Like many people, I’m an idealist trapped in the body of a pragmatist. I want a world where everybody thinks logically and behaves reasonably and speaks carefully. Where we argue in good faith and look at life from perspectives other than our own. Sometimes I slip on some Kenny G, close my eyes, and imagine what a utopia this would be.
Welp, a few of the comments here are dong a fabulous job of highlighting the divide between how good were capable of being and how we sometimes are. I though there was only one topic at the moment that turned otherwise smart, sane people into ad hominem machines, but it looks like we have another contender.
I'll be going through and deleting some of the the most unproductive comments. C'mon guys, you're better than this. You can disagree. There's a lot to this conflict worth thinking about. But disagreeing does not an enemy make. Yelling at each other doesn't make your arguments more convincing.
I'm going to look at this from a very different vantage point that may or may not become clear.
About 54 years ago while in SE Asia I saw the Chinese as 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘖𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘵. At the time, outside of China they were in a state of diaspora. They could not own land and farm, so they became the businessmen who in some cases ended up financially well off, and they were despised for it. Sounding familiar yet? Largely segregated to 𝘊𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘛𝘰𝘸𝘯𝘴 (ghettos). Sounding familiar yet?
My wife, raised in a land where bargaining is common is better at it than me. When car buying, I need to shut up and let her do her thing. For many years she thought I was saying "chew someone down" when bargaining since she had never heard of the rather racist "Jew someone down" that I grew up with. The Marxist oppressor and oppressed worldview where the names bourgeoisie and proletariat have been replaced by other tribal names. But the Jews may forever be seen as the bourgeoisie to people wrapped up in the idea that they are oppressed victims.
How does this apply? Back then, two of my wife to be's neighbors were the 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘰𝘳 𝘸𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘴 to Chinese men who I got to know. One owned a restaurant in China Town (a story with that that I will save) and was a man of wealth. I've known several Chinese wheeler dealers thru the years. Between the first and last time I've been in China their economy and wealth has grown tremendously and they have become a military power destined to be the dominant force worldwide. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘣𝘶𝘺 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴.
Israel is also a military power with wealth. But there is a difference in that their enemies want to exterminate them. Even though the average Jew is non-practicing, they as a people rejected Mohamad as God's messenger and their haters will not forget it. They have bought some friends in the Muslim world, but as a Saudi friend once said to me, "Never trust a Saudi. Not even me." China is buying debt slaves; Israel does not have that power so they cannot extricate themselves from their fate. At least not on that patch of land and not for long if they appear to.
As the realtors say, "location, location, location!" They might have lived in peace if they had been given Utah, rather than 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘺 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘥. I would like to be optimistic, but I think that that location sealed their fate. Meanwhile, the rest of the mob on the internet goes on and on with whose fault it all is and who is the biggest bad guy. I didn't bother to mention all of the terrible shit being done by the tribes; we know that. That is all very real, but I'll repeat, I think that the location is a cornerstone in this.
"That is all very real, but I'll repeat, I think that the location is a cornerstone in this."
Yeah, I touched on this very briefly, but Israel's location is politically important because it gives the U.S. an eye in the Middle East. Obviously that wasn't the original intention, but it's the intention now. Biden ws surprisingly candid about this back in 1986 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86Nrv5izaTs).
Israel's location, surrounded by Muslim countries, is obviously insane. But millions of people live there now. There has to be a serious, pragmatic effort to deal with the mess that exists. Either that or get working on a time machine.
Well sorry, but add a fourth person to the list of people who think peace in that NJ-sized strip of land is a pipe dream. With or without Hamas.
My views are evolving constantly on this mess but I just can't get over how difficult it is to support the Palestinians on *anything*. 'Free Palestine'? Sorry, as if they could ever be free! If somehow magically all of HamsterAss disappeared tomorrow, another external genocidal nutbag group would take over, or it would be generated from within whatever Palestinians are left. Because hating Jews is what they do. Indoctrinated from birth. A fuckuva lot of them support Hamas, or at least support hating Jews and wanting to eliminate them. They don't have it in them to be free. 89% of them would love to see Palestine ruled by Sharia law, which never works out well for women (who suffer appalling amounts of domestic violence from their darling hubbies). They're pretty famously mega-homophobic, too. There's nothing more ludicrous than watching Team Rainbow wave their multicoloured flags around with their kaffiyehs. Gazans push people like that off of rooftops. *If* they can identify them. Since LGBTQ people there keep a very low profile, and running around with goofy hair colours and pierced noses doesn't go over well with the masturbates-to-Leni-Riefenstahl crowd.
They need a homeland because the three guys are right: Jews aren't safe anywhere in the world. They're as Indigenous to the land as the Palestinians. Sure, many of them came from somewhere else - Europe, after the war, and the Middle East, as they got kicked out or expelled from their home countries there, too. Neither were all the Palestinians born there either; many of them were kicked out, and no one else will take them back or in. Just ask Egypt.
I don't have the answers for that part of the world, *no one* does. But I don't believe Palestinians have it in them to be free. They love hatred and a genocidal view. They're dying by the droves because the death cult they voted for uses them as human shields. They strike me as being somewhat like the Trumpers: No matter how bad they get it from the folks who claim to represent them, they bend over again, spread their butt cheeks, and say, "Please, sir, may I have some more?"
Hamas located their headquarters under a hospital so the IDF would *have* to bomb it to get to them. Dead Palestinians are *great* press for them. Until the Gazans figure that out, and stop voting for the people who are *trying* to get them killed, they're going to reap what they sow.
"If somehow magically all of HamsterAss disappeared tomorrow, another external genocidal nutbag group would take over, or it would be generated from within whatever Palestinians are left."
I agree. This is actually central to my belief that you can't bomb Hamas out of Gaza. But aren't you overlooking the reason why there's so much tension in the region? As I said in the conversation. There are bad, antisemitic reasons why Israel is hated in the region. But there are also understandable territorial and "bombing thousands of innocent mothers, fathers and children into oblivion" reasons. And we're talking before Oct 7th.
Let's imagine that Hamas disappears tomorrow and Israel stops bombing Gaza the same day. Will everybody be happy? No. Because the blockade would still be there. The West Bank barrier would still be there. The inequality between Jews and Arabs in Israel would still be there. Gazans would still be living in poverty and ruin (now, of course, even greater poverty and ruin).
This is why I'm at such great pains to distinguish Hamas from Palestinians. Yes, there's overlap. Hamas hate Jews. They need to be stopped. I think all sane people agree. I'm simply arguing that they need to be stopped in a way that doesn't radicalise even more Palestinians. And I think that Israel recognising and taking active steps to end its part in this mess would go a long, long way to doing that.
Somewhat agreed. The Palestinians have some pretty legitimate grievances against Israel, and the US and its allies for supporting them and looking the other way when they violate certain agreements. But honestly, what radicalizes Palestinians far more than Israel is their intense hate-on for the Jews which goes on for hundreds and hundreds of years. Anti-Semitism and hatred of other non-Muslims is 'baked into' the Koran, to cadge a phrase from campus Hamas groupies. Steve, I honestly don't think the Palestinians could live by themselves with or without Hamas, with or without Israel. They are so steeped in hatred, their children are steeped in it from birth, that it takes a helluva free thinker to move beyond that sort of hate prison. We can talk about the real abuse of Palestinian rights all we want, but I for one wouldn't support a two-state solution for them until they publicly stated they refute the notion of 'river to the sea' and agree to share the land with Jews. If they can't do that, then, I'm sorry, fuck 'em. I don't think they could live in peace with each other if all the Jews and Hamas disappeared. What would they do with all that hate? Turn on each other. Maybe I'm extremely pessimistic but I don't think they'll be ready for self-government for many, many generations. And even if they DID agree to live with Jews, how would the rest ot the kill-all-the-Jews Arab world handle that? Would they go along with it? I don't think so. But hey, they're all welcome to prove me wrong.
"But honestly, what radicalizes Palestinians far more than Israel is their intense hate-on for the Jews"
I'm not sure what has you so convinced of this. I've watched so many interview with Palestinians over the past month. They hate the blockade, yes, but almost none of them have expressed hate for Jews. No more than the Jews I've seen interviewed expressed hatred for Palestinians.
The Quran says all kinds of terrible things. As does pretty much every "holy" book. But most religious people don't adhere to (in fact, most aren't even aware of) every word written in their holy books. Jihad is a feature of Islam. But far from all Muslims are Jihadis.
Beyond that, polling from 2006, the last we have before Hamas came to power, showed that 79.5% of Palestinians wanted peace with Israel (http://www.neareastconsulting.com/plc2006/blmain.html). 75.2% thought Hamas should change its policies regarding Israel. The evidence suggests that Palestinians aren't the radicalised sociopaths you seem to think they are.
Religious dogma is always an obstacle to resolving any real-world issue. There is certainly hate there (again, from some Jews too). But I think most people, Palestinians and Jews, still want peace. Or, at least, they prefer it to the alternative.
When mice got into my house and I heard them scurrying under the bed at night, I didn’t hate them. I just wanted them gone. Same for cockroaches.
You won’t hear much from Israelis about how much they hate Arabs. They don’t need to. The presumption of Jewish supremacy runs too deep for that. It’s a very different sort of bigotry from the inferiority complex that drives rural southern American whites.
I reject that hackneyed and reflexive charge of antisemitism for saying this. It comes from friends who live in or have visited Israel. In the days of psychedelic trance a lot of the artists were Israelis, we communicated a lot, and to a man they deplored the nonchalance of their countrymen’s dismissal of Arabs as subhuman.
We’ve heard from both Israelis and Palestinians who want peace. You won’t hear it from the settlers or their movement.
I see no way out of this not externally imposed, and nobody is going to do that. Biden is a stenographer. AIPAC has vast funds to keep anyone not stridently supportive of Israel out of office.
The rest of the world is seeing the wanton brutality but Israel is less likely to see reality than the GOP.
Less recently, having read the Koran years ago (still have it on my bookshelf) and 1,400 years of anti-Semitism and Christophobia. Not to mention looking at what a lot of these Islamofascist terrorist groups want (the extermination of the Jews from river to sea) not to mention a fairly ludicrous but serious threat to the West: The desire to bring the One True Religion to the rest of us, by force if not by persuasion. Sound like any other religion you can think of? Although that one has civilized itself a lot in the last few centuries.
Check out the stats of what Palestinians elsewhere say about Jews and the desire for peace, consider how many two-state solutions they've turned down, and then tell me they still want peace. A minority do, for sure. And the West Bank is less insane than Gaza.
People will tell pollsters what they think they want to hear, or what they know is politically correct, or they'll virtue signal. Talk is cheap. Action (or inaction) is louder than words.
I'm sorry, Steve, I just don't trust the Palestinians as far as I can throw them. They, and Hamas, represent some of the very worst excesses of violent right-wing dogma, not to mention all the pathologies that come along with it - hatred of women, 'Others', homosexuals, etc. The same people who condemn Donald Trump and the Christian Right jump up and down like excited cheerleaders for Hamas's touchdown on Oct 7. I have long found the Palestinians to be the world's least sympathetic victims and now I feel it even more so.
Israel has a lot to answer for too, but I think a lot of what looks like 'oppression' is actually a need for security. As the article notes, terrorism, violence and anti-Semitism is simply part of the culture. The Vietnamese didn't turn into terrorists and the Americans bombed them a fuckuva lot harder than the Palestinians have been. If anyone should have a hate-on for Americans it's the Japanese, since they're the only people (so far) to have been *nuked* - and that was beyond nightmarish. And yet *they're* not terrorists. Maybe it's because they're not Muslim. In fact, I'd bet my life on it. Islam has some good things going for it, but it's got an ugly cancer they haven't yet addressed for a very, very long time.
"People will tell pollsters what they think they want to hear, or what they know is politically correct, or they'll virtue signal. "
😅 You think people in Gaza are worried about being politically correct or virtue signalling? The same people who overwhelmingly and publicly support sharia law and outlawing homosexuality when polled? In fact, you think virtue signalling in Gaza means calling for peace with Israel rather than the other way around? Who do you think they're trying to impress? Twitter? I see no reason to believe they'd lie. Especially in a way that supported Israel.
People in Gaza have good reason to hate Israel. If you were living there, regardless of what God you believed in, you wouldn't think highly of Israel either. No, I don't think that would turn you or any sane person into a terrorist. And, of course, it hasn't turned ~99% of the people living in Gaza into terrorists either.
So if you want to talk about the problems with Islam as an ideology, fine. I'm right there with you. (of course, you could also talk out the problems with Christianity and Judaism as ideologies, their holy books aren't too friendly towards women and homosexuals either I'll remind you). But just as most Christians and Jews aren't killing people because of the stupid things their holy books say, nor are most Muslims.
