Israel/Palestine Thread

You're right that it's extremely unpopular in Israel.

Unfortunately though, I think your second part is wrong: international reluctance to clearly condemn Hamas' October attack on Israel - eg the silence of women's groups internationally about the rapes filmed by Hamas themselves - and to call for Hamas to release the hostages etc, has led to a bunker mentality in Israel, where even the most traditionally moderate, have concluded that the rest of the world has shown itself to be not that far off accepting a new genocide of the Jews if the state of Israel does not defend itself fiercely.

IOW even many of those who were the strongest advocates of the two state solution now feel that Hamas have shown that they will never accept the existence of Israel, and a large number of Gazans support Hamas in that, so that only a military response can have any effect. Same as negotiating with Hitler was a bad idea from the outset.

And worryingly I read that support for Hamas hasn't weaned much in Gaza as they are seen as the only resistance they have against Israel. Gazans feel largely let down by the international response, and imo, rightly so. I would love to know how much of Hamas ranks in Gaza are Gazans as against maybe Palestinians drafted in to the enclave.

https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20250321-israeli-forces-advance-further-gaza-destroy-cancer-hospital-hostages-hamas

the only cancer hospital in Gaza now blown up. could it get any more bleak?

No argument on most that, except maybe the blinkered way you worded it. If someone asks a question on Hamas it seem they're Israeli apologists?

So basically do we have a stance of looking for peace and trying to find Hamas faults, you're an Israel apologist, if you point out Israels faults, you're a Hamas terrorist supporter?

No fn wonder things are hard to change!

No problem answering your questions at all but I think the standard etiquette is to answer one question then you get to pose a follow up question.

I did though. You admitted yourself that my opinion was given in that post; I simply provided a description of the limits to that opinion.

However, regardless of that, what Hamas did on Oct 7th is abhorrent - if you (the royal you) wanted to call it Genocide, I'd have no issue with that as it certainly seems to tick most of the definition boxes.

Well except you sort of did, didn't you? Why else did you query it?

What they did would certainly amount to War Crimes.

No it is unlikely to be deemed to be war crimes. Because there was no state of war between Israel and gaza on Oct 7th.

It was certainly a crime against humanity though - and those can be committed by individuals, according to the Tribunal set up for Yugoslav trials:

"The International Tribunal shall have the power to prosecute persons responsible for the following crimes when committed in armed conflict, whether international or internal in character, and directed against any civilian population:

(a) murder;(b) extermination;(c) enslavement;(d) deportation;(e) imprisonment;(f) torture;(g) rape;(h) persecutions on political, racial and religious grounds;(i) other inhumane acts."

This definition of crimes against humanity revived the original 'Nuremberg' nexus with armed conflict, connecting crimes against humanity to both international and non-international armed conflict. It also expanded the list of criminal acts used in Nuremberg to include imprisonment, torture and rape. Cherif Bassiouni has argued that this definition was necessary as the conflict in the former Yugoslavia was considered to be a conflict of both an international and non-international nature.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimes_against_humanity

But for sure, if that is the case for Hamas, then it is certainly the case for Israel

This doesn't necessarily follow at all. In attacking the kibbutzim and the concert, Hamas had no reasonable military objective. That's not the case for Israel attacking Gaza which was administered by Hamas.

The allegations against Israel would need to be answered one by one, because fundamentally their attack on Gaza was legal and proportionate to the threat they were under. Hamas' attack on Israel was neither or those, so was illegal right from the start. Like Russia's invasion of Ukraine, except that the Russians had some hope of winning. But being a suicidal death cult is not a legitimate defence for launching an illegal war.

So basically do we have a stance of looking for peace and trying to find Hamas faults, you're an Israel apologist, if you point out Israels faults, you're a Hamas terrorist supporter?

I can't speak for anyone else, but as someone who is regularly accused of rejoicing in the deaths of brown babies and other hysterical claims, I have never said that Israel can't be criticised for anything.

Indeed as someone who is a strong critic of Netanyahu’s far right government and the illegal settlements in the West Bank, and who says that Israel needs to obey international law, I’d just be interested to know what the pro Palestine posters on here propose should be done with Hamas. Nonbe of them ever seem willing to engage with that question.

Got to go out so I don't have time to respond in detail just now but I can't let this go:

And actually, yes, the War did commence on 7th October. A cursory Google search would confirm that for you.

OMG Stupidity or deliberate misrepresentation? I don't know.

If you want to be pedantic though, what I meant is that there was no pre-existing war at the point when Hamas attacked, and therefore their attack was illegal.

That is not true for Israel's response to that attack.

Clear?

I'll respond to the rest when I have time.

Is there anything in the Geneva Convention about the deliberate policy of killing one’s own soldiers and civilians who have been captured?

Probably a scenario not contemplated by civilised societies.

The Israeli public widely celebrated the bombing of hospitals, death of whole families. There was an entire Israeli TikTok craze of mocking the suffering of children, by Israeli children alongside their parents.
Don’t try to one side depravity.
There were many Israeli war crime apologists at the start of this thread who regurgitated Hasbara propaganda that the photos of dead Gazan children were really dolls! They wouldn’t believe that Israel would kill children despite the evidence of their own eyes.
The next red line was their refusal to believe that Israel would bomb a hospital. Something even an Israeli government spokesperson labeled a “blood libel”.
Israeli soldiers ran over Palestinians with their tanks and bulldozed their bodies.
Those poor Bibas children were then used by Israel in reprehensible propaganda telling the world they were tortured and beaten to death with bare hands. All to avoid admitting they may have been killed in an Israeli airstrike.

You'll get no argument from me at all SS. That's the major catastrophe in the midst of it all. That Israel has no regard of whom is their collateral damage is not in any doubt in my mind!