BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 06:13 AM

In April 2022, there were 4,450 Palestinian security prisoners in Israeli prisons – including 160 children, 32 women, and over 1000 "administrative detainees" (indefinitely incarcerated without charge).

Releasing the hostages unilaterally will not alleviate the violence and tension. It would be seen as a defeat by Hamas and will serve to stoke up further tension. So how how about negotiating a prisoner exchange? Both sides are holding citizens of the other side completely unjustly. Stop the shooting and get round that table...

From Wikipedia

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Nov 23 - 08:20 PM

Defending itself. I can barely bring myself to watch, day after day, Israel exercising its "right to self-defence."

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Nov 23 - 06:38 PM

Paywall.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Nov 23 - 03:26 PM

And let's not overlook the fact that most of the dead civilians in Gaza were killed by the IDF, and let's never overlook the history.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Nov 23 - 08:30 AM

Excellent point.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Nov 23 - 06:17 AM

Hamas started this particular episode, true enough, with horrendous and inhuman attacks on civilians. Why I keep saying look at the history is because individual outrages, and this was one of the worst ever, can't be seen in isolation. I'm not saying let's look for excuses for Hamas's action. There aren't any. I am saying that the tragic history of the region, particularly the most relevant last three-quarters of a century, puts every single outrage in a wider context. Study the history to get a balanced view. Ignore the history and you'll take sides. I could, for example, take the low road and pick out a single incident to further my prejudice. How about the refugee camp massacres in Lebanon in 1982, the responsibility for which was pinned on a man who later because an Israeli prime minister who went on to trigger an intifada via his provocation at the Wailing Wall. That's the easy, lazy and risky approach, and that's what people like Netanyahu wants us to do. We won't, and should never, forgot the horrors of October, even though Bibi would rather we forgot dozens of other outrages.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 08:47 PM

Thanks, Maggie.

An odd thing about the last three weeks, ironic even, given how far apart the factions now are, is the greatly increased frequency of mentions of that two-state solution that, until now, has looked as far away as ever. Maybe it still does, but who knows how things might pan out after the current tumult. I'm pretty confident that Netanyahu's days are numbered, and he won't be back once he's sidelined as he's being confronted with potential criminal proceedings (where have we seen that before...). Whether his vicious hard-right regime will crumble with him is another matter. Had it been my lot to have spent my long life as an Israeli citizen rather than a Brit, having lived through conflict after conflict, knowing that my near-neighbours in Palestinian areas have never lived happily, that I'm currently unable to sleep at night, living in constant fear for my family's wellbeing and security, I think I'd be wanting something very different for Israel when all this has passed. I've always harboured a faint hope that the ordinary citizens of Israel will one day come to feel that way and stop listening to the crop of leaders they've had for so long who persuade them that their hostile neighbours all around are to blame for absolutely everything. Ironically again, maybe Bibi is accelerating the coming of that sentiment.

(Cloud cuckoo land again, Stephen. But hope springs eternal...)

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 06:04 PM

"Israel admits bombing a community called Jabalia. News reports are describing it as a 'refugee camp'.There's a word picture for you. But Wikpedia describes it as a 'city' of over 170,000 people in the northern area where Israel urged evacuation.

Images on CNN sure look like a city to me."

So let's not let the facts get in the way of what's looking dangerously like prejudice... Jabalia is a large town a couple of miles from Gaza City, right? Jabalia refugee camp is just that, a refugee camp, adjacent to Jabalia but NOT Jabalia. It's very large and it's been a refugee camp for many years.

"Israel urged evacuation." Sure. Tens of thousands of people in northern Gaza were not able to evacuate. They were in hospital, or they have family members in hospital, or were disabled, or they had no transport or fuel for transport, or the roads to the south were wrecked by shelling. Let's blame all those people for failing to evacuate and remaining behind to be bombed, people in a refugee camp that is the single most overcrowded spot on the planet. This is easy knowledge to obtain, it took me five minutes, and it's knowledge that the Israeli regime possessed as they ordered the bombing.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 05:16 PM

"Either way?" I don't think so! A Guardian-reading Palestine-sympathiser from afar like me is far more likely to call for hostage release than a Gazan citizen embittered by weeks of Israeli bombardment and previous decades of Israeli repression, especially when there's a good chance that a friend or relative is imprisoned in Israel without trial. Or worse. As I said, I don't know anyone here who wants Hamas to keep the hostages, but I think I'd fully sympathise with millions of Gazans who don't give a shit about them, right or wrong. I'll be checking some of the details of your interpretation of the history too...