You're writing off 2.3 million people because of the actions of a few hundred men. If that. Which, not for nothing, is exactly what Trump did with his Muslim ban. God damn I hate the instinct that makes people do this.
I'm already well-familiar with the past evils of Christianity and Judaism; last night after my arrival at my family's in the States a brief topic of conversation is, "Why We Understand Why Some People Have Hated the Jews." I said anyone who had to live with them in Biblical times sure had good reason, based on the Old Testament. And as a Pagan I can speak up one side and down the other about the evils of Christianity. But...neither of those religions is actively launching terrorist attacks. If you look at the research in that article, it shows rather a lot of support for terrorism, Hamas, laws that hate one people dear to liberals' hearts, etc. Now, maybe those surveys aren't right; I don't know. Surveys aren't the most reliable sources of information, and people will sometimes give what they think is the 'right' answer (or the ones they think will make their people look better to the rest of the world). There's just too much support for terrorism, and I keep thinking of how many times they've turned down a two-state solution. So yeah, I suspect virtue signalling. But I could be wrong.
Not convinced it's just 'a few hundred men', frankly.
It was a given in my military days that when a bomb killed a farmer's daughter all the young men in the village picked up a rifle. That is the big flaw in overkill. How many enemies are created with every kill? Killing non-combatants creates enemies. But even the combatants have people who lived them, even if it is only their mother.
"And I think that Israel recognising and taking active steps to end its part in this mess would go a long, long way to doing that."
It would still take at least a generation. Muslims hold long grudges and the Palis have plenty they want to avenge. I doubt anyone in either territory is more than two degrees of separation from some killed by Israel or by those horrid settlers, who do it for sport.
This is an utterly vile post, painting in such unnuanced broad strokes that it's impossible to reconcile with the thoughtfulness I've seen you exhibit. The savagery you aimed at me in that since-deleted post rolls off after reading this.
My guess is that Hamas' treatment of WOMYN has snapped your chain. Corroborated by the oft-repeated stuff about how badly I would be treated there, being a gay man. Well. I've worked with a lot of Muslims; Palestinians, Pakistanis, Lebanese, and all knew I'm gay and not a one of them gave a damn. But I've already written about nomadic peoples and their infant mortality rates so that's all I have to say about that.
Word for word, the same lies that Israel spews. Do you really think that every Palestinian loops endlessly on hating Jews? That they don't cook food and love their families and maintain their motorbikes, and everything else people do, but just think "I hate Jews, kill them all" .. every day, all day?
Who says Hamas located their headquarters under a hospital? Israel says so. The same Israel that's been caught in lie after lie after lie. The same Israel that has failed to keep its agreements, the same Israel that elects rabid bigots like Netanyahu and Bennett, but you believe every word.
Yeah, Palestinians hate Israel. This is my shocked face. Israel has been murdering them, stealing their land, bulldozing their homes, shooting them for sport, treating them with cruelty that so exceeds any excuses about self-defense. It would be absolutely and astonishingly unlike humanity if they didn't hate Israel.
Suppose somehow Mexico came into Texas and started demolishing towns and setting up Spanish-speaking settlements and shooting any Americans who weren't happy about it. Would you be calling those Americans "terrorists" and calling them "hateful bigots?" Forget for the moment that they would be repelled by those people whose garages are arsenals. Are you so enraged that Hamas tortured and raped some women that you can't follow the comparison?
I mentioned that Netanyahu promoted Hamas, assuring that the PA would not govern both territories, but it sounds like "Bibi" gets a pass because "HamsterAss." It makes no impression.
And you don't have a word to say about the greatest act of theft in human history or the legitimacy of Palestinian grievances, with only a perfunctory box-check that Israel hasn't been, what was the word, "angelic."
While Justice Minister, Ayelet Shaked (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayelet_Shaked) called for the murder of all Palestinian mothers; this wasn't an overheard remark at a dinner party, this was from the podium in her official capacity. I hope I don't need to point out that Palestinian mothers are women too, but, hey, I guess that doesn't matter. Let me guess, what's the difference between Israeli women and Palestinian women?
Funny, I thought a gay gay would have less of a hard-on for people who hate people like him. *I* don't support people who hate me (which the Gazan nuts do), but maybe you're different.
I mean, the shit they did to Israeli women brought a whole new creativity to inflicting pain and degradation during mass rape that must have the Nazis writhing in jealous that they didn't think of it first.
I know the Israelis are no angels either, but I think they could live peaceably without terrorist neighbours. Unfortunately their terrorist neighbours can't live peaceably with them.
You trade in caricatures. Simpleminded ones at that. Like "all Palestinians are terrorists." Or "all Muslims would murder you for being gay." Which makes me wonder how I survived screwing several of them.
Isn't there some vestigial piece of your mind that pauses as you write junk like that?
Hamas' rape and torture of Israeli women seems to have overwhelmed your reason, yet the former Justice Minister calling for the murder of all Palestinian mothers seems to have left no impression.
Based on ancient claims that only apply to Israel.
So Jews lived there 3500 years ago SO WHAT. America was occupied by native tribes 250 years ago. They have no claim. South Africa had its own peoples and the Boers just took it.
But as with the nonsense phrase “right to exist,” and just as larcenous “settlements” are exempt from international law, just as the slaughter that was the Nakba went unpunished, Israel is exempt.
But in bombing schools and hospitals, Israel has gone too far
Hey, any speculation why Jews have been historically persecuted? They coexisted with Palestinians before 1948.... not since.
Israel is more “full of itself” than any entity of any scale anywhere on the planet.
It hasn't always been their strip of land. In their own holy book they describe how they entered that land and massacred the people already living in the cities there, but took young women and girls for their "brides".
Recent archeology and DNA analysis shows that the native who met the European immigrants 100% descended from the Clovis peoples who cross the Alaskan land bridge about 13,000 years ago - but that the North and South American continents had already been settled by a differently descended group of people starting more than 20,000 years ago. The Clovis peoples had better technology and larger numbers, causing the original inhabitants of the Americas to be conquered and completely (100%) eliminated, thousands of years before Europeans arrived in a second wave of conquest (which is more recent but much less thorough).
Whoever the ancient Jews might have conquered in moving into Judea and Samaria were almost certainly earlier conquerors of that same land. It's what human tribes do, alas.
How far do we try to unravel history and prehistory and restore the original state of things? We can't give the Americas back to the original inhabitants because the Clovis peoples (now known as "native Americans", "first nations", etc) completely eliminated them. But the Jews could be pushed out of there, and then the Arabs could be pushed out, and we could see if there are any surviving descendants of whoever occupied that land 10,000 years ago.
Imagine that we decided that whichever side actually caused fewer casualties to the other side (EVEN IF they killed as many as they had the power to accomplish), has the more just cause and is in the right.
Imagine that the Allied newspapers were publishing photos and stories of the German and Italian babies killed by Allied bombing raids, with heart rending pictures of their grieving relatives collecting the body parts. All of the horrible things described in Palestine happened in Germany and Italy too, as the Allies sought to unseat the dictatorial regimes controlling Germany and Italy. Clearly the conclusion would be that the Allies were in the wrong, and should have agreed to a cease fire before D-Day, leaving the Axis to consolidate their control of the continent.
Imagine suggesting that the Allies cannot bomb the Nazi's out of power, and should instead support the German people in overthowing the Nazi armies. Is that a pragmatic or idealistic alternative?
I cannot be other than sad (no celebrations here) at the losses to all sides, and I see why all sides are angry and vengeful. And also why all sides may feel they have no other alternative than the approach they are taking, that their hands are tied (if they want to be effective in achieving their goals).
I think there is to some degree a naivete born of growing up in a relatively peaceful era (by historic standards) and then without preparation, confronting the horror that is and always has been war.
There is value in comparing "what is" to a more ideal imagined world; otherwise we'd never advance. But if that comparison become too ungrounded in pragmatic reality, it can produce further horrors rather than a more wonderful world.
"Imagine suggesting that the Allies cannot bomb the Nazi's out of power, and should instead support the German people in overthowing the Nazi armies. Is that a pragmatic or idealistic alternative?"
I think this is a pretty troubled analogy.
First, and most importantly, Germany was the sole aggressor in WWII. I won't bore you with a history lesson on the decades long conflict in Israel/Palestine. I'm sure you're aware of it. But the situation in Israel/Palestine is obviously very different to that. The Jews in Germany weren't blockading German civilians for decades or responding to antisemitism with bombardments or claiming that a strip of German land had "always been theirs."
Second, the Germans military and civilian population weren't confined to a single area. With all of their military installations and civilian infrastructure in the same 25-mile stretch of land. Civilians had a realistic route to escape the worst of any bombardments/ground assaults.
And thirdly, it’s not enough to bomb Hamas out of power. They don’t care about being in power or running Gaza. It’s about bombing them out of existence. And I think this is totally unrealistic. Just as unrealistic, in fact as the idea that you could bomb the Nazis out of existence. The Nazis are still alive and well today. Because Nazism is an ideology. They aren't starting a new World War for two main reasons. First, because the conditions that made people desperate enough to support them have ben largely ameliorated. And second, because they lack the support and financing they'd need.
Hamas has neither of these problems. Right now, Israel is compounding the conditions that make Gazans support Hamas beyond anything seen before. And Hamas' financial support is secure and isn't conditional on whether Palestinians vote for them. They'll still attack Israel even if Gaza is completely levelled. Most of Hamas' senior leadership isn't even *in* Gaza.
All that said, if I'd been writing during WWII, I'd have been advocating for peace and diplomacy then too. I'd have been condemning the deaths of civilians, especially when those civilian were the primary casualties of an attack, not "collateral damage" (how I hate that term). And I'd have condemned the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with all the rhetorical force at my disposal. Apparently, in terms of cumulative explosive power, Israel have dropped a similar amount of firepower on Gaza in the past month to the bombings of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Almost all wars end at the negotiating table. It's just a question of how many civilians die first. And given Israel's significant faults in this conflict, I think you can only compare Israel/Gaza to The Allies/Nazis if you ignore a lot of history.
I have read detailed accounts of the Japanese surrender process, and whether or not to surrender was hanging by a thread, even after (1) The fire bombing of Tokyo had killed more people than nuclear weapons would, (2) Two fission bombs were dropped with the threat of continuing city by city until surrender, and (3) The USSR had declared war on Japan.
This makes me doubt those who think that a surrender outcome would have obviously happened anyway without the nuclear bombing; I think that's based more on wishful thinking (or desire to support a pre-determined narrative). Was there some talk of it within parts of the government? Yes, the later examination of records reveal that it was discussed in some quarters. Were the advocates of surrender in control of the government? No, they were not, and even after the bombings they barely managed to get their way in the end.
Would the Japanese people have fared worse by not surrendering, and instead fighting it out (leaving out nuclear bombs)? I believe so. Read more about what happened in Okinawa (and other Japanese held islands). Very few surrendered and survived. I think the estimates of well over a million Japanese deaths from resisting a mainland invasion (or from conventional bombs etc along with possible starvation) are well justified; even leaving aside hundreds of thousands of deaths among the Allied soldiers and sailors.
And I think that the American public might have been less motivated to be generous in victory, if the total American deaths from WWII had been increased by 50-100% by the invasion of mainland Japan.
Obviously, we can at best estimate counterfactual history, and cannot run the experiment both ways and compare. But I find the proposition that the fission bombs spared a huge number of Japanese lives as well as those of the Allies to be very credible, even if not certain. Trying to optimize for the immediate ends (avoid the deaths from the atomic bombs) can potentially lead to worse outcomes in the long run (even more deaths from other means).
There are opinions in both directions which cannot be proven. My own take is based on my reading of the arguments on both sides, with no narrative of my own to support (eg: love whatever America does, hate whatever America does). Others are free to hold and defend their own opinions.
I hope this doesn't stimulate a bad reaction, but I wish to respectfully clarify my point.
Analogies are ALWAYS inexact, as no two situations are the same. We use analogies to assert that some fragment of one situation may apply to some fragment of another. A common and easy way to brush aside any analogy, without exception, is to point out some difference in the two cases. The question often not addressed is "how relevant is that difference" to the point being made.
For example, whether bombing is or is not a potentially key component of a strategy to remove an enemy from power does not depend on whether that enemy was the sole aggressor (or was even an aggressor at all). That's not relevant to the facet of the analogy being asserted, any more than the fact the the Nazi's spoke a different language than the Arabs in Gaza. When we shift between "moral justifications" and "military effectiveness" as if they were the same thing, we can get confused. One can assert that (1) bombing Gaza has no military effectiveness (regardless of whether it's morally justified), or that (2) bombing Gaza (whether it is effective or not) is not morally justified. I was addressing the former only in the quoted segment; the latter is a good but different question.
