the Israeli aggression, whether morally and/or legally, there is no discussing this with you. You don't exist in reality in this thread. You seem reasonable in other threads but a lot of people go cuckoo when it comes to Israel and Palestine, so you wouldn't be the first by any means. In this case, by blowing up at me for merely pointing out the reality here.

I don't count the number of likes as a meaning of anything, but I do count the likes of who I see as reasonable posters, who are bright and perceptive, but maybe a bit less rough around the edges with me. I think being judged by your peers is indeed a measuring stick, and if you can't grasp that, that again is your problem, not mine.

Get a grip, you're losing it.

I'm going to like all your posts from now on too.

 

[MrSquished]

It's a horseshit argument to say "collateral damage" was tolerated throughout history, so it must be tolerated now due to Hamas' terrorism. I guarantee you WW2 style firebombings of major cities would not be acceptable to NATO today. If we condemn Russia's unprovoked bombings of Ukrainian cities, we must similarly tread very carefully as to how Israel conducts its war. Notice that originally the U.S. strongly stood by Israel's side with very specific language: Israel has the moral "obligation" to defend itself and its citizens (by any means necessary). This is obviously true, but the U.S. took every opportunity to remind everyone we were not giving Israel any instructions on how to conduct its military operations.

More recently, Biden is privately cautioning Israel against excessively punishing civilians in retaliation, even in the course of legitimate operations. This is the reasonable approach as thousands perished in the first few weeks of bombings.

If history is our guide, then there would be no modern rules of war. The Mongols gave their targets only one opportunity to surrender; else they simply sacked and destroyed cities.

Finally, what level of collateral damage is deemed acceptable is in the eye of the beholder. We may have excused civilian deaths in the Iraq War, but I guarantee you the people who suffered through it have a very different opinion of the lives lost or ruined.

1000%, and many people here are so warped when it comes to Israel and Palestine, they are defending willful atrocities. It's disgusting.

 

[Fenixgoon]

It's a horseshit argument to say "collateral damage" was tolerated throughout history, so it must be tolerated now due to Hamas' terrorism. I guarantee you WW2 style firebombings of major cities would not be acceptable to NATO today. If we condemn Russia's unprovoked bombings of Ukrainian cities, we must similarly tread very carefully as to how Israel conducts its war. Notice that originally the U.S. strongly stood by Israel's side with very specific language: Israel has the moral "obligation" to defend itself and its citizens (by any means necessary). This is obviously true, but the U.S. took every opportunity to remind everyone we were not giving Israel any instructions on how to conduct its military operations.

More recently, Biden is privately cautioning Israel against excessively punishing civilians in retaliation, even in the course of legitimate operations. This is the reasonable approach as thousands perished in the first few weeks of bombings.

If history is our guide, then there would be no modern rules of war. The Mongols gave their targets only one opportunity to surrender; else they simply sacked and destroyed cities.

Finally, what level of collateral damage is deemed acceptable is in the eye of the beholder. We may have excused civilian deaths in the Iraq War, but I guarantee you the people who suffered through it have a very different opinion of the lives lost or ruined.

Qfmft, especially the bolded.

War is horrible. I saw earlier today that netanyahu rebuffed calls for ceasefire and said "now is a time for war".
If anything, now is a time for peace. End the bloodshed once and for all.

 

[MrSquished]

Sorry, but you display no understanding or knowledge of the history. This isn't about "stealing someone's land." There's plenty of space for both Jews and Arabs in Palestine. Arabs turned down the two state solution in 1939, 1948, 1999, and 2003. THe first of those offers would have given them 80% of Palestine. They rejected it because they don't want Jews there. Because they were different, and because they were "infidels." This is a culture war and a religious war, not a war about land or other material grievances.

So far as the Jews are concerned, they fled genocides in Russia and later in Europe as a whole, which destroyed over a third of the Jewish population of the world. They went to Palestine to survive, not to steal people's land. But then, that doesn't concern you at all, does it? Gee I wonder why.

Bullshit. They rejected having a people FORCED upon them on lands they have historically been living on, by a fucking colonialist power nobody liked. WTF would you expect? Ironically, it was the West who wanted to also get rid of their 'Jew' problem in Europe by giving them Israel. Put them there, let them have their holy land, less of our problem now. You accuse the natives of Palestine of what the West was literally guilty of then.