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 02:31 PM

You didn't say Palestinians. You said supporters of Palestinians.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 11:35 AM

"Just to repeat what I wrote some time ago, I don't hear any supporters of Palestinians shouting 'Release the Hostages!'l

Well I'm supporter of Palestinians and I do. And so does everyone else I ever speak to about this. Hostage-taking is a vile war crime.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 11:27 AM

"It would all be over if Hamas lays down its arms.

Like the Nazis did.

Of course, Israel could call a halt too."

You want Hamas to lay down its arms, but you only want Israel to call a halt.

How's about Hamas calls a halt and Israel calls a halt?

You can destroy the manifestation of Hamas that is currently in charge in Gaza. Or drive them out. To be really effective, just destroy Gaza completely. But I think you're missing something, and, again, it's a lesson that history teaches us. Resistance movements arise when a people is subjugated, repressed, discriminated against, persecuted. It's easy enough to find out why we even have a Hamas and Hezbollah. Look it up. By the way, as recently as 2019 Netanyahu stated that Hamas were useful because two dissenting Palestinian factions allowed him all the more easily to divide and rule (his sentiments, not his words). Well that's come back to bite him and the unfortunate citizens of Israel big time. He's a massive part of the problem.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 10:42 AM

I'm not going to play tit-for-tat with you here. I have never supported any of Hamas's war crimes and I don't need to be constantly told what I've already said many times about Hamas's inhumanity. Hamas's aggressive actions against Israelis are unjustified and repugnant. But what I hear from apologists for the Israeli regime all the time is excuses for the thousands of civilian deaths THEY cause. THEY shell the schools, hospitals, places of worship and UN installations. THEY are careless of the death and misery being meted out to Gazans. The sheer numbers testify to that. They say that Hamas uses human shields. Gaza is tiny and grossly overcrowded. You can't shoot at Gaza without risking civilian casualties in their thousands. Hamas may well be using human shields. But it's the first thing Israel says every time there's a conflict and it's meant as a deflection from the horrors they are perpetrating. If you shoot at me, an innocent, and kill me, you don't get to blame me for getting in your way when it was you who pulled the trigger.

And what you never hear: Bedouin farming communities are being driven from their land in the occupied West Bank by extreme right-wing settlers in rapidly-increasing numbers since this war started, some even being murdered, with the connivance, even encouragement, of the Netanyahu regime. The eyes of the world aren't on that at the moment, of course, because of the current conflict, so it proceeds apace. Just another thing, eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 07:47 AM

And by the way:

"It is a war crime to target civilian areas simply to kill civilians or to destroy civilian morale."

It's a war crime to not take every possible step to protect civilians from harm, whichever side you're on. Even if you suspect that your enemy is using human shields, it's a war crime to shoot at them.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 07:35 AM

Well a few things first. I hope that "partisan claims" is not directed at me. You're clearly a supporter of the Israeli regime (though not necessarily of its current actions, though you do seem to be excusing things that a true neutral probably wouldn't), and as such you should be wary of pointing the finger at folks who could well be less "partisan" than you. I'm very careful as to where I get what information I can about this conflict and I'm trying hard to see things from the point of view of non-combatant civilians (if we ever get the old thread back you'd see that I said that a lot of times). My view of the two enemies in the conflict is that they are both inhumanly repugnant. I can't say equally so because they are repugnant in different ways. I'm not going to make any excuse for Hamas and I'd like to think that no-one is any longer making excuses for the slaughter and thoroughly inhuman treatment of Gaza citizens.

"White phosphorous [sic] is indeed outlawed when used intentionally against civilian targets. Its use for smoke screens, for illumination, in tracer rounds, and against military targets, however, is perfectly legal."

White phosphorus shells were used on more than one occasion in the first week of this conflict over the port of Gaza (Human Rights Watch). It is not possible to use this in densely-populated areas without a dire threat to civilians. Contact with this material results in horrific, deep burns. It's not conceivable that its use in that part of Gaza was legal.

A single shell containing cluster bomblets can spread its load of bomblets over 57 acres. Again, use of cluster munitions in heavily-populated areas wantonly threatens civilians and can never be justified, i.e., it's illegal.