As for the evacuation - again, not very relevant to the question of military effectiveness, but possibly relevant to debates about morality.
Nobody is trying to make a general or broad comparison of Israel/Gaza to Allies/Nazis. I was comparing a SINGLE FACET of one situation to a single facet of anther, and that IS possible by paying attention to history, not ignoring it. I hope the difference is clear.
There is a possibly accidental strawman involved here as well. I'm a fairly rational person, so I never suggested that bombing alone would be sufficient to remove Hamas from power, and I have never seen anybody anywhere so assert, so that's built of straw. Certainly the IDF has no such illusions, or they would have reduced their casualties to near zero by avoiding the bloody ground invasion and just using bombs. The ONLY thing in question (in either side of the analogy) is "can the task be accomplished without bombing" (debatable), not "could it be accomplished by bombing alone" (EVERYONE agrees that it could not).
Can Hamas be completely eliminated by military means (with or without bombing) - every single person? Of course not. Nor can their Islamist radicalism be eliminated from the world. But there is no need to eliminate them, only to greatly reduce their ability to cause harm to others. Can the ability of Hamas (or a successor) to attack Israel be greatly reduced such that it would take at least a decade before they could attempt such an attack again? That might be militarily possible. Hamas has spent over a decade and billions of dollars preparing for this event (financed by diverted aid money, and taxes on tunnel smuggling from Egypt, their main sources of income; and supported by arms from Iran), and their explicit promise to keep doing it could be interrupted/delayed by destroying much of that infrastructure. And it's possible that their support from Iran would dry up in that period of time. That is, they might lack the "support and financing they need" in your words. No guarantees, but it's not an absurd proposition, especially if Israel can in the meanwhile restore their normalization process with Saudi Arabia, which Hamas felt to be an existential threat to their power.
“A common and easy way to brush aside any analogy, without exception, is to point out some difference in the two cases”
Of course. And yes, I’m aware that analogies are never perfect. But I didn’t just brush the analogy aside, I explained, in some detail, why the two situations have almost nothing in common except that civilians are being bombed. Analogies don’t work if the two situations being compared are too dissimilar.
Comparing just the single facet of bombing civilians without acknowledging the enormous differences in why they’re being bombed or what led up to it or what else could be done to avoid it *requires* that you ignore a lot of history. And that history is extraordinarily relevant. It’s not clear to me at all how you think you’re paying attention to it.
For example, I talked about who was the aggressor because it speaks to moral justification. Otherwise, why not talk purely about whether the Nazi’s strategy was militarily effective and ignore everything else? How else were they to achieve their goal of world domination with the fewest Nazi casualties possible?
Yes, bombing is almost always an effective strategy for killing or weakening your enemies. Was that the point you were making though? I don’t think it was. Otherwise an analogy was unnecessary. Israel’s bombs are doing an excellent job of killing Palestinians.
So maybe the question was, “will bombing Gaza into oblivion weaken Hamas’ fighting ability?” And yes, no doubt it will. But then why not go the nuclear route? That would certainly be militarily effective in reducing Hamas’ fighting ability even further. And, of course, the sole reason, which is sadly not persuasive to some in Israel’s military, is that the cost of innocent civilians would be too great to morally defend. War always involves moral considerations.
Even just using conventional weapons, Israel could kill every single person living in Gaza, including all the Hamas members obviously, without a single IDF soldier setting foot in the Gaza Strip. Near 100% military effectiveness. A little shakier on the moral front though.
So no, the only question is not can the task of removing Hamas be accomplished without bombing.
The questions (plural) are, can it be accomplished without bombing and killing 11,000 (and counting) civilians and destroying the homes of over a million? Can it be accomplished by ending the illegal occupation in the West Bank? Can it be accomplished by ending the blockade on Gaza? Can it be accomplished by accepting a two-state solution according to the 1967 borders? Can it be accomplished by convincing Iran to stop supplying weapons and funding to Hamas? Can it be accomplished by relinquishing the idea that one particular piece of land has been reserved for Jews by the creator of the universe?
The answers to many of these questions is on the “probably/yes” end of the spectrum. And none of these options were available to the Allies as they fought the Nazis. This is why I think the analogy is flawed.
> "why not go the nuclear route? That would certainly be militarily effective in reducing Hamas’ fighting ability even further. And, of course, the sole reason, which is sadly not persuasive to some in Israel’s military, is that the cost of innocent civilians would be too great to morally defend."
Could you provide any links to those in the Israeli military who have stated that using nuclear weapons on Gaza would be morally acceptable as a means of eliminating Hamas? I've never seen that but I would like to know about it if true.
You said "I don't believe Hamas can be bombed out of Gaza."
My basic response was to that specific point, full stop. I was not saying what the best answer was, or who was more moral, or any of the other important issues. I was NOT trying to distill the entire conflict down to one question, I was only addressing that one question on its own.
From your response, I think you may have construed my answer far more broadly than I intended it, and then pushed back on that broad interpretation.
My point is that there is nobody saying that bombing alone could eliminate Hamas as a force to contend with (where by bombing we are discussion the kind which Israel is actually doing and you are critiquing, not some fictional nuclear leveling).
Where there could be different opinions, is whether Hamas can be effectively eliminated without bombing as a part of the effort. That is, there is no "bombing alone" question on the table, but there could be a "bombing plus other things" vs "no bombing, only other things" debate.
Reread the quote from you at the beginning; were you saying that you don't believe that bombing alone can remove Hamas, or that you don't believe that bombing can even be a component of a broader effort to remove Hamas? Since nobody is questioning the former, I thought you were closer to asserting the latter. That seems to be the more respectful interpretation, not the more easily impugned.
You are correct that there are MANY, MANY other questions (including those you list) which also bear on the overall problems, and if you believed my narrowly focused dissent about bombing as a component was attempting to bypass or supercede all of the other considerations, then I can see how you would disagree. I would too. But my intended clarification was much more modest in scope.
"And I'd have condemned the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with all the rhetorical force at my disposal."
I am holding in my hand a crude bracelet made of woven solder. The material came from a roll of solder that went into the Hiroshima bomb. I used to have a copper thimble that was also made from stock that went into the bomb, but it is lost. An employee of my grandfather was on the project but I don't know why she gave them to me.
I've seen films of survivors being treated in Japanese clinics. There is one utterly horrifying memory of a young boy whose lips are gone, along with about an inch of flesh around them. He was not blind. It's hard to argue with horror like that.
But I must try. Japan would not have surrendered without the bombs, and would have put ever younger children into uniform for two more years until they were utterly destroyed. I would hate to be the one to make that decision but the bombs ended the war before tens or hundreds of thousands of children would have died.
War imposes grim choices. But that boy's burned-away face haunts me.
"Japan would not have surrendered without the bombs, and would have put ever younger children into uniform for two more years until they were utterly destroyed. I would hate to be the one to make that decision but the bombs ended the war before tens or hundreds of thousands of children would have died."
Opinion is divided on whether Japan would have surrendered or was already in the process of surrendering. I don't know enough to say with real confidence. But I'm not convinced the death toll would have been higher if the bombs hadn't been dropped.
Italy and Germany had surrendered 3 months prior, Japan had been defeated on Okinawa and several other countries had recently declared war on Japan. Would another 200,000 people have been killed before Japan realised it was hopeless? Not to mention the human suffering you allude to. I don't think so.
Fifty years ago (apox) I read Hiroshima by John Hersey. The thoughts of survivors. A compelling book that influenced my views on nuking cities. And yet Lemay boasted that his fire bombing campaign killed more Japanese people than the nukes.
Israel is nothing if not expansionist. The settler movement runs the government and ownership of land is fundamental to personal identity and authenticity in their religion.
As I have said, they plan to expand into indisputable sovereign nations and I doubt the USA will do anything about it, but will continue to send them weapons to kill Syrian and Lebanese. Those countries' defense will be labeled "terrorists" and "gunmen."
As for "antisemitism" and "terrorists" and "Hamas," (HamsterAss, jesus christ), if a kid carries the mutilated corpse of his mother out of the remains of their house, he is not going to grow up pro-Israel. He comes from an honor-driven society and his life will be dedicated to revenge.
I think the problem is 90% Israel and I have pre-48 evidence to support. It is a rogue nation.
Chris, could you name the specific "indisputably sovereign nations" which you believe Israel is intending to expand into? Jordan? Egypt? Lebanon? Syria? Or jump over to Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia? I can think of none that fit your description.
There certainly IS a very troubling settler movement in the West Bank territory, but I don't think it's objective reality to assert that the West Bank is an indisputably sovereign nation.
... as Israel, based on some claims from thousands of years ago. And that's just Likud.
Others like Shas and Jewish Home argue for "unlimited" settlement expansion, as in respecting no borders.
I say that any further diplomatic relations with "the state of Israel" should be contingent on removing all settlers from the West Bank; since their original countries don't want them back, they would need to move into Israel, where they would cause NO END of trouble.
which would appear to be contrary to your assertions, but perhaps the current charter is much more aggressively expansionistic in the ways that you assert. I'll read any links to a Likud charter you can provide.
While discussion often includes opinions (expert or not), let's start by being clear about the underlying and verifiable objective facts, like the contents of the Likud charter. So let's look together at what the Likud charter you have based your assertions above upon actually says. While I was never any fan of Likud, I have not seen any assertion matching yours, and if validated that could shift my views on the situation. So show us the Likud charter you are referencing.
Wow. What a total mess the article and comments display.
The comments at this time are all from 3 regulars whom I respect, and they are not coming to any semblance of agreement, with each other or with Steve.
This issue is dividing the American left, dividing the America right, and dividing the sometimes more nuanced middle/independent folks, where segments within each can be just as dogmatic and one-sided as the traditional left/right split.
Just like some other political, people are often describing similar values, but applied within a different set of selectively chosen "facts".
It seems pretty idealistic to hope that Palestinians and Israeli's can work out some agreement to bring peace, when the thoughtful intelligent folks in this comment thread are not succeeding, due to just a watered down subset of the issues dividing Israel/Gaza/West Bank.
I have no solution for the region; I can see the forces driving a self-reinforcing cycle of war and hatred but it's hard to discern what could effectively shift that towards a more peaceful coexistence on all sides. But I could try to nuance some particular issues at least. Like examining the hypothesis that Hamas is using civilians as shields. Or comparing what's happening now or stated intentions for the future to the definition of "genocide".
But the comments here are alas not sounding like in general there's a desire to nuance or consider both sides; it feels pretty self-righteously angry and hostile. I'm not seeing much space we we "argue in good faith and look at life from perspectives other than our own." (with "our own" meaning those on the side we are polarized in favor of, whether or not we are personally a member).
As I perceive it, we are not handling this touchy issue any better than the Critical Social Justice ideologues. And that's depressing.
And the best you can do is that tired "antisemitic" trope, the equation of Jews = Israel that has put innocent Jews all over the world in danger because people lile Alan Dershowitz and you insist that any criticism of the policies of the country Israel is nothing more than hatred of Jews.
What simpleminded rubbish.
And since nomenclatural accuracy is a fetish of mine, I need to point out that Semitic peoples are Sephardic Jews (second-class Israelis) and Palestinians, but that the European-descended Jews who rule Israel, as well as the settlers, are not.
I do think you know me well enough to know of my contempt for religions, all of them, as well as the greater contempt for nations that are founded by religious identity. Saudi Arabia has the Shahhadah on its flag; Israel has that stupid star. They can both sink into the ooze as far as I'm concerned.
Not sure why you're so focused on me, maybe it was my reaction to that libertarian fucktard that Anthony brought into our little group, but there are plenty in this discussion who are even less rah-rah Israel than I am.
Israel's solution is clear: expel or exterminate the Palestinians and take all their land as more Israel. This is indisputable. The filling of the WB is already too complete for the two-state solution, and Netanyahu HELPED Hamas to assure that Gaza and the WB were not united under the single leadership of the Palestinian Authority. And Netanyahu knew what they were.
1200 dead Israelis is a small cost for the expansion enabled by promoting the occupation to expanded borders. Gaza will be resettled, the WB will be completely taken, and then it's on to other nations.
Which America will meekly call "unhepful" and the money and weapons will keep coming.
Chris, can we calm down the rhetoric just a bit, among ourselves? I will try as well.
