Hamas strike on Israel - mod warning in OP updated 19/10/23

In charge of utter devastation, rubble, rotting bodies, the dying and the starving. So, they're actually not in charge of very much really. And better for Gaza if they just left.

I am against the attempt to suggest that history only started 80 years ago, hence my post.

It's also strange that this would be mentioned in a thread entitled 'Hamas strike on Israel'.

However, even if you believe the propaganda spread by hamas, violence on one side does not excuse violence by the other, right?

Hamas are a recognised terrorist group yet are the elected representatives of the palestinian regions.

Going back to the origins of this issue in the modern era, when mandatory palestine (which people falsely equate to modern day 'palestine') was partitioned by the UN, the jewish palestinians were happy with this but the arabian palestinians and their allies were not, leading to attacks on jewish palestine by the arabian countries in the 6 day war. If you want to point to a beginning of the conflict then I would at least start there.

I still think that the country should be united with a federal solution for governance. Like they have in N. Ireland, and it worked well in the last 20 years.

Lets not kid ourselves that Ireland as a state could be perceived as neutrals on this issue. My own feelings aside, our country has bed down with the other hamas supporters.

We are not neutral. We are as pro hamas as the US is pro israel.

We are pro Palestinian not pro hamas. Israel will never have a unified nation with Palestinians and Jewish people in one country - the Jewish would no longer have the majority vote then.

Those who fail to understand history are condemned to repeat it.

Don't put yourself in that category by ignoring the events of the last 2,000 years or more.

Israel don't seem to want a two state or one state solution now so hard to know what will happen given they are the dominant party in the conflict.

Except that you back one side on having the right to do it and the other as deserving of it.

One constant through those 2,000 years is the persecution of Jews.

Stupid comment.

Ireland claims to be a neutral country, however, it is plain to see that we have abandoned all sense of neutrality when it comes to Hamas war with Israel. I have long believed that Ireland should move away from neutrality but not in this shameful way.

That's simplistic nonsense. All Irish politicians condemned the Hamas terrorist attack. Without question. And they continue to repeat those condemnations whenever discussing the conflict. You know that to be true. Yet you seem to require constant reminders.

However you would prefer that the Irish politicians completely ignored the Israeli revenge mission. I cannot comprehend that viewpoint.

And there it is. You spend a week waffling about how people posting links to news articles about Israeli war crimes is the equivalent to "students union politics". And then we have this absolute drivel about Ireland being pro-hamas, and surprise, surprise, you're fully on board with it.

It's no surprise that the "Hamas supporter" line raises its ugly head again.

Bear in mind, that moniker was trotted out multiple times by Israel. Anyone who criticised them for their campaign in Gaza was immediately accused of either being a supporter of Hamas or anti-Semitic, or both.

That such accusations be repeated in posts here from day 1 was no surprise either - that is propaganda - simply repeat what you hear.

Consistently, on providing credible reports from reputable organisations (including the UN) the common defence was "you support Hamas". And in reality, it was the only defence because there had never been any credible rebuttal evidence. So, the only resort is name calling.

A weak and pathetic position in my opinion.

To extrapolate the accusation of "Hamas supporters" to the entire Irish Nation is utterly disgusting.

We absolutely are neutral.

Hamas has been criticised harshly umpteen times by every politician in government, yet you guys disregard this when we criticise Israel for consistently ignoring and breaking international law. Why? We criticize Russia, for example, for the exact same thing, and are consistent.

Other western countries make serious serious exceptions for Israel, who constantly ignore and break international law without sanction. By doing this, they are not being neutral. They are supporting or allowing mass illegal actions to be commited - they all have their own reasons for doing this. For many, their shameful history of persecuting Jews may mean they ignore this out of guilt.

Ireland does not have this guilt, as we are unique amongst the countries of Europe, I would bet, in having no history of engaging in this type of thing, outside of small incident in Limerick a hundred years ago.

Irelands position is recognition of the Israeli state, within its borders. Is this in itself not supportive of Zionism?

We don't support colonialist Zionism that attempts to violently disregard international law and national borders, steal land from their neighbors, and in the current guise, ethnically cleanse them from the region under the guise of self defence.

That is 100% a neutral position.