"

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Oct 23 - 07:00 PM

There is a history of violence going back much further than the Israel/Hezbollah conflict you refer to. Whilst everything in the Middle East is connected to everything else, that conflict is just a tad peripheral to the present Israel/Gaza conflict, as it directly involved Hezbollah and Israel alone. Israel didn't even declare war on Lebanon, though they blighted the place with millions of cluster bomblets which killed hundreds of people long after the conflict, and used white phosphorus munitions, both illegal under international law.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Oct 23 - 04:24 PM

Two voices. First, the UK home secretary Suella Braverman. In words that will anger some peace campaigners, the home secretary said “tens of thousands of people” had taken to the streets and had “chanted for the erasure of Israel from the map”.

Speaking after a Cobra meeting chaired by Rishi Sunak, Braverman said: “We’ve seen now tens of thousands of people take to the streets following the massacre of Jewish people, the single largest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust, chanting for the erasure of Israel from the map.

“To my mind there is only one way to describe those marches: they are hate marches.”

Her words appear to be a reference to the chant “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”.

Second, Nowar Diab, a young student from Gaza City who has been forced to flee with her family four times in the last/three weeks and who has lost two friends:

...One thing that has recently given me hope in the face of the tragedy that has become our lives here in Gaza. It is the pictures of hundreds of thousands of people standing up for us and protesting in our name – demonstrations held in the streets of cities across the world, from Algiers and Istanbul to London and Washington DC. The kindness of strangers, often thousands of miles away: this pulls us out of that feeling of hopelessness. Seeing this, I cannot help my eyes filling with tears. It shows people care and our suffering is felt.

...Seeing people of all ages and from all communities descend on the streets of London last weekend proved that our cries were not in vain. We are heard. The world is watching. And our fellow humans are standing up for us by opposing this war.

...My message to those people of Britain – who will stand up for us yet again today by attending peaceful demonstrations held in London and other cities– is a simple word of thanks. You restore my faith in humanity – each time you march in our name and call for peace, each time you chant for a free Palestine and a better world, and with every sign, banner and flag that you wave in our support.

...You give us hope for a better, fairer world.

The Guardian is the source for both extracts. I know who I'd rather listen to.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Nov 23 - 05:42 AM

I agree about BBCWS. I read the i newspaper, as well as listening to the BBCWS. I like the way the i reports news without the bias and spin of the Right- and Left-supporting publications. I still trust BBCWS but I’m not sure how it might go in the future.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Nov 23 - 10:26 AM

John 11:35

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Nov 23 - 07:54 AM

Source(s)?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 10:06 AM

Thompson, check out my post of 01 Nov 23 - 05:21 AM which contains a link to a Blickifier which handles lengthy links properly. You can save it as a Favourite. I use it every time I need to create a Blicky.

I like proper, working Links, because I like to understand precisely where information is coming from, and whether a poster’s ‘interpretation’ of the piece linked to jives with my own.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 07:27 AM

Here’s a link to the piece from Haaretz about solitary confinement, Thompson.

Thanks for those links.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 01 Nov 23 - 05:21 AM

”Using a link rather than blickifier because of the blick's problem with long links.)”

Thompson, you could try using thIs Mudcat Simple Linkifier - I’m pretty sure it takes care of the long link problem. You can save the Simple Linkifier as a favourite.

Here are your links from above…

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/31/un-official-resigns-israel-hamas-war-palestine-new-york

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/31/russian-soldiers-accused-of-killing-family-of-nine-in-ukraine

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Nov 23 - 11:35 AM

Robomatic, just saw your post. I am the nation or the prime minister of Israel when the 7 October attack by Hamas happens, what will I do? Interesting question.
I know what I won't do, and it's kill 5,000 children and 7,000 adults (on today's figures) in revenge and destroy an entire nation with bombing. This does not seem to me an intelligent response, apart from being batshit psycho crazy.
Since Mossad and Shin Bet are supposed to be able to track anyone down, and according to Israel's own account they know where every Hamas member is at all times, and know all about every bit of tunnelling, I suppose I would send these spy groups to find the killers and bring them in, and then put them on trial, as well as requesting that this government be tried by the International Criminal Court. And of course they'd be able to find the hostages and bring them home.
Speaking for myself (not as a pretend nation or prime minister but just as an ordinary person), I was unutterably horrified by the Hamas raid and the taking of hostages.
The smashing of an entire society, killing of journalists so there are no witnesses, the bombing of desalination plants to deprive people of water, the starving of hospitals of power so that premature babies in incubators and people on dialysis and in intensive care die is so far beyond horror that this empathy has not died away, but has been concealed behind a greater disgust and rage.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 23 - 05:30 PM

Robomatic, what exactly do you mean by "what would you do", please?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 23 - 09:15 AM

Well worth watching The Fog of War, Donuel.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 12 Nov 23 - 12:44 AM

The Israelis have succeeded in drawing Hamas into the open - they're fighting in the streets outside - by bombing around the largest hospital in Gaza.