Let's stick to Gaza for the moment. Israel removed all settlements in 2005 (which were never very extensive). The population of Gaza has more than doubled since then. Israel has supplied water and electricity, and treatment of serious medical conditions is often done in Israel. There is a LOT to criticize about Israel's policies towards Gaza, but I have seen zero evidence that Israel is trying to reduce the population of Gaza, much less expel or exterminate them.
What convinces you that Israel is "indisputably" attempting to expel or exterminate the population of Gaza? Please, no yelling or insults, but a link to some factual article supporting your opinion would be appreciated. I'm asking you to support your goal of "championing objective reality", and I'll read any (reasonable length and available) source which supports that opinion.
I do think that the conservative coalition behind Netanyahu desires to take over most of the West Bank, and I think that's a terrible injustice, which many (but not enough) Israelis oppose. I'm asking for clarification about your assertion about Gaza, tho, not about the West Bank.
One problem in the area is that there are two fast growing populations: culturally conservative Palestinians (most of them), and culturally conservative Israelis (now a majority of Israel), both of which tend to have large families.
(True in the US as well; conservatives have larger families on average than modern liberals - but more pronounced in Israel since many of the more conservative parts of the Israeli population come from quite different nations and cultures than the more liberal parts do).
In Israel, this demographic shift is favoring the right side of the spectrum in democratic elections, alas. Israeli citizens whose families migrated from Arabic or Islamic nations tend to be more aggressive in their treatment of Palestinians - and they have no dual citizenship to allow them to happily return to the US or Europe if Israel fails. They have less (if any) faith in a solution of peaceful co-existence, largely due to their own experiences. Meanwhile, generations of Palestinians are growing up with understandable hatred of Israel. It's definitely a tragedy, with no easy solutions.
I think it’s abundantly clear that they are taking all of Gaza, presumably to be resettled, but several spokesmen have said that all Palestinians must leave.
Could you provide a link? In my research of the many, many points from both sides, I have never come across a spokesman for Israel who advocated for Israel even to 'eventually' take over and settle "all of Gaza" after forcing all Palestinians to leave, much less that they are doing so in present tense, but if you can provide some solid evidence that might shift my perspective. I'm astounded that I've never seen even the harsh critics of Israel document such a point, but you may be more familiar with the objective sources so I'm open to one or more links supporting your opinion.
OK, so your morning newsfeed included an Israeli spokesman who said that all Palestinians must leave Gaza, and further that the (2-2.5million) residents there should be divided into groups of 20-50K going to each Arab nation?
I'd really appreciate a link to that, so we can cooperatively verify the objective factuality of it. I assume you know where you get your morning newsfeed from, and the time and day you heard that.
But you have said that "several spokesmen" for Israel have stated that all Gazans must leave, so you could provide links to some of the other spokemen's words instead if that's easier.
I'm wondering about their exact words, and their credentials to speak on behalf of the Israeli government.
"The comments at this time are all from 3 regulars whom I respect, and they are not coming to any semblance of agreement, with each other or with Steve."
The symmetry is broken: I say many or most Israelis want to end the occupation and go two-state, Labia says all Palestinians are psychotic terrorists. The fact that they tortured WOMYN seems to have broken something.
I despise the settlers. I'm sure some of them are decent folk but as it happens I have never read or heard a word by one like that. Israel ships them in and sends them right out to the WB, they never even *enter* Israel. And they start making trouble the day they arrive.
OK, so if a future government of Israel were to withdraw all of the settlers in the West Bank (and they have zero settlers anywhere else so that's easy), do you think that Palestinians would allow Israel to exist within its own borders in peace?
Eventually, yes, After at least a generation, likelier two. In the short run, there is too much thirst for vengeance, amply justified. Israelis have gone far past any bounds excusable by self-defense and have killed Palestinians for sport, and when not killing they have been savagely cruel.
In one case soldiers were going house to house looking for some fugitive. While they tore apart a Palestinian woman's bedroom, with no room for anyone to hide, another unzipped his pants and urinated on her carpet. There was a toilet.
On the same search, a tank going down the street took a detour and reasonlessly crushed a man's taxi, destroying his livelihood.
Palestinians have ample reason to despise Israel. They won't forget soon.
Another question of clarification. By "settlers" do you mean the 700,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank? Or do you mean all 9 million Israelis, which is what Hamas and the left in the West calls "settlers"? I suspect the former.
I think a two state solution might have worked in 1948 if the Arabs had accepted that plan, or perhaps in 1967. At this point, I don't see how it could work - it looks to me as if there would be two sovereign states in easy artillery and rocket range of each others, in perpetual full scale war - until it was reduced to one state or zero. In the abstract, a two state solution (or three state variant) seems like (1) the most ideal outcome in the abstract, and (2) a now obsolete fantasy which would end disastrously. And both sides have lots of responsibility for getting into this dilemma.
Both figures could be considered "correct" depending on whether you think the settlers in East Jerusalem to be OK, or part of the same problem as the other 450K outside of East Jerusalem.
450 K in West Bank excluding East Jerusalem
220 K in East Jerusalem
-------
670 K total settlers in West Bank including East Jerusalem
I consider the larger figure to be more relevant to discussion of Israeli settlement on the West Bank. If you have reason to consider the East Jerusalem settlements distinctly less problematic and thus excludable, I will listen. Perhaps I am naive to use the total including East Jerusalem when discussing the settler problem.
“Just like describing our actions in Gaza right now as "collective punishment" are disingenous. That's not our intention, and it's outside of our control.”
This is such a brazen and contemptible lie I had to stop reading.
Yeah, it’s not our intention. We just can’t help ourselves, that hospital is sitting there just begging for a missile and there’s a rumor that a Hamas person is in the basement.
And, drum roll, we do not intentionally target civilians. Just ask “Bibi.”
It’s collective punishment. Those 5000 dead kids didn’t do 10/7.
The settlements are built on stolen land.
The settlers are verminous rabble.
Netanyahu, Bennett, Lieberman, Shaked... are vile bigots.
And the leveling of Gaza is prelude to resettling it with more unobservant Jewish-descended trash.
I'll leave issues like the settlers to others. A thing that I have no idea of how to deal with is urban warfare. I was not in Hue in 1968 so my war was rural. I don't know if you are familiar with the Military Grid Reference System (MGRS), it is much like National Grids where geographic locations can be defined in squares.
In that war, we knew where friendly villages, our bases of operation and allied military bases were. We knew where our patrols were operating on a given night. Those grid squares were not subject to artillery Harassment and Interdiction (H&I) fire. It was a big help in reducing fratricide and killing friendlies. One night some of our short rounds hit a friendly village. I was corporal of the guard for a section of the perimeter capable of firing on the road from the village. It looked like a medieval move as they came down the road with flashlights like torches while chanting something i could not understand. Field phone jingling, "hold your fire!" They were bringing us their wounded. We medevac'd them to 1st Med Battalion in Danang. The key factor in this is that we had a pretty good way of determining who was who. Farmers wore black pajamas, but they didn't carry AK-47s.
How can the Israelis map 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘭𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘯-𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘣𝘢𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘵 grid squares that they will not hit when the hostiles/enemy is collocated with them? Keep in mind that I include non-combatants with friendlies. I have no idea of how to deal with that. Perhaps a veteran of urban fighting could chime in on how we dealt with it in their experience. It is completely outside my experience, and I don't know how doctrine applies. Where should the line be drawn? There is a grey area between morality (as if there can be morality in war) and pragmatism. The Israelis are in an untenable position.
It has been nearly twenty years since I read, "The Sling and The Stone, On war in the 21st Century" by Colonel Thomas X. Hammes, USMC. Perhaps it is time to read it again. As I remember it, it addressed this, but I don't remember what it said.
You'll hear a lot about Hamas using civilians as "human shields," and about caching military ordnance in hospitals and schools so that innocents are killed in destroying it.
Given how many times Israel has been caught lying (read fast, because those news stories have a funny way of vanishing and leaving no history), there is ample reason to doubt the truth of this claim. The BBC recently exposed a clear case of architected falsehood, a gun layin atop an MRI machine suddenly being two guns after Israel had evacuated it. It's all staged.
If you knew about how Israel treats the Palestinians then you would not find the desire to erase Israel at all remarkable. And the settlers are the very worst. They're like the neighbors who kill your pets and put an M80 in your mailbox. They murder the people who have lived there for centuries with no reprisal and even the best of them are nuisances. There is no argument anyone can make about Israel's "terrorist" neighbors or their hatred of Israel that doesn't fall apart the moment you learn about the settlements.
A Palestinian family gets its door kicked in; they have five minutes to evacuate before their house is bulldozed, and anyone still inside will be crushed. making room for trailers for Russian rabble or luxurious condominiums for wealthy American Jews.
Settlement construction is a big business.
If you'd buried your children, shot in the back from helicopters, you'd want Israel destroyed too.
Sure, many Israelis are decent people who want the occupation ended. But they aren't running the country, the settler movement does that, just as MAGA runs the GOP.
And after Gaza is resettled and the West Bank is full, next up are Lebanon and Syria, which even the Likud Party claims as Israel, while Shas and Jewish Home accept no limits anywhere. Respecting no borders. Just wait:
"Lebanese terrorists"
"I stand with Israel"
"Lebanese gunmen" <——> "Israeli self-defense"
America should end diplomatic relations with "the state of Israel" and shift the aid to the people being exterminated, and make any further relations conditional on emptying the settlements and putting several dozen members of the Israeli right on trial in The Hague.
My question was specific. The video that I've seen shows the fighting taking place in a highly populated area. Leaving human shield accusations aside, Hamas and non-combatant Palestinians are in the same space.
When I see a video of a bunker buster being used to blast the bottom out of talk buildings, collapsing then into their footprint, it is said that there was a Hamas command center in it, with an unmentioned mostly not Hamas in it. Assuming that the command center was in it, is destroying the whole building the right thing?
Population centers and their infrastructure are being destroyed, making the place unlivable. That seems to be beyond going after Hamas. Ignoring words, with my own eyes I see widespread destruction and airburst WP over population centers. I wouldn't burn a house down to kill a mouse.
My question pertains to how, and I'm not saying human shield, do you fight in that environment? I am ignoring good guys vs bad guys and focusing on friend or foe where I treat non-combatants as friend. The conduct of warfare in and urban setting. How it is being conducted, rather than why?
"My question pertains to how, and I'm not saying human shield, do you fight in that environment?"
Your military knowledge far exceeds mine, but I think the most enlightening way to answer this question is to ask what Israel would do if those "unmentioned mostly not Hamas" were Israeli instead of Palestinian civilians. I think there's still a point at which they'd accept those casualties. But I think they'd be far more likely to hit targets like that with troops instead of bombs in that instance. Troops allow for a degree precision and restraint that bombs don't.
Military forces have claimed that civilian-filled targets were covers for military infrastructure forever. There's no way to confirm which claims are true and which are false. But I don't know what military target, especially in a place like Gaza, justifies over 4000 dead children.
"Military forces have claimed that civilian-filled targets were covers for military infrastructure forever. There's no way to confirm which claims are true and which are false. "
While it was training for riot control it would also apply to counter insurgency. "They are your fellow Americans. Use the minimum force necessary, but all that is necessary." The uncomfortable meaning is clear. I can never forget those words.
Welp, a few of the comments here are dong a fabulous job of highlighting the divide between how good were capable of being and how we sometimes are. I though there was only one topic at the moment that turned otherwise smart, sane people into ad hominem machines, but it looks like we have another contender.
I'll be going through and deleting some of the the most unproductive comments. C'mon guys, you're better than this. You can disagree. There's a lot to this conflict worth thinking about. But disagreeing does not an enemy make. Yelling at each other doesn't make your arguments more convincing.
I would have at one time said that it was amazing, but now it has become the norm. Heavy sigh!
Never thought I'd be called "disgusting" in this forum.
I'm going to look at this from a very different vantage point that may or may not become clear.
About 54 years ago while in SE Asia I saw the Chinese as 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘖𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘵. At the time, outside of China they were in a state of diaspora. They could not own land and farm, so they became the businessmen who in some cases ended up financially well off, and they were despised for it. Sounding familiar yet? Largely segregated to 𝘊𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘛𝘰𝘸𝘯𝘴 (ghettos). Sounding familiar yet?
My wife, raised in a land where bargaining is common is better at it than me. When car buying, I need to shut up and let her do her thing. For many years she thought I was saying "chew someone down" when bargaining since she had never heard of the rather racist "Jew someone down" that I grew up with. The Marxist oppressor and oppressed worldview where the names bourgeoisie and proletariat have been replaced by other tribal names. But the Jews may forever be seen as the bourgeoisie to people wrapped up in the idea that they are oppressed victims.
