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

Criticism of either israels or hamas's actions are not "bashing". People can choose to blindly follow one side or the other but unfortunately they will always be met with legitimate criticism. We have two parties lead by war criminals with the civilians of Gaza stuck in the middle. Its a very sad situation.

Now where did I say that under circumstances its ok to murder innocent children? That was a deliberate misinterpretation. You appear to be trying to get some kind of reaction out of me instead of addressing the point I am making.

What moral conundrum? Look again at what I said:

If Hamas had surrendered on October 8th, releasing every single hostage, and handing over the ringleaders of the terrorist attack on Israel, I believe not a single shell or missile would have been launched at Gaza by Israel.

It is as simple as that, doesn't need any more complications, additions or whatabouts.

That is a truism. The ones with the moral conundrums are those like yourself who cannot bring yourself to accept my statement. Once you acknowledge the truth of it, you are forced to examine the subsequent actions of Hamas, the numerous times that they could have surrendered and stopped the war that they started. In your lust to blame Israel for everything, you ignore this inconvenient truth.

It took nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, truly horrible acts, to make some (and frighteningly, only some) of the Japanese leadership realise that their futile determination to war was doing more damage to their own people than anyone else. The courage of Emperor Hirohito has been absent from the leadership of Hamas in a similar situation.

It is said that those that don't learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. Like the Nazi generals and the Japanese warmongers, the leaders of Hamas put their own wealth, mad desires of conquest and their bloated egos ahead of the welfare of their people.

The only person obsessed with Israelis being Jewish is you. You constantly other them, make them into some hive mind who all support this butchery. There are plenty of Jews who are horrified to their core with this 'war', plenty of Israelis too from what I can see. Why don't you ever talk about them when you are speaking to us on how all Jews feel? What makes you so qualified to slander them all as complicit in this slaughter?

But that's not only it - the innocent dead pile up, and you cheerlead it and explain it away.

Blowing up children in the manner the IDF did over the last few days has nothing to do with religion, and this isn't a war. There is only one army in this, and they are receiving no fight back. They broke a ceasefire with no cause, and began again in their horrific acts of blowing up poor people living in rubble amongst the bodies of other blown up people.

Destroying Hamas is not a valid military aim. It is impossible and completely unmeasurable. Removing Palestinians from their country could be a military aim, but would be a genocide. I don't even think you would care if they did.

Honestly, I thought I was dealing with somewhat normal people on this thread, albeit ones I didn't agree with. I now know this is not the case. Extremism has taken hold of many. Morality and decency has gone out the window. There is nothing Israel can do to those poor people that you and you ilk won't defend, justify or make excuses for. No level of suffering will move you. I am shocked in that people like this exist in Ireland, though I don't know why I am. I have ever met or spoken to people who think this way before, outside of this thread

This "consequences of starting a war"/"Hamas as the 21C Nazis/Empire of Japan" argument as excuse for what Israel is doing depends on Hamas being some kind of peer to the IDF and posing a threat to Israel.

It was poor argument even on Oct. 8th (and a few months after).

IMO it's just quite farcical to persist with it at this stage (over a year later), when Hamas is now small bands of (likely) teenagers and young adults with guns penned up in Gaza, spending their days hiding and running while overwatched 24-7-365 by one of the most technologically advanced and lethal miltaries on Earth.

It's like your thinking on this is set in stone.🤷‍♀️

There's nothing wrong with associating Jews and Israel lads. Its a Jewish state. You can be against the states policies without being against their religious ethnicity. Just thought I'd throw that in.

Well Blanche just like your assertion that what Hamas didn't do defines them, I can say the same about you - what you didn't say defines you in my mind.

I asked you over a dozen times in this thread

what specific actions that Israel have carried out do you condemn, with regard to their treatment of Palestinian civilians during this war??

You could have said, oh I dunno, take more care when aiming, and not killing so many children. But no, time and again you said nothing. In fact, I seem to remember comments about child soldiers and female Hamas fighters. Care to answer the question now?

To your second point. Hamas are a jihadi terrorist group. Terrorist groups are criminal organizations that exist throughout this world, and usually take hold in places of extreme inequality and hopelessness. Their reason for being is to inflict terror, and destruction. They aren't a valid army. They aren't there to protect people in the same way an elected government is, they don't have the same responsibility. You have told us this numerous times. They don't care a jot if you or I think they should surrender, or how many Palestinians die, they are radicalized jihadis. They are not normal people. That is a fact that has been proved out.

Democratic countries, like Israel, should be the adults in the room. They have responsibility to their people yes, but also to the international community, including Palestinian civilians. Israel should be governed and adhere to international law, and international human rights, for the good of all people. This is true of all democracies. They get lots of benefits as a democracy btw, trade openly with the world, their people are free to go from all other democratic countries and are welcomed everywhere. With this comes a responsibility to uphold certain standards for the good of all of us all.