Meanwhile in America, a politician has called openly for genocide.

The stories get madder. There's one going around, which I can scarcely believe, that 100 Israeli doctors called for the bombing of Gaza hospitals. Another that premature babies have started to die as the hospital runs out of power.

And no, these stories don't make me a Hamas supporter. They make me a peace supporter.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Nov 23 - 11:52 AM

I'm not sure how it might go in the future either. I stopped listening to BBC Radio 4 (the former "Home Service") a few years ago when it became chokingly jingoistic; maybe it's stopped that now, but at the time every second word was "British" and it stuck in my throat.

BBC online news is reporting a demonstration by 300,000 people in London against the war today. Also this mind-numbingly tragic story, which brings home the horror of the 11,000 dead. When it was 10,000 dead, 4,000 of the dead were children. Doctors are saying that the majority of the wounded are children.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Nov 23 - 02:45 AM

BBC World Service is a good radio station, at the moment. Who knows what will happen to it with the current UK government in control, but right now it tells the news straight from all around the world. You can hear it on online radio aggregators like TuneIn Radio Pro.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 10 Nov 23 - 01:15 AM

BBC World Service news reported an Israeli statement that these "humanitarian" pauses will not be allowed to be used to bring in humanitarian aid.
Meanwhile, here's Oxfam on the whole "humanitarian pause" concept.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 08 Nov 23 - 12:27 AM

Has your child ever been in hospital?

In Gaza, there's no clean water - the pipes have been bombed - and no medical supplies. Medical staff describe a scene worse than any battlefield, patients with worms coming out of wounds even after they operate.

40% of those killed were children; presumably 40% of patients crushed when their homes were bombed and hit by shrapnel and bullets are also children.

This war will shame Israel among the nations forever.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 07 Nov 23 - 04:26 AM

Jewish activists took over the Statue of Liberty yesterday asking for the attacks on Gaza to stop. The phrase on the banner - "Never again for anyone" dates back to the Holocaust.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 04 Nov 23 - 05:12 AM

I don't think so, Steve. People are in grief.
Governments, that's another matter.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 08:42 AM

Thanks!

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 07:12 AM

Sorry, I mis-copied one of those blickies.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 07:11 AM

Looks about right; from August in Haaretz:

The number of Palestinian administrative detainees as of August 1 stood at 1,201 – the highest number recorded since human rights organizations began collecting monthly data in 2001.
Administrative detainees are held under a procedure defined as “preventive detention,” which is based on intelligence that is not disclosed to the detainees or their lawyers. There are no evidentiary court hearings for their cases and the detainees’ lawyers are not privy to evidence against them, other than a short summary presenting the suspicions against their clients…
According to Prison Service figures, 5,014 Palestinians are currently incarcerated in Israeli prisons, 2,353 of whom have been tried and sentenced. A further 1,460 are defined as detainees whose legal proceedings are ongoing, while the remainder are administrative detainees. In addition to the Palestinian administrative detainees, there are currently eight Jews detained under administrative orders – the highest number in years.

Also from https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2022-02-24/ty-article/.premium/israels-prisons-hold-thousands-of-inmates-in-solidary-confinement-some-for-years/0000017f-f591-d318-afff-f7f3c7250000 is a piece on the use of solitary confinement (regarded as torture in civilised countries):

According to figures provided by the prison service, in the first ten months of 2021, 1,587 inmates, among them 66 minors, had been held in complete solitary confinement. In that same year, by the end of August, another 1,134 prisoners, 53 of whom were minors, were held in “individual seclusion,” or “two-person seclusion.”