How does this apply? Back then, two of my wife to be's neighbors were the 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘰𝘳 𝘸𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘴 to Chinese men who I got to know. One owned a restaurant in China Town (a story with that that I will save) and was a man of wealth. I've known several Chinese wheeler dealers thru the years. Between the first and last time I've been in China their economy and wealth has grown tremendously and they have become a military power destined to be the dominant force worldwide. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘣𝘶𝘺 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴.
Israel is also a military power with wealth. But there is a difference in that their enemies want to exterminate them. Even though the average Jew is non-practicing, they as a people rejected Mohamad as God's messenger and their haters will not forget it. They have bought some friends in the Muslim world, but as a Saudi friend once said to me, "Never trust a Saudi. Not even me." China is buying debt slaves; Israel does not have that power so they cannot extricate themselves from their fate. At least not on that patch of land and not for long if they appear to.
As the realtors say, "location, location, location!" They might have lived in peace if they had been given Utah, rather than 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘺 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘥. I would like to be optimistic, but I think that that location sealed their fate. Meanwhile, the rest of the mob on the internet goes on and on with whose fault it all is and who is the biggest bad guy. I didn't bother to mention all of the terrible shit being done by the tribes; we know that. That is all very real, but I'll repeat, I think that the location is a cornerstone in this.
"That is all very real, but I'll repeat, I think that the location is a cornerstone in this."
Yeah, I touched on this very briefly, but Israel's location is politically important because it gives the U.S. an eye in the Middle East. Obviously that wasn't the original intention, but it's the intention now. Biden ws surprisingly candid about this back in 1986 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86Nrv5izaTs).
Israel's location, surrounded by Muslim countries, is obviously insane. But millions of people live there now. There has to be a serious, pragmatic effort to deal with the mess that exists. Either that or get working on a time machine.
Seventy five years in, hundreds of nuclear warheads, Israel isn’t going anywhere, and they are going to continue to expand.
America's friends provide some benefit to America. We are not purely altruistic.
https://quotefancy.com/quote/1158567/Moshe-Dayan-Israel-must-be-like-a-mad-dog-too-dangerous-to-bother
Nuclear warheads aimed at every population center within reach, enemies and allies alike.
Would you like some more lemon in your tea, Mr. Netanyahu?
Well sorry, but add a fourth person to the list of people who think peace in that NJ-sized strip of land is a pipe dream. With or without Hamas.
My views are evolving constantly on this mess but I just can't get over how difficult it is to support the Palestinians on *anything*. 'Free Palestine'? Sorry, as if they could ever be free! If somehow magically all of HamsterAss disappeared tomorrow, another external genocidal nutbag group would take over, or it would be generated from within whatever Palestinians are left. Because hating Jews is what they do. Indoctrinated from birth. A fuckuva lot of them support Hamas, or at least support hating Jews and wanting to eliminate them. They don't have it in them to be free. 89% of them would love to see Palestine ruled by Sharia law, which never works out well for women (who suffer appalling amounts of domestic violence from their darling hubbies). They're pretty famously mega-homophobic, too. There's nothing more ludicrous than watching Team Rainbow wave their multicoloured flags around with their kaffiyehs. Gazans push people like that off of rooftops. *If* they can identify them. Since LGBTQ people there keep a very low profile, and running around with goofy hair colours and pierced noses doesn't go over well with the masturbates-to-Leni-Riefenstahl crowd.
They need a homeland because the three guys are right: Jews aren't safe anywhere in the world. They're as Indigenous to the land as the Palestinians. Sure, many of them came from somewhere else - Europe, after the war, and the Middle East, as they got kicked out or expelled from their home countries there, too. Neither were all the Palestinians born there either; many of them were kicked out, and no one else will take them back or in. Just ask Egypt.
I don't have the answers for that part of the world, *no one* does. But I don't believe Palestinians have it in them to be free. They love hatred and a genocidal view. They're dying by the droves because the death cult they voted for uses them as human shields. They strike me as being somewhat like the Trumpers: No matter how bad they get it from the folks who claim to represent them, they bend over again, spread their butt cheeks, and say, "Please, sir, may I have some more?"
Hamas located their headquarters under a hospital so the IDF would *have* to bomb it to get to them. Dead Palestinians are *great* press for them. Until the Gazans figure that out, and stop voting for the people who are *trying* to get them killed, they're going to reap what they sow.
"If somehow magically all of HamsterAss disappeared tomorrow, another external genocidal nutbag group would take over, or it would be generated from within whatever Palestinians are left."
I agree. This is actually central to my belief that you can't bomb Hamas out of Gaza. But aren't you overlooking the reason why there's so much tension in the region? As I said in the conversation. There are bad, antisemitic reasons why Israel is hated in the region. But there are also understandable territorial and "bombing thousands of innocent mothers, fathers and children into oblivion" reasons. And we're talking before Oct 7th.
Let's imagine that Hamas disappears tomorrow and Israel stops bombing Gaza the same day. Will everybody be happy? No. Because the blockade would still be there. The West Bank barrier would still be there. The inequality between Jews and Arabs in Israel would still be there. Gazans would still be living in poverty and ruin (now, of course, even greater poverty and ruin).
This is why I'm at such great pains to distinguish Hamas from Palestinians. Yes, there's overlap. Hamas hate Jews. They need to be stopped. I think all sane people agree. I'm simply arguing that they need to be stopped in a way that doesn't radicalise even more Palestinians. And I think that Israel recognising and taking active steps to end its part in this mess would go a long, long way to doing that.
Somewhat agreed. The Palestinians have some pretty legitimate grievances against Israel, and the US and its allies for supporting them and looking the other way when they violate certain agreements. But honestly, what radicalizes Palestinians far more than Israel is their intense hate-on for the Jews which goes on for hundreds and hundreds of years. Anti-Semitism and hatred of other non-Muslims is 'baked into' the Koran, to cadge a phrase from campus Hamas groupies. Steve, I honestly don't think the Palestinians could live by themselves with or without Hamas, with or without Israel. They are so steeped in hatred, their children are steeped in it from birth, that it takes a helluva free thinker to move beyond that sort of hate prison. We can talk about the real abuse of Palestinian rights all we want, but I for one wouldn't support a two-state solution for them until they publicly stated they refute the notion of 'river to the sea' and agree to share the land with Jews. If they can't do that, then, I'm sorry, fuck 'em. I don't think they could live in peace with each other if all the Jews and Hamas disappeared. What would they do with all that hate? Turn on each other. Maybe I'm extremely pessimistic but I don't think they'll be ready for self-government for many, many generations. And even if they DID agree to live with Jews, how would the rest ot the kill-all-the-Jews Arab world handle that? Would they go along with it? I don't think so. But hey, they're all welcome to prove me wrong.
"But honestly, what radicalizes Palestinians far more than Israel is their intense hate-on for the Jews"
I'm not sure what has you so convinced of this. I've watched so many interview with Palestinians over the past month. They hate the blockade, yes, but almost none of them have expressed hate for Jews. No more than the Jews I've seen interviewed expressed hatred for Palestinians.
The Quran says all kinds of terrible things. As does pretty much every "holy" book. But most religious people don't adhere to (in fact, most aren't even aware of) every word written in their holy books. Jihad is a feature of Islam. But far from all Muslims are Jihadis.
Beyond that, polling from 2006, the last we have before Hamas came to power, showed that 79.5% of Palestinians wanted peace with Israel (http://www.neareastconsulting.com/plc2006/blmain.html). 75.2% thought Hamas should change its policies regarding Israel. The evidence suggests that Palestinians aren't the radicalised sociopaths you seem to think they are.
Religious dogma is always an obstacle to resolving any real-world issue. There is certainly hate there (again, from some Jews too). But I think most people, Palestinians and Jews, still want peace. Or, at least, they prefer it to the alternative.
When mice got into my house and I heard them scurrying under the bed at night, I didn’t hate them. I just wanted them gone. Same for cockroaches.
You won’t hear much from Israelis about how much they hate Arabs. They don’t need to. The presumption of Jewish supremacy runs too deep for that. It’s a very different sort of bigotry from the inferiority complex that drives rural southern American whites.
I reject that hackneyed and reflexive charge of antisemitism for saying this. It comes from friends who live in or have visited Israel. In the days of psychedelic trance a lot of the artists were Israelis, we communicated a lot, and to a man they deplored the nonchalance of their countrymen’s dismissal of Arabs as subhuman.
We’ve heard from both Israelis and Palestinians who want peace. You won’t hear it from the settlers or their movement.
I see no way out of this not externally imposed, and nobody is going to do that. Biden is a stenographer. AIPAC has vast funds to keep anyone not stridently supportive of Israel out of office.
The rest of the world is seeing the wanton brutality but Israel is less likely to see reality than the GOP.
"I'm not sure what has you so convinced of this."
This, most recently:
https://volodzko.substack.com/p/the-problem-is-palestinian-culture
Less recently, having read the Koran years ago (still have it on my bookshelf) and 1,400 years of anti-Semitism and Christophobia. Not to mention looking at what a lot of these Islamofascist terrorist groups want (the extermination of the Jews from river to sea) not to mention a fairly ludicrous but serious threat to the West: The desire to bring the One True Religion to the rest of us, by force if not by persuasion. Sound like any other religion you can think of? Although that one has civilized itself a lot in the last few centuries.
Check out the stats of what Palestinians elsewhere say about Jews and the desire for peace, consider how many two-state solutions they've turned down, and then tell me they still want peace. A minority do, for sure. And the West Bank is less insane than Gaza.
People will tell pollsters what they think they want to hear, or what they know is politically correct, or they'll virtue signal. Talk is cheap. Action (or inaction) is louder than words.
I'm sorry, Steve, I just don't trust the Palestinians as far as I can throw them. They, and Hamas, represent some of the very worst excesses of violent right-wing dogma, not to mention all the pathologies that come along with it - hatred of women, 'Others', homosexuals, etc. The same people who condemn Donald Trump and the Christian Right jump up and down like excited cheerleaders for Hamas's touchdown on Oct 7. I have long found the Palestinians to be the world's least sympathetic victims and now I feel it even more so.
Israel has a lot to answer for too, but I think a lot of what looks like 'oppression' is actually a need for security. As the article notes, terrorism, violence and anti-Semitism is simply part of the culture. The Vietnamese didn't turn into terrorists and the Americans bombed them a fuckuva lot harder than the Palestinians have been. If anyone should have a hate-on for Americans it's the Japanese, since they're the only people (so far) to have been *nuked* - and that was beyond nightmarish. And yet *they're* not terrorists. Maybe it's because they're not Muslim. In fact, I'd bet my life on it. Islam has some good things going for it, but it's got an ugly cancer they haven't yet addressed for a very, very long time.
"People will tell pollsters what they think they want to hear, or what they know is politically correct, or they'll virtue signal. "
😅 You think people in Gaza are worried about being politically correct or virtue signalling? The same people who overwhelmingly and publicly support sharia law and outlawing homosexuality when polled? In fact, you think virtue signalling in Gaza means calling for peace with Israel rather than the other way around? Who do you think they're trying to impress? Twitter? I see no reason to believe they'd lie. Especially in a way that supported Israel.
People in Gaza have good reason to hate Israel. If you were living there, regardless of what God you believed in, you wouldn't think highly of Israel either. No, I don't think that would turn you or any sane person into a terrorist. And, of course, it hasn't turned ~99% of the people living in Gaza into terrorists either.
So if you want to talk about the problems with Islam as an ideology, fine. I'm right there with you. (of course, you could also talk out the problems with Christianity and Judaism as ideologies, their holy books aren't too friendly towards women and homosexuals either I'll remind you). But just as most Christians and Jews aren't killing people because of the stupid things their holy books say, nor are most Muslims.
You're writing off 2.3 million people because of the actions of a few hundred men. If that. Which, not for nothing, is exactly what Trump did with his Muslim ban. God damn I hate the instinct that makes people do this.
I'm already well-familiar with the past evils of Christianity and Judaism; last night after my arrival at my family's in the States a brief topic of conversation is, "Why We Understand Why Some People Have Hated the Jews." I said anyone who had to live with them in Biblical times sure had good reason, based on the Old Testament. And as a Pagan I can speak up one side and down the other about the evils of Christianity. But...neither of those religions is actively launching terrorist attacks. If you look at the research in that article, it shows rather a lot of support for terrorism, Hamas, laws that hate one people dear to liberals' hearts, etc. Now, maybe those surveys aren't right; I don't know. Surveys aren't the most reliable sources of information, and people will sometimes give what they think is the 'right' answer (or the ones they think will make their people look better to the rest of the world). There's just too much support for terrorism, and I keep thinking of how many times they've turned down a two-state solution. So yeah, I suspect virtue signalling. But I could be wrong.