They should not, as adults in the room, act so violently on the whims of a jihadi terrorist organization, partaking in ethnic cleansing, calling for genocide (many of their politicians did this), and the violent annexation of land that is not theirs.

They are responsible for what they do. So are Hamas. So am I. So are you.

So why did Israel break the ceasefire? The hostages were coming home under the agreement laid out, Hamas were upholding their end.

Another way of putting it is that there is no slam dunk evidence, no smoking gun, and that the full evidence and defence needs to be heard. That doesn't apply to other examples of war crimes in this conflict where the evidence is more than clear.

Lol. Israel gets special treatment that doesn't apply to anyone else… Why is that?

Also, tell me, Israel has killed a similar number in the last 2 days as Israeli's that died on Oct 7th. What level of response do you think is proportionate for those fighting for Palestine to use with respect to this? We've seen what Israel did and how that was justified on here and elsewhere.

The fact that Hamas has not attacked Israel in any meaningful way except for Oct 7th is a good thing. And as agreed with the US, they have stated they will vacate Gaza for up to 10 years.

But the response of Israel has been utterly disproportionate to the detriment of Palestinian civilians. As a functional military organisation, Hamas (terrorists of course) have no ability to attack Israel in any meaningful way. So the emphasis on "there will be strike after strike" is a bit on the heavy side (given a 2000lb bomb response by Israel will proportionally cause a magnitude more harm). As regards Hamas being bloodthirsty, indeed they are. And so are Israel. But stack of the numbers of dead side-by-side and see who talks the talk and who walks the walk. There is only one side able to carry through with the violence in any demonstrable way. Hamas may vent their spleen and scream death to everyone in Israel - but they are impotent. Israel on the other hand have been able to kill nearly 50,000 known people in Gaza. Estimates put the true numbers at circa 200,000. And Israel has started Genocide #2 so there's a lot more headroom to go. Hamas murdered circa 1000 Israelis. And I've not even mentioned Lebanon, the West bank, Golan or East Jerusalem.

Of course, that the Israeli campaign has resulted in minimal hostage releases (bar the ones the IDF murdered of course) is very telling. All that military might and the hostages remain.

I posted a long time ago that Israel actual has a crack hostage rescue unit. Used to be headed up by none other than Netanyahu. Go figure why it has not been brought into play.

You do have a balanced view though and I agree with much of what you say. So the above is not a direct response to your entire post. I do agree with your sentiments.

Your post is very clearly victim blaming so I believe it was a fair question, no misinterpretation from me. It's also very naive to think evil terrorists would just surrender. If criminals were to rob a bank and they took 50 hostages and the cops stormed the bank killing the criminals and hostages what do they tell the hostages family? Do they tell them that a well we wouldn't of murdered hostages if the criminals didn't rob the bank. Now before you say hamas was voted into power I'm talking here about the innocent children under 18.

Waffling about Hamas not surrendering is just whataboutery as everyone on this thread already agrees that Hamas are evil scum. Clearly the IDF are not learning from history either as murdering civilians is the guaranteed way of making sure terrorist groups get stronger.

Very good question. Some of us have been asking about the acceptable level of proportionality for a long time. No answers.

The deaths of tens of thousands of civilians isn't a bug in the assault, it's a feature

Great to see it.

Wonder where it leaves all the ghouls on this thread that tell us being opposed to the IDF and Israeli governments shameful conduct in this war as being against "the Jews", as though every one of them support, stand by, and are complicit in it.

These people out protesting don't fit into their little narrative - why are they never mentioned I wonder?

Mod Edit: Warned for uncivil posting

Don't think the violence stops if the hostages are released unfortunately, Israel believes in collective punishment.

This is quite a stunning shrugging of the shoulders to read which displays absolute ambivalence at what the Palestinians are suffering. To take your post at its face value, and the suggestion that state actors are held to a lesser standard than non-state actors, why do you think that the Palestinian defenders are considered non-state actors in this respect?

Is it not for the actions of Israel and the US in particular in ensuring that they have not achieved full statehood by which to then justify their defence. This view is like a group of kids in the playground and the bully both hits the other kids and tells them that because they (the bully) are the one who makes the rules, the other kids cannot hit back.

You didn't answer the main question in my last post (I'll come back to that in a moment) but I'll give you another one. How do you expect a non-state actor to reasonably defend itself in the face of such brutal and damaging attacks from a state actor?

And again, for the second time, please indicate what you would consider a reasonable response for the Palestinians who have suffered attacks (during a ceasefire) that have resulted in the deaths of circa 1000 people. We know Israel used such attacks to justify their levelling of Gaza and killing at least 50,000 people outright so leaving aside the 'State Actor' rule that is apparently now being used, what would you consider a proportional response to Israel's barbarity for the Palestinians to consider?

The longer this conflict goes on, the further and further I move from seeing the Zionist project as having any justification. I am appalled at how so much of the West has shown such disdain to tolerate the abhorrent behaviour by those currently leading the Jewish state.