And from last week, no, last month, 22 October, also Haaretz:

Before the war, Israel held close to 5,000 Palestinian prisoners. Over 1,000 of these were held without trial. Almost 200 of them are minors. A large portion of these are political prisoners. A majority of them are serving draconian sentences, handed down in the spirit of the judicial methods of the so-called military justice system.
To these were added more than 1,000 Palestinians that Israel abducted in the West Bank only over the last two weeks, as well as an unknown number of armed men from Gaza and thousands of other Gazan residents. The release of most, if not all of them, is now required, unless it is decided to abandon the hostages and leave them to their fates.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 03 Nov 23 - 06:00 AM

Have the hostage releases that have happened alleviated the violence and tension?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 02 Nov 23 - 08:10 PM

From the New York Times today:

The Israeli military said that in its strikes on Jabaliya it had been targeting Hamas commanders who played key roles in the attacks on Oct. 7, which Israeli officials said killed more than 1,400 people. The military also said that Hamas had an extensive tunnel network in Jabaliya.
On Wednesday, Dr. Abu Safyia said, he was working with a colleague in the hospital’s neonatal intensive-care unit — one of two units that still had power amid a severe fuel shortage — when casualties from Jabaliya started arriving.
When they rushed down to the emergency room to help, he said, his colleague was stunned to see that two of her own children were among the dead. Her 9-year-old and 7-year-old had been killed in their home, he said, along with several of her siblings and relatives.
“We are working at a place where at any moment we expect our children, spouses, siblings or friends to come in in pieces,” he said.
Some children could not be identified because of the severity of their injuries, he said. The hospital’s morgue was so full that people were stacking bodies on top of one another.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 01 Nov 23 - 08:23 AM

The problem both with Israel's invasion of Gaza and the attack on an Israeli plane in Dagestan is that both murderous attacks are against the wrong people.
Same with the Hamas attack on Israelis.
Hamas attacked random Israelis because of the illegal settlements gradually grabbing increasing amounts of Palestinian land.
The State of Israel then attacked and is attacking random Palestinians in revenge.
The Dagestan crowd sought to attack random passengers coming from Israel in revenge.
The old saying "If you plan revenge, dig two graves" is out of date. Now it should be "If you plan revenge open a whole cemetery for people who were never involved in the first place".

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 01 Nov 23 - 01:44 AM

The director of the New York office of the UN high commissioner for human rights has left his post - “The current wholesale slaughter of the Palestinian people, rooted in an ethno-nationalist colonial settler ideology, in continuation of decades of their systematic persecution and purging, based entirely upon their status as Arabs … leaves no room for doubt.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/31/un-official-resigns-israel-hamas-war-palestine-new-york

(Using a link rather than blickifier because of the blick's problem with long links.)

Meanwhile, white phosphorous: why should anyone argue about whether napalm, white phosphorous, killer gases, etc, are "legal". They're murder.

And in Ukraine, also from The Guardian, a group of Russian soldiers killed a family, using machine guns with silencers, because the family refused to give them their house.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/31/russian-soldiers-accused-of-killing-family-of-nine-in-ukraine

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Thompson
Date: 30 Oct 23 - 06:06 PM

Oh lord, so so sorry to hear that that poor girl is dead. My hands were clenched into my palms hoping for her safety.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 04:19 PM

Either way. Where's the outrage?

One more curious point. Israel admits bombing a community called Jabalia. News reports are describing it as a "refugee camp." There's a word picture for you. But Wikpedia describes it as a "city" of over 170,000 people in the northern area where Israel urged evacuation.

Images on CNN sure look like a city to me.

So why not free the hostages? Why not surrender, end the violence, and turn Gaza over to the Palestinian National Authority/ Fatah, which Hamas violently drove from Gaza? I assume it's largely because the PLA hasn't called for wiping Israel off the map.

I have no skin in this game, and no influence over it, but I think I can fairly judge the relative virtues of the belligerents.

You know, a lot of lives would have been saved - French and Belgian civilian lives too - if the Allies had given Hitler a black eye at Stalingrad or on D Day and declared peace.

I don't think that would have been the best idea.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 01:49 PM

Sorry, Stilly, but there's nothing in the CBS article about any Palestinians calling for the release of hostages.

It was a mainly Jewish group calling for a ceasefire.

Hardly the same thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 10:35 AM

It would all be over if Hamas lays down its arms.

Like the Nazis did.

Of course, Israel could call a halt too.

Like the Allies didn't do in 1944.

Any government's first responsibility is to defend and protect its citizens. That's what Israel is doing and Hamas is not, regardless of politics. Hamas is pledged literally to wipe Israel off the map and replace it with a Muslim theocracy. Israel is not sworn to wipe Gaza off the map or to kill Palestinians. Israel withdrew its troops and settlements from Gaza in 2006. Hamas has been in charge since then.

Are both sides "equally to blame" for the current situation?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 10:21 AM

Just to repeat what I wrote some time ago, I don't hear any supporters of Palestinians shouting "Release the Hostages!"

Not even in countries where they could do so quite safely.

Why is that?

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 09:56 AM

No, Steve, I didn't mean you.