Not convinced it's just 'a few hundred men', frankly.
It was a given in my military days that when a bomb killed a farmer's daughter all the young men in the village picked up a rifle. That is the big flaw in overkill. How many enemies are created with every kill? Killing non-combatants creates enemies. But even the combatants have people who lived them, even if it is only their mother.
"And I think that Israel recognising and taking active steps to end its part in this mess would go a long, long way to doing that."
It would still take at least a generation. Muslims hold long grudges and the Palis have plenty they want to avenge. I doubt anyone in either territory is more than two degrees of separation from some killed by Israel or by those horrid settlers, who do it for sport.
This is an utterly vile post, painting in such unnuanced broad strokes that it's impossible to reconcile with the thoughtfulness I've seen you exhibit. The savagery you aimed at me in that since-deleted post rolls off after reading this.
My guess is that Hamas' treatment of WOMYN has snapped your chain. Corroborated by the oft-repeated stuff about how badly I would be treated there, being a gay man. Well. I've worked with a lot of Muslims; Palestinians, Pakistanis, Lebanese, and all knew I'm gay and not a one of them gave a damn. But I've already written about nomadic peoples and their infant mortality rates so that's all I have to say about that.
But read your own words:
𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝐼 𝑑𝑜𝑛'𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑒𝑣𝑒 𝑃𝑎𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑠 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑒 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑒. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑡𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎 𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑜𝑐𝑖𝑑𝑎𝑙 𝑣𝑖𝑒𝑤. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦'𝑟𝑒 𝑑𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑏𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑟𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑎𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑒𝑎𝑡ℎ 𝑐𝑢𝑙𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑣𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑢𝑠𝑒𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑎𝑠 ℎ𝑢𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑒𝑙𝑑𝑠.
Word for word, the same lies that Israel spews. Do you really think that every Palestinian loops endlessly on hating Jews? That they don't cook food and love their families and maintain their motorbikes, and everything else people do, but just think "I hate Jews, kill them all" .. every day, all day?
Who says Hamas located their headquarters under a hospital? Israel says so. The same Israel that's been caught in lie after lie after lie. The same Israel that has failed to keep its agreements, the same Israel that elects rabid bigots like Netanyahu and Bennett, but you believe every word.
Yeah, Palestinians hate Israel. This is my shocked face. Israel has been murdering them, stealing their land, bulldozing their homes, shooting them for sport, treating them with cruelty that so exceeds any excuses about self-defense. It would be absolutely and astonishingly unlike humanity if they didn't hate Israel.
Suppose somehow Mexico came into Texas and started demolishing towns and setting up Spanish-speaking settlements and shooting any Americans who weren't happy about it. Would you be calling those Americans "terrorists" and calling them "hateful bigots?" Forget for the moment that they would be repelled by those people whose garages are arsenals. Are you so enraged that Hamas tortured and raped some women that you can't follow the comparison?
I mentioned that Netanyahu promoted Hamas, assuring that the PA would not govern both territories, but it sounds like "Bibi" gets a pass because "HamsterAss." It makes no impression.
And you don't have a word to say about the greatest act of theft in human history or the legitimacy of Palestinian grievances, with only a perfunctory box-check that Israel hasn't been, what was the word, "angelic."
While Justice Minister, Ayelet Shaked (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayelet_Shaked) called for the murder of all Palestinian mothers; this wasn't an overheard remark at a dinner party, this was from the podium in her official capacity. I hope I don't need to point out that Palestinian mothers are women too, but, hey, I guess that doesn't matter. Let me guess, what's the difference between Israeli women and Palestinian women?
I'll come to me soon.
“They love hatred and a genocidal view”
Rubbish.
If you’d buried a child, shot in the back by joyriding Israeli soldiers from a helicopter, would you feel any different?
You’re better than this, Nicole, at least I thought you were.
Funny, I thought a gay gay would have less of a hard-on for people who hate people like him. *I* don't support people who hate me (which the Gazan nuts do), but maybe you're different.
I mean, the shit they did to Israeli women brought a whole new creativity to inflicting pain and degradation during mass rape that must have the Nazis writhing in jealous that they didn't think of it first.
I know the Israelis are no angels either, but I think they could live peaceably without terrorist neighbours. Unfortunately their terrorist neighbours can't live peaceably with them.
An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
You trade in caricatures. Simpleminded ones at that. Like "all Palestinians are terrorists." Or "all Muslims would murder you for being gay." Which makes me wonder how I survived screwing several of them.
Isn't there some vestigial piece of your mind that pauses as you write junk like that?
Hamas' rape and torture of Israeli women seems to have overwhelmed your reason, yet the former Justice Minister calling for the murder of all Palestinian mothers seems to have left no impression.
Pretty hypocritical.
Such excellent observations and writing, Steve. As well as a spell-binding conversation. Thank god for atheists. (warning: humour involved.)
“Because it's always been our strip of land, “
Based on ancient claims that only apply to Israel.
So Jews lived there 3500 years ago SO WHAT. America was occupied by native tribes 250 years ago. They have no claim. South Africa had its own peoples and the Boers just took it.
But as with the nonsense phrase “right to exist,” and just as larcenous “settlements” are exempt from international law, just as the slaughter that was the Nakba went unpunished, Israel is exempt.
But in bombing schools and hospitals, Israel has gone too far
Hey, any speculation why Jews have been historically persecuted? They coexisted with Palestinians before 1948.... not since.
Israel is more “full of itself” than any entity of any scale anywhere on the planet.
It hasn't always been their strip of land. In their own holy book they describe how they entered that land and massacred the people already living in the cities there, but took young women and girls for their "brides".
Recent archeology and DNA analysis shows that the native who met the European immigrants 100% descended from the Clovis peoples who cross the Alaskan land bridge about 13,000 years ago - but that the North and South American continents had already been settled by a differently descended group of people starting more than 20,000 years ago. The Clovis peoples had better technology and larger numbers, causing the original inhabitants of the Americas to be conquered and completely (100%) eliminated, thousands of years before Europeans arrived in a second wave of conquest (which is more recent but much less thorough).
Whoever the ancient Jews might have conquered in moving into Judea and Samaria were almost certainly earlier conquerors of that same land. It's what human tribes do, alas.
How far do we try to unravel history and prehistory and restore the original state of things? We can't give the Americas back to the original inhabitants because the Clovis peoples (now known as "native Americans", "first nations", etc) completely eliminated them. But the Jews could be pushed out of there, and then the Arabs could be pushed out, and we could see if there are any surviving descendants of whoever occupied that land 10,000 years ago.
I can't help but think of other wars, like WWII.
Imagine that we decided that whichever side actually caused fewer casualties to the other side (EVEN IF they killed as many as they had the power to accomplish), has the more just cause and is in the right.
Imagine that the Allied newspapers were publishing photos and stories of the German and Italian babies killed by Allied bombing raids, with heart rending pictures of their grieving relatives collecting the body parts. All of the horrible things described in Palestine happened in Germany and Italy too, as the Allies sought to unseat the dictatorial regimes controlling Germany and Italy. Clearly the conclusion would be that the Allies were in the wrong, and should have agreed to a cease fire before D-Day, leaving the Axis to consolidate their control of the continent.
Imagine suggesting that the Allies cannot bomb the Nazi's out of power, and should instead support the German people in overthowing the Nazi armies. Is that a pragmatic or idealistic alternative?
I cannot be other than sad (no celebrations here) at the losses to all sides, and I see why all sides are angry and vengeful. And also why all sides may feel they have no other alternative than the approach they are taking, that their hands are tied (if they want to be effective in achieving their goals).
I think there is to some degree a naivete born of growing up in a relatively peaceful era (by historic standards) and then without preparation, confronting the horror that is and always has been war.
There is value in comparing "what is" to a more ideal imagined world; otherwise we'd never advance. But if that comparison become too ungrounded in pragmatic reality, it can produce further horrors rather than a more wonderful world.
"Imagine suggesting that the Allies cannot bomb the Nazi's out of power, and should instead support the German people in overthowing the Nazi armies. Is that a pragmatic or idealistic alternative?"
I think this is a pretty troubled analogy.
First, and most importantly, Germany was the sole aggressor in WWII. I won't bore you with a history lesson on the decades long conflict in Israel/Palestine. I'm sure you're aware of it. But the situation in Israel/Palestine is obviously very different to that. The Jews in Germany weren't blockading German civilians for decades or responding to antisemitism with bombardments or claiming that a strip of German land had "always been theirs."
Second, the Germans military and civilian population weren't confined to a single area. With all of their military installations and civilian infrastructure in the same 25-mile stretch of land. Civilians had a realistic route to escape the worst of any bombardments/ground assaults.
And thirdly, it’s not enough to bomb Hamas out of power. They don’t care about being in power or running Gaza. It’s about bombing them out of existence. And I think this is totally unrealistic. Just as unrealistic, in fact as the idea that you could bomb the Nazis out of existence. The Nazis are still alive and well today. Because Nazism is an ideology. They aren't starting a new World War for two main reasons. First, because the conditions that made people desperate enough to support them have ben largely ameliorated. And second, because they lack the support and financing they'd need.
Hamas has neither of these problems. Right now, Israel is compounding the conditions that make Gazans support Hamas beyond anything seen before. And Hamas' financial support is secure and isn't conditional on whether Palestinians vote for them. They'll still attack Israel even if Gaza is completely levelled. Most of Hamas' senior leadership isn't even *in* Gaza.
All that said, if I'd been writing during WWII, I'd have been advocating for peace and diplomacy then too. I'd have been condemning the deaths of civilians, especially when those civilian were the primary casualties of an attack, not "collateral damage" (how I hate that term). And I'd have condemned the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with all the rhetorical force at my disposal. Apparently, in terms of cumulative explosive power, Israel have dropped a similar amount of firepower on Gaza in the past month to the bombings of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Almost all wars end at the negotiating table. It's just a question of how many civilians die first. And given Israel's significant faults in this conflict, I think you can only compare Israel/Gaza to The Allies/Nazis if you ignore a lot of history.
As to Japan and WWII.
I have read detailed accounts of the Japanese surrender process, and whether or not to surrender was hanging by a thread, even after (1) The fire bombing of Tokyo had killed more people than nuclear weapons would, (2) Two fission bombs were dropped with the threat of continuing city by city until surrender, and (3) The USSR had declared war on Japan.
This makes me doubt those who think that a surrender outcome would have obviously happened anyway without the nuclear bombing; I think that's based more on wishful thinking (or desire to support a pre-determined narrative). Was there some talk of it within parts of the government? Yes, the later examination of records reveal that it was discussed in some quarters. Were the advocates of surrender in control of the government? No, they were not, and even after the bombings they barely managed to get their way in the end.
Would the Japanese people have fared worse by not surrendering, and instead fighting it out (leaving out nuclear bombs)? I believe so. Read more about what happened in Okinawa (and other Japanese held islands). Very few surrendered and survived. I think the estimates of well over a million Japanese deaths from resisting a mainland invasion (or from conventional bombs etc along with possible starvation) are well justified; even leaving aside hundreds of thousands of deaths among the Allied soldiers and sailors.
And I think that the American public might have been less motivated to be generous in victory, if the total American deaths from WWII had been increased by 50-100% by the invasion of mainland Japan.
Obviously, we can at best estimate counterfactual history, and cannot run the experiment both ways and compare. But I find the proposition that the fission bombs spared a huge number of Japanese lives as well as those of the Allies to be very credible, even if not certain. Trying to optimize for the immediate ends (avoid the deaths from the atomic bombs) can potentially lead to worse outcomes in the long run (even more deaths from other means).
There are opinions in both directions which cannot be proven. My own take is based on my reading of the arguments on both sides, with no narrative of my own to support (eg: love whatever America does, hate whatever America does). Others are free to hold and defend their own opinions.
I hope this doesn't stimulate a bad reaction, but I wish to respectfully clarify my point.
Analogies are ALWAYS inexact, as no two situations are the same. We use analogies to assert that some fragment of one situation may apply to some fragment of another. A common and easy way to brush aside any analogy, without exception, is to point out some difference in the two cases. The question often not addressed is "how relevant is that difference" to the point being made.
For example, whether bombing is or is not a potentially key component of a strategy to remove an enemy from power does not depend on whether that enemy was the sole aggressor (or was even an aggressor at all). That's not relevant to the facet of the analogy being asserted, any more than the fact the the Nazi's spoke a different language than the Arabs in Gaza. When we shift between "moral justifications" and "military effectiveness" as if they were the same thing, we can get confused. One can assert that (1) bombing Gaza has no military effectiveness (regardless of whether it's morally justified), or that (2) bombing Gaza (whether it is effective or not) is not morally justified. I was addressing the former only in the quoted segment; the latter is a good but different question.