Unreal the sickness you pro-Zionists have.

Because they don't have to nuke the place and kill all the civilians. If you either care about preserving human life, or you just don't want the negative publicity that goes with killing too many, you're going to do the least harm while achieving your objective. In terms of what is happening now, Israel's objective is to destroy Hamas. But Hamas is distributed throughout the civilian population of Gaza, the least amount of harm is likely to be quite a lot, but then, it's nothing compared to what has happened in various historical wars and other human conflicts.

Now if you think a democratically elected leader is going to turn the other cheek here because of too many civilian casualties, you're being naive. Remember how people here felt after 9/11? Well that's what people in Israel are feeling right now.

You have clearly shown you have no respect for Palestinian civilian life, so this is very fucking rich. And twisted.

Sick fuck.

 

[MrSquished]

I'll bite on your whataboutism. How am I supposed to be pro-life in this situation?

We have two belligerents with little regard for human life going to war. I've been in favor of a two state solution for decades - Israel has flaunted international law for decades and the Palestinian authorities have rejected any supposedly legitimate offers by Israel to create a Palestinian state.

The Middle East has been at war with itself forever. The subjugation of people living in the Israeli/Palestine land region has been nearly constant for the past 3000+ years. It’s some sort of sick meme.

I'll bite back.

You say you are sympathetic to the Palestinian problem, but you are merely arguing the legalese of this.

That is fucking rich. There is nothing legal about apartheid, and now genocide. You are pretending Israel is an honest actor here, of course trying to limit civilian casualties. Are you fucking kidding me? Israel has shown for decades they don't give a shit about being honest OR civilian or journalist casualties, or being an apartheid state. Their entire state was founded on extreme religious views. Never a good start.

We have Israel, just a few weeks ago, being surprised by a big Hamas surprise attack ON THEIR OWN TURF, and now you think they have the intelligence to mostly just target Hamas terrorist buildings when they got suprised by a major Hamas attack IN ISRAEL a few weeks ago? That is fucking unreal. Not to mention the reporting shows, they are just leveling whole neighborhoods. There is nothing legal about that.

So if you want to pretend you have empathy here, then stop with your ridiculous 'we are just talking about the intricacies of law here', when that is just ludicrous as I've pointed out, and start calling out the Israeli war crimes.

 

[MrSquished]

Qfmft, especially the bolded.

War is horrible. I saw earlier today that netanyahu rebuffed calls for ceasefire and said "now is a time for war".
If anything, now is a time for peace. End the bloodshed once and for all.

I haven't excused the civilian deaths in the Iraq war. And neither have many people. We consider Bush a war criminal for Iraq. We were protesting in the streets.

IT's fucking sick that people pretend to be liberal and progressive and start using the Iraq war to defend Israel here. It's complete nonsense and these people have zero intellectual and less than zero moral ground to stand on.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

It's a horseshit argument to say "collateral damage" was tolerated throughout history, so it must be tolerated now due to Hamas' terrorism. I guarantee you WW2 style firebombings of major cities would not be acceptable to NATO today. If we condemn Russia's unprovoked bombings of Ukrainian cities, we must similarly tread very carefully as to how Israel conducts its war. Notice that originally the U.S. strongly stood by Israel's side with very specific language: Israel has the moral "obligation" to defend itself and its citizens (by any means necessary). This is obviously true, but the U.S. took every opportunity to remind everyone we were not giving Israel any instructions on how to conduct its military operations.

More recently, Biden is privately cautioning Israel against excessively punishing civilians in retaliation, even in the course of legitimate operations. This is the reasonable approach as thousands perished in the first few weeks of bombings.

If history is our guide, then there would be no modern rules of war. The Mongols gave their targets only one opportunity to surrender; else they simply sacked and destroyed cities.

Finally, what level of collateral damage is deemed acceptable is in the eye of the beholder. We may have excused civilian deaths in the Iraq War, but I guarantee you the people who suffered through it have a very different opinion of the lives lost or ruined.

Well said.