Was the WP used to kill civilians? What was it used for, and what did it do? Use of white phosphorous shells is not in itself prohibited.

And whatever one might think of them, cluster bombs are still legal - unless you have more detailed information about the Convention than I do. The Convention specifically allows cluster munitions of certain sizes anyway.

Moreover,

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/4/3/why-we-need-to-challenge-russias-human-shields-narrative

"According to international law, using human shields constitutes a war crime, while the party responsible for the death of human shields is not the one killing them – if the attack is proportionate – but instead, the one deploying them."

Hamas consciously brought this on themselves and their people to generate international outrage against Israel. In this they have been remarkably successful - even though their eight-hour spree of murder, arson, rape, and torture on Israel was absolutely a series of crimes.

According to CNN, even in "peacetime," Hamas lobs two or three rockets a day into Israel. Hamas has explicitly pledged to destroy Israel and its Jewish citizens.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Oct 23 - 10:29 PM

I'm not a scholar of international law, but it's all more complicated than partisan claims suggest.

White phosphorous is indeed outlawed when used intentionally against civilian targets. Its use for smoke screens, for illumination, in tracer rounds, and against military targets, however, is perfectly legal.

Whether Israel used WP against civilians in Lebanon is disputed. If an international body like the World Court was ever sufficiently persuaded to bring charges, I haven't seen mention of it.

The Convention on Cluster Munitions doesn't "outlaw" cluster bomblets. Their use against certain military targets, in fact, remains legal under international law.

Instead, signatories to the Convention simply pledge not to employ certain munitions of that kind. Israel, however, along with Russia, China, India, the United States, and a few other countries, is not a signatory.

If someone uses cluster munitions against a non-signatory nation, that non-signatory has no ground for protest or action under international law; however, it is not restrained from using such weapons itself when it deems them "necessary."

As for civilian targets in general: it is a war crime to target civilian areas simply to kill civilians or to destroy civilian morale. It's not a war crime, however, if civilians die in attacks on legitimate military targets.

Equally interesting is that it is very much a war crime to place military forces or assets in a civilian area to use the residents as human shields. Such military targets have always been legitimate under international law, and any resultant civilian harm is the responsibility of the defending forces.

When civilians are harmed, defenders can always charge they were targeted intentionally. (The word "genocide" is often bandied about in such cases.)

Current international law requires that reasonable measures be taken to minimize civilian casualties. Of course, what measures are "reasonable" in a given circumstance may be a matter of opinion, and many people don't recognize or won't heed warnings. Moreover, if legitimately targeted enemy forces would be alerted, a warning isn't required.

Stakes are high on the world stage, so both sides exaggerate or lie when convenient. It's often difficult to determine whether a war crime has occurred until there's a verdict by a duly appointed international tribunal.

In 1864 General W. T. Sherman wrote that "War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it." Later attempts to mitigate the cruelty have had real but very limited success.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 19 Nov 23 - 07:37 PM

Steve:But if you want to accuse Hamas of specific bad actions, such as hiding bags of weapons in hospitals, etc., you need much better evidence than likely put-up-job IDF staged photos.

I am not looking to provide evidence. You, yourself said: there is, or has been, a considerable Hamas presence in the hospital.

This, from your own words, makes the hospitals a valid target!

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 19 Nov 23 - 12:42 PM

Steve: "I'm not denying that there is, or has been, a considerable Hamas presence in the hospital. That would be a war crime. So is the deliberate targeting of a hospital by the IDF."

Once you have accepted that Hamas have (or have had) a considerable presence in the hospital then the war crimes are those of Hamas.

From The Guardian

Article 8 of the Rome statute, which established the international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague, defines a long list of war crimes including “intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science or charitable purposes, historic monuments, hospitals and places where the sick and wounded are collected”.

But it makes an exception if the targets are “military objectives”. Philip-Gay said that “if a civilian hospital is used for acts harmful to the enemy, that is the legal term used”, the hospital can lose its protected status under international law and be considered a legitimate target. Nevertheless, if there is doubt as to whether a hospital is a military objective or being used for acts harmful to the enemy, the presumption, under international humanitarian law, is that it is not.

Subject: RE: BS: Hamas attacks Israel - part II
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Nov 23 - 12:59 PM

Donuel: "Nuremberg sentences for those not executed were watered down within a short time. That court introduced the word genocide."

The Nuremburg Court was established in November 1945.
The word Genocide was coined in 1944 (according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum)

I may not always agree with Steve, but I do try to stick to facts.