As for the evacuation - again, not very relevant to the question of military effectiveness, but possibly relevant to debates about morality.
Nobody is trying to make a general or broad comparison of Israel/Gaza to Allies/Nazis. I was comparing a SINGLE FACET of one situation to a single facet of anther, and that IS possible by paying attention to history, not ignoring it. I hope the difference is clear.
There is a possibly accidental strawman involved here as well. I'm a fairly rational person, so I never suggested that bombing alone would be sufficient to remove Hamas from power, and I have never seen anybody anywhere so assert, so that's built of straw. Certainly the IDF has no such illusions, or they would have reduced their casualties to near zero by avoiding the bloody ground invasion and just using bombs. The ONLY thing in question (in either side of the analogy) is "can the task be accomplished without bombing" (debatable), not "could it be accomplished by bombing alone" (EVERYONE agrees that it could not).
Can Hamas be completely eliminated by military means (with or without bombing) - every single person? Of course not. Nor can their Islamist radicalism be eliminated from the world. But there is no need to eliminate them, only to greatly reduce their ability to cause harm to others. Can the ability of Hamas (or a successor) to attack Israel be greatly reduced such that it would take at least a decade before they could attempt such an attack again? That might be militarily possible. Hamas has spent over a decade and billions of dollars preparing for this event (financed by diverted aid money, and taxes on tunnel smuggling from Egypt, their main sources of income; and supported by arms from Iran), and their explicit promise to keep doing it could be interrupted/delayed by destroying much of that infrastructure. And it's possible that their support from Iran would dry up in that period of time. That is, they might lack the "support and financing they need" in your words. No guarantees, but it's not an absurd proposition, especially if Israel can in the meanwhile restore their normalization process with Saudi Arabia, which Hamas felt to be an existential threat to their power.
“A common and easy way to brush aside any analogy, without exception, is to point out some difference in the two cases”
Of course. And yes, I’m aware that analogies are never perfect. But I didn’t just brush the analogy aside, I explained, in some detail, why the two situations have almost nothing in common except that civilians are being bombed. Analogies don’t work if the two situations being compared are too dissimilar.
Comparing just the single facet of bombing civilians without acknowledging the enormous differences in why they’re being bombed or what led up to it or what else could be done to avoid it *requires* that you ignore a lot of history. And that history is extraordinarily relevant. It’s not clear to me at all how you think you’re paying attention to it.
For example, I talked about who was the aggressor because it speaks to moral justification. Otherwise, why not talk purely about whether the Nazi’s strategy was militarily effective and ignore everything else? How else were they to achieve their goal of world domination with the fewest Nazi casualties possible?
Yes, bombing is almost always an effective strategy for killing or weakening your enemies. Was that the point you were making though? I don’t think it was. Otherwise an analogy was unnecessary. Israel’s bombs are doing an excellent job of killing Palestinians.
So maybe the question was, “will bombing Gaza into oblivion weaken Hamas’ fighting ability?” And yes, no doubt it will. But then why not go the nuclear route? That would certainly be militarily effective in reducing Hamas’ fighting ability even further. And, of course, the sole reason, which is sadly not persuasive to some in Israel’s military, is that the cost of innocent civilians would be too great to morally defend. War always involves moral considerations.
Even just using conventional weapons, Israel could kill every single person living in Gaza, including all the Hamas members obviously, without a single IDF soldier setting foot in the Gaza Strip. Near 100% military effectiveness. A little shakier on the moral front though.
So no, the only question is not can the task of removing Hamas be accomplished without bombing.
The questions (plural) are, can it be accomplished without bombing and killing 11,000 (and counting) civilians and destroying the homes of over a million? Can it be accomplished by ending the illegal occupation in the West Bank? Can it be accomplished by ending the blockade on Gaza? Can it be accomplished by accepting a two-state solution according to the 1967 borders? Can it be accomplished by convincing Iran to stop supplying weapons and funding to Hamas? Can it be accomplished by relinquishing the idea that one particular piece of land has been reserved for Jews by the creator of the universe?
The answers to many of these questions is on the “probably/yes” end of the spectrum. And none of these options were available to the Allies as they fought the Nazis. This is why I think the analogy is flawed.
> "why not go the nuclear route? That would certainly be militarily effective in reducing Hamas’ fighting ability even further. And, of course, the sole reason, which is sadly not persuasive to some in Israel’s military, is that the cost of innocent civilians would be too great to morally defend."
Could you provide any links to those in the Israeli military who have stated that using nuclear weapons on Gaza would be morally acceptable as a means of eliminating Hamas? I've never seen that but I would like to know about it if true.
Sorry, not in the military, a politician.
https://www.politico.eu/article/israel-minister-amichai-eliyahu-suspend-benjamin-netanyahu-nuclear-bomb-gaza-hamas-war/
Ah. I think I may see what's going on here.
You said "I don't believe Hamas can be bombed out of Gaza."
My basic response was to that specific point, full stop. I was not saying what the best answer was, or who was more moral, or any of the other important issues. I was NOT trying to distill the entire conflict down to one question, I was only addressing that one question on its own.
From your response, I think you may have construed my answer far more broadly than I intended it, and then pushed back on that broad interpretation.
My point is that there is nobody saying that bombing alone could eliminate Hamas as a force to contend with (where by bombing we are discussion the kind which Israel is actually doing and you are critiquing, not some fictional nuclear leveling).
Where there could be different opinions, is whether Hamas can be effectively eliminated without bombing as a part of the effort. That is, there is no "bombing alone" question on the table, but there could be a "bombing plus other things" vs "no bombing, only other things" debate.
Reread the quote from you at the beginning; were you saying that you don't believe that bombing alone can remove Hamas, or that you don't believe that bombing can even be a component of a broader effort to remove Hamas? Since nobody is questioning the former, I thought you were closer to asserting the latter. That seems to be the more respectful interpretation, not the more easily impugned.
You are correct that there are MANY, MANY other questions (including those you list) which also bear on the overall problems, and if you believed my narrowly focused dissent about bombing as a component was attempting to bypass or supercede all of the other considerations, then I can see how you would disagree. I would too. But my intended clarification was much more modest in scope.
Peace.
"And I'd have condemned the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with all the rhetorical force at my disposal."
I am holding in my hand a crude bracelet made of woven solder. The material came from a roll of solder that went into the Hiroshima bomb. I used to have a copper thimble that was also made from stock that went into the bomb, but it is lost. An employee of my grandfather was on the project but I don't know why she gave them to me.
I've seen films of survivors being treated in Japanese clinics. There is one utterly horrifying memory of a young boy whose lips are gone, along with about an inch of flesh around them. He was not blind. It's hard to argue with horror like that.
But I must try. Japan would not have surrendered without the bombs, and would have put ever younger children into uniform for two more years until they were utterly destroyed. I would hate to be the one to make that decision but the bombs ended the war before tens or hundreds of thousands of children would have died.
War imposes grim choices. But that boy's burned-away face haunts me.
"Japan would not have surrendered without the bombs, and would have put ever younger children into uniform for two more years until they were utterly destroyed. I would hate to be the one to make that decision but the bombs ended the war before tens or hundreds of thousands of children would have died."
Opinion is divided on whether Japan would have surrendered or was already in the process of surrendering. I don't know enough to say with real confidence. But I'm not convinced the death toll would have been higher if the bombs hadn't been dropped.
Italy and Germany had surrendered 3 months prior, Japan had been defeated on Okinawa and several other countries had recently declared war on Japan. Would another 200,000 people have been killed before Japan realised it was hopeless? Not to mention the human suffering you allude to. I don't think so.
Please don’t think I’m saying the bombing was justified. I too have read many opinions on how much longer they would have fought.
Those clinic films haunt me.
Fifty years ago (apox) I read Hiroshima by John Hersey. The thoughts of survivors. A compelling book that influenced my views on nuking cities. And yet Lemay boasted that his fire bombing campaign killed more Japanese people than the nukes.
Israel is nothing if not expansionist. The settler movement runs the government and ownership of land is fundamental to personal identity and authenticity in their religion.
As I have said, they plan to expand into indisputable sovereign nations and I doubt the USA will do anything about it, but will continue to send them weapons to kill Syrian and Lebanese. Those countries' defense will be labeled "terrorists" and "gunmen."
As for "antisemitism" and "terrorists" and "Hamas," (HamsterAss, jesus christ), if a kid carries the mutilated corpse of his mother out of the remains of their house, he is not going to grow up pro-Israel. He comes from an honor-driven society and his life will be dedicated to revenge.
I think the problem is 90% Israel and I have pre-48 evidence to support. It is a rogue nation.
Chris, could you name the specific "indisputably sovereign nations" which you believe Israel is intending to expand into? Jordan? Egypt? Lebanon? Syria? Or jump over to Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia? I can think of none that fit your description.
There certainly IS a very troubling settler movement in the West Bank territory, but I don't think it's objective reality to assert that the West Bank is an indisputably sovereign nation.
The Likud charter claims
* all of Lebanon
* all of Syria
* a third of Iraq
* a third of Iran (good luck with that one)
... as Israel, based on some claims from thousands of years ago. And that's just Likud.
Others like Shas and Jewish Home argue for "unlimited" settlement expansion, as in respecting no borders.
I say that any further diplomatic relations with "the state of Israel" should be contingent on removing all settlers from the West Bank; since their original countries don't want them back, they would need to move into Israel, where they would cause NO END of trouble.
Which serves them right.
Chris, could you provide some links to support your assertions regarding what land Likud claims?
I can find things like their original platform:
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/original-party-platform-of-the-likud-party
which would appear to be contrary to your assertions, but perhaps the current charter is much more aggressively expansionistic in the ways that you assert. I'll read any links to a Likud charter you can provide.
While discussion often includes opinions (expert or not), let's start by being clear about the underlying and verifiable objective facts, like the contents of the Likud charter. So let's look together at what the Likud charter you have based your assertions above upon actually says. While I was never any fan of Likud, I have not seen any assertion matching yours, and if validated that could shift my views on the situation. So show us the Likud charter you are referencing.
Wow. What a total mess the article and comments display.
The comments at this time are all from 3 regulars whom I respect, and they are not coming to any semblance of agreement, with each other or with Steve.
This issue is dividing the American left, dividing the America right, and dividing the sometimes more nuanced middle/independent folks, where segments within each can be just as dogmatic and one-sided as the traditional left/right split.
Just like some other political, people are often describing similar values, but applied within a different set of selectively chosen "facts".
It seems pretty idealistic to hope that Palestinians and Israeli's can work out some agreement to bring peace, when the thoughtful intelligent folks in this comment thread are not succeeding, due to just a watered down subset of the issues dividing Israel/Gaza/West Bank.
I have no solution for the region; I can see the forces driving a self-reinforcing cycle of war and hatred but it's hard to discern what could effectively shift that towards a more peaceful coexistence on all sides. But I could try to nuance some particular issues at least. Like examining the hypothesis that Hamas is using civilians as shields. Or comparing what's happening now or stated intentions for the future to the definition of "genocide".
But the comments here are alas not sounding like in general there's a desire to nuance or consider both sides; it feels pretty self-righteously angry and hostile. I'm not seeing much space we we "argue in good faith and look at life from perspectives other than our own." (with "our own" meaning those on the side we are polarized in favor of, whether or not we are personally a member).
As I perceive it, we are not handling this touchy issue any better than the Critical Social Justice ideologues. And that's depressing.
It appears to be from what I've seen so far, one guy with a seriously antisemitic bug up his ass.
No chance you mean anyone but me. of course.
And the best you can do is that tired "antisemitic" trope, the equation of Jews = Israel that has put innocent Jews all over the world in danger because people lile Alan Dershowitz and you insist that any criticism of the policies of the country Israel is nothing more than hatred of Jews.
What simpleminded rubbish.
And since nomenclatural accuracy is a fetish of mine, I need to point out that Semitic peoples are Sephardic Jews (second-class Israelis) and Palestinians, but that the European-descended Jews who rule Israel, as well as the settlers, are not.
I do think you know me well enough to know of my contempt for religions, all of them, as well as the greater contempt for nations that are founded by religious identity. Saudi Arabia has the Shahhadah on its flag; Israel has that stupid star. They can both sink into the ooze as far as I'm concerned.
Not sure why you're so focused on me, maybe it was my reaction to that libertarian fucktard that Anthony brought into our little group, but there are plenty in this discussion who are even less rah-rah Israel than I am.
Israel's solution is clear: expel or exterminate the Palestinians and take all their land as more Israel. This is indisputable. The filling of the WB is already too complete for the two-state solution, and Netanyahu HELPED Hamas to assure that Gaza and the WB were not united under the single leadership of the Palestinian Authority. And Netanyahu knew what they were.
1200 dead Israelis is a small cost for the expansion enabled by promoting the occupation to expanded borders. Gaza will be resettled, the WB will be completely taken, and then it's on to other nations.
Which America will meekly call "unhepful" and the money and weapons will keep coming.
Chris, can we calm down the rhetoric just a bit, among ourselves? I will try as well.
Let's stick to Gaza for the moment. Israel removed all settlements in 2005 (which were never very extensive). The population of Gaza has more than doubled since then. Israel has supplied water and electricity, and treatment of serious medical conditions is often done in Israel. There is a LOT to criticize about Israel's policies towards Gaza, but I have seen zero evidence that Israel is trying to reduce the population of Gaza, much less expel or exterminate them.
What convinces you that Israel is "indisputably" attempting to expel or exterminate the population of Gaza? Please, no yelling or insults, but a link to some factual article supporting your opinion would be appreciated. I'm asking you to support your goal of "championing objective reality", and I'll read any (reasonable length and available) source which supports that opinion.
I do think that the conservative coalition behind Netanyahu desires to take over most of the West Bank, and I think that's a terrible injustice, which many (but not enough) Israelis oppose. I'm asking for clarification about your assertion about Gaza, tho, not about the West Bank.
One problem in the area is that there are two fast growing populations: culturally conservative Palestinians (most of them), and culturally conservative Israelis (now a majority of Israel), both of which tend to have large families.
(True in the US as well; conservatives have larger families on average than modern liberals - but more pronounced in Israel since many of the more conservative parts of the Israeli population come from quite different nations and cultures than the more liberal parts do).
In Israel, this demographic shift is favoring the right side of the spectrum in democratic elections, alas. Israeli citizens whose families migrated from Arabic or Islamic nations tend to be more aggressive in their treatment of Palestinians - and they have no dual citizenship to allow them to happily return to the US or Europe if Israel fails. They have less (if any) faith in a solution of peaceful co-existence, largely due to their own experiences. Meanwhile, generations of Palestinians are growing up with understandable hatred of Israel. It's definitely a tragedy, with no easy solutions.
I think it’s abundantly clear that they are taking all of Gaza, presumably to be resettled, but several spokesmen have said that all Palestinians must leave.
Could you provide a link? In my research of the many, many points from both sides, I have never come across a spokesman for Israel who advocated for Israel even to 'eventually' take over and settle "all of Gaza" after forcing all Palestinians to leave, much less that they are doing so in present tense, but if you can provide some solid evidence that might shift my perspective. I'm astounded that I've never seen even the harsh critics of Israel document such a point, but you may be more familiar with the objective sources so I'm open to one or more links supporting your opinion.
One was talking about each Arab nation taking 20-50,000. On my morning news feed.
OK, so your morning newsfeed included an Israeli spokesman who said that all Palestinians must leave Gaza, and further that the (2-2.5million) residents there should be divided into groups of 20-50K going to each Arab nation?
I'd really appreciate a link to that, so we can cooperatively verify the objective factuality of it. I assume you know where you get your morning newsfeed from, and the time and day you heard that.
But you have said that "several spokesmen" for Israel have stated that all Gazans must leave, so you could provide links to some of the other spokemen's words instead if that's easier.
I'm wondering about their exact words, and their credentials to speak on behalf of the Israeli government.
"The comments at this time are all from 3 regulars whom I respect, and they are not coming to any semblance of agreement, with each other or with Steve."
The symmetry is broken: I say many or most Israelis want to end the occupation and go two-state, Labia says all Palestinians are psychotic terrorists. The fact that they tortured WOMYN seems to have broken something.
I despise the settlers. I'm sure some of them are decent folk but as it happens I have never read or heard a word by one like that. Israel ships them in and sends them right out to the WB, they never even *enter* Israel. And they start making trouble the day they arrive.
OK, so if a future government of Israel were to withdraw all of the settlers in the West Bank (and they have zero settlers anywhere else so that's easy), do you think that Palestinians would allow Israel to exist within its own borders in peace?
Eventually, yes, After at least a generation, likelier two. In the short run, there is too much thirst for vengeance, amply justified. Israelis have gone far past any bounds excusable by self-defense and have killed Palestinians for sport, and when not killing they have been savagely cruel.
In one case soldiers were going house to house looking for some fugitive. While they tore apart a Palestinian woman's bedroom, with no room for anyone to hide, another unzipped his pants and urinated on her carpet. There was a toilet.
On the same search, a tank going down the street took a detour and reasonlessly crushed a man's taxi, destroying his livelihood.
Palestinians have ample reason to despise Israel. They won't forget soon.
Another question of clarification. By "settlers" do you mean the 700,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank? Or do you mean all 9 million Israelis, which is what Hamas and the left in the West calls "settlers"? I suspect the former.
I think a two state solution might have worked in 1948 if the Arabs had accepted that plan, or perhaps in 1967. At this point, I don't see how it could work - it looks to me as if there would be two sovereign states in easy artillery and rocket range of each others, in perpetual full scale war - until it was reduced to one state or zero. In the abstract, a two state solution (or three state variant) seems like (1) the most ideal outcome in the abstract, and (2) a now obsolete fantasy which would end disastrously. And both sides have lots of responsibility for getting into this dilemma.
I believe the WB settler population is 450,000 and that’s who I was talking about.
Both figures could be considered "correct" depending on whether you think the settlers in East Jerusalem to be OK, or part of the same problem as the other 450K outside of East Jerusalem.
450 K in West Bank excluding East Jerusalem
220 K in East Jerusalem
-------
670 K total settlers in West Bank including East Jerusalem
I consider the larger figure to be more relevant to discussion of Israeli settlement on the West Bank. If you have reason to consider the East Jerusalem settlements distinctly less problematic and thus excludable, I will listen. Perhaps I am naive to use the total including East Jerusalem when discussing the settler problem.
The 700K figure was just rounding.
“Just like describing our actions in Gaza right now as "collective punishment" are disingenous. That's not our intention, and it's outside of our control.”
This is such a brazen and contemptible lie I had to stop reading.
Yeah, it’s not our intention. We just can’t help ourselves, that hospital is sitting there just begging for a missile and there’s a rumor that a Hamas person is in the basement.
And, drum roll, we do not intentionally target civilians. Just ask “Bibi.”
It’s collective punishment. Those 5000 dead kids didn’t do 10/7.
The settlements are built on stolen land.
The settlers are verminous rabble.
Netanyahu, Bennett, Lieberman, Shaked... are vile bigots.
And the leveling of Gaza is prelude to resettling it with more unobservant Jewish-descended trash.
Oh, but it’s all “beyond our control.”
How is any of this different from Master Race?
I'll leave issues like the settlers to others. A thing that I have no idea of how to deal with is urban warfare. I was not in Hue in 1968 so my war was rural. I don't know if you are familiar with the Military Grid Reference System (MGRS), it is much like National Grids where geographic locations can be defined in squares.
In that war, we knew where friendly villages, our bases of operation and allied military bases were. We knew where our patrols were operating on a given night. Those grid squares were not subject to artillery Harassment and Interdiction (H&I) fire. It was a big help in reducing fratricide and killing friendlies. One night some of our short rounds hit a friendly village. I was corporal of the guard for a section of the perimeter capable of firing on the road from the village. It looked like a medieval move as they came down the road with flashlights like torches while chanting something i could not understand. Field phone jingling, "hold your fire!" They were bringing us their wounded. We medevac'd them to 1st Med Battalion in Danang. The key factor in this is that we had a pretty good way of determining who was who. Farmers wore black pajamas, but they didn't carry AK-47s.
How can the Israelis map 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘭𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘯-𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘣𝘢𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘵 grid squares that they will not hit when the hostiles/enemy is collocated with them? Keep in mind that I include non-combatants with friendlies. I have no idea of how to deal with that. Perhaps a veteran of urban fighting could chime in on how we dealt with it in their experience. It is completely outside my experience, and I don't know how doctrine applies. Where should the line be drawn? There is a grey area between morality (as if there can be morality in war) and pragmatism. The Israelis are in an untenable position.
It has been nearly twenty years since I read, "The Sling and The Stone, On war in the 21st Century" by Colonel Thomas X. Hammes, USMC. Perhaps it is time to read it again. As I remember it, it addressed this, but I don't remember what it said.
You'll hear a lot about Hamas using civilians as "human shields," and about caching military ordnance in hospitals and schools so that innocents are killed in destroying it.
Given how many times Israel has been caught lying (read fast, because those news stories have a funny way of vanishing and leaving no history), there is ample reason to doubt the truth of this claim. The BBC recently exposed a clear case of architected falsehood, a gun layin atop an MRI machine suddenly being two guns after Israel had evacuated it. It's all staged.
As the bombing of Gaza has shown, Israel doesn't give a shit about innocent lives. They never have. As a fetus acquires humanity at birth, a person acquires humanity by being Jewish. To kill a non-Jew is not murder under the Israeli right's view, a position unapologetically detailed in this 2009 bestseller: https://www.dohainstitute.org/en/ResearchAndStudies/Pages/The_Kings_Torah_and_the_Killing_of_Palestinians.aspx
If you knew about how Israel treats the Palestinians then you would not find the desire to erase Israel at all remarkable. And the settlers are the very worst. They're like the neighbors who kill your pets and put an M80 in your mailbox. They murder the people who have lived there for centuries with no reprisal and even the best of them are nuisances. There is no argument anyone can make about Israel's "terrorist" neighbors or their hatred of Israel that doesn't fall apart the moment you learn about the settlements.
A Palestinian family gets its door kicked in; they have five minutes to evacuate before their house is bulldozed, and anyone still inside will be crushed. making room for trailers for Russian rabble or luxurious condominiums for wealthy American Jews.
Settlement construction is a big business.
If you'd buried your children, shot in the back from helicopters, you'd want Israel destroyed too.
Sure, many Israelis are decent people who want the occupation ended. But they aren't running the country, the settler movement does that, just as MAGA runs the GOP.
And after Gaza is resettled and the West Bank is full, next up are Lebanon and Syria, which even the Likud Party claims as Israel, while Shas and Jewish Home accept no limits anywhere. Respecting no borders. Just wait:
"Lebanese terrorists"
"I stand with Israel"
"Lebanese gunmen" <——> "Israeli self-defense"
America should end diplomatic relations with "the state of Israel" and shift the aid to the people being exterminated, and make any further relations conditional on emptying the settlements and putting several dozen members of the Israeli right on trial in The Hague.
My question was specific. The video that I've seen shows the fighting taking place in a highly populated area. Leaving human shield accusations aside, Hamas and non-combatant Palestinians are in the same space.
When I see a video of a bunker buster being used to blast the bottom out of talk buildings, collapsing then into their footprint, it is said that there was a Hamas command center in it, with an unmentioned mostly not Hamas in it. Assuming that the command center was in it, is destroying the whole building the right thing?
Population centers and their infrastructure are being destroyed, making the place unlivable. That seems to be beyond going after Hamas. Ignoring words, with my own eyes I see widespread destruction and airburst WP over population centers. I wouldn't burn a house down to kill a mouse.
My question pertains to how, and I'm not saying human shield, do you fight in that environment? I am ignoring good guys vs bad guys and focusing on friend or foe where I treat non-combatants as friend. The conduct of warfare in and urban setting. How it is being conducted, rather than why?
"My question pertains to how, and I'm not saying human shield, do you fight in that environment?"
Your military knowledge far exceeds mine, but I think the most enlightening way to answer this question is to ask what Israel would do if those "unmentioned mostly not Hamas" were Israeli instead of Palestinian civilians. I think there's still a point at which they'd accept those casualties. But I think they'd be far more likely to hit targets like that with troops instead of bombs in that instance. Troops allow for a degree precision and restraint that bombs don't.
Military forces have claimed that civilian-filled targets were covers for military infrastructure forever. There's no way to confirm which claims are true and which are false. But I don't know what military target, especially in a place like Gaza, justifies over 4000 dead children.
"Military forces have claimed that civilian-filled targets were covers for military infrastructure forever. There's no way to confirm which claims are true and which are false. "
I think "false" is a far safer presumption.
While it was training for riot control it would also apply to counter insurgency. "They are your fellow Americans. Use the minimum force necessary, but all that is necessary." The uncomfortable meaning is clear. I can never forget those words.
Read the book link I posted and the morality will become clear.