Today's discussion about the news

rick_chasey

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

rjsterry

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

By making them irrelevant.

rick_chasey

rjsterry said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

By making them irrelevant.

Now, hang on, that's not the discussion here.

Right, we can argue about the strategy about whether destroying hamas is worth the effort.

But they are doing that, and I don't really know how their critics expect the IDF to conduct their war without blowing sh!t up.

I mean, we are talking about the most sophisticated tunnel system ever constructed for a war and a foe that literally hides itself inside civilian infrastructure.

briantrumpet

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

pblakeney

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

Anyway, Israel has found a new hospital to drive tanks into and a new UN school to bomb.

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

That certainly appears to be the case.

rick_chasey

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

rjsterry

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

By making other options more attractive and thereby them irrelevant. But that is quite a long term thing.

TheBigBean

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

You're not a fan of international law then?

pblakeney

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

rick_chasey

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

You're not a fan of international law then?

That's entirely allowed according to international law. "reasonable efforts" does a lot of lifting when it comes to the army avoiding civilian casualties.

Have a read on urban and tunnel warfare and how best to conduct it. For example, it's safer for the attacker to literally blow up a hole in the wall than it is to go through the door, and safer still to blow the whole building up with a tank/plane.

Come on, show a bit of imagination here. You'd not survive very long if you go knocking on doors and introducing yourself to the enemy.

rick_chasey

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

*this is the problem with Hamas tactics*. There is a reason why human shields are actually against international law. Hiding behind civilians just encourages the enemy to reasonably assume civilians are potential threats and civilian infrastructure houses the enemy. Which, let's be real, in Gaza is almost entirely the case, as they're hardly operating our of barracks or military bases, are they?

Very happy to agree that the strategy of waging war against hamas is not going to achieve the long term strategic objective of peace in the area, but this idea the IDF can somehow effectively conduct an operations without blowing most of gaza up is up there with believing the world is flat.

TheBigBean

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

You're not a fan of international law then?

That's entirely allowed according to international law. "reasonable efforts" does a lot of lifting when it comes to the army avoiding civilian casualties.

Have a read on urban and tunnel warfare and how best to conduct it. For example, it's safer for the attacker to literally blow up a hole in the wall than it is to go through the door, and safer still to blow it up with a tank/plane.

Come on, show a bit of imagination here. You'd not survive very long if you go knocking on doors and introducing yourself to the enemy.

They are not the rules for engagement in a hospital.

Israel and Hamas are routinely criticised for their breaches of international law. Neither cares.

rick_chasey

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

You're not a fan of international law then?

That's entirely allowed according to international law. "reasonable efforts" does a lot of lifting when it comes to the army avoiding civilian casualties.

Have a read on urban and tunnel warfare and how best to conduct it. For example, it's safer for the attacker to literally blow up a hole in the wall than it is to go through the door, and safer still to blow it up with a tank/plane.

Come on, show a bit of imagination here. You'd not survive very long if you go knocking on doors and introducing yourself to the enemy.

They are not the rules for engagement in a hospital.

Israel and Hamas are routinely criticised for their breaches of international law. Neither cares.

BB, until you offer actual proof that the hopsital was not a base, or indeed, there is proof that it definitely was, neither of us are in a position to debate the legality or otherwise of the hopsital's involvement.

Hamas do have a history of using hospitals as military bases for exactly the reason why you're arguing that the IDF are committing a war crime by going into one, so let's not pretend this is so off the charts terrible.

TheBigBean

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

You're not a fan of international law then?

That's entirely allowed according to international law. "reasonable efforts" does a lot of lifting when it comes to the army avoiding civilian casualties.

Have a read on urban and tunnel warfare and how best to conduct it. For example, it's safer for the attacker to literally blow up a hole in the wall than it is to go through the door, and safer still to blow it up with a tank/plane.

Come on, show a bit of imagination here. You'd not survive very long if you go knocking on doors and introducing yourself to the enemy.

They are not the rules for engagement in a hospital.

Israel and Hamas are routinely criticised for their breaches of international law. Neither cares.

BB, until you offer actual proof that the hopsital was not a base, or indeed, there is proof that it definitely was, neither of us are in a position to debate the legality or otherwise of the hopsital's involvement.

Hamas do have a history of using hospitals as military bases for exactly the reason why you're arguing that the IDF are committing a war crime by going into one, so let's not pretend this is so off the charts terrible.

The onus is on Israel to prove it. Under international law, if there is uncertainty, then it must not be attacked. No amount of "but Hamas had a tunnel" will meet the required threshold for good reason.

The US bombed an MSF hospital in Afghanistan. They did at least admit it was a mistake, but no one was held accountable for it.

TheBigBean

The one thing the world needs for peace is the prosecution of war criminals. It's one of the many disappointments about Obama - complete failure to prosecute, so in the future everyone knows that if it is sanctioned by the president, you'll get away with it.

rick_chasey

TheBigBean said:

The onus is on Israel to prove it. Under international law, if there is uncertainty, then it must not be attacked. No amount of "but Hamas had a tunnel" will meet the required threshold for good reason.

.

I mean, Hamas wage their entire war via tunnels and they are not being dug for any other reasons; so "having a tunnel" is a pretty good indicator the Hamas military are using it for something, else why would there be a tunnel?

Like I said, there is precedent for Hamas using hospitals. Hell, it was like this in the last gaza war and sure enough, they did use it then.

briantrumpet

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

The onus is on Israel to prove it. Under international law, if there is uncertainty, then it must not be attacked. No amount of "but Hamas had a tunnel" will meet the required threshold for good reason.

.

I mean, Hamas wage their entire war via tunnels and they are not being dug for any other reasons; so "having a tunnel" is a pretty good indicator the Hamas military are using it for something, else why would there be a tunnel?

Like I said, there is precedent for Hamas using hospitals. Hell, it was like this in the last gaza war and sure enough, they did use it then.

But if you were to take the view that Israel - well, Netanyahu - could have made Hamas irrelevant by flooding Gaza with kindness rather than turning it into an open prison, then Netanyahu's Israel encouraged Hamas to dig in, and for Gazans not to they had anything to lose by not kicking Hamas out of power and out of their tunnels (even if they could).

In other words, *if* Israel's long-term plan was to find enough of an *excuse/reason to go in to flatten Gaza indiscriminately and then not leave, then they might have done just what we've witnessed.

*select depending on allegiance/bias

rick_chasey

Yeah I am absolutely in agreement with that. Running a system of apartheid like they are now will not ever solve the issue.

I would also add that the Hamas hatred of Israel is harder to nudge than just be kind enough to them, and there is a system of power that they have which is hard to dismantle, and they are a genuinely opposed to a solution. Their entire existence is founded on killing jews and destroying israel. They are really really awful. I mean, even just from a liberal democracy perspective, they're illiberal dictators who are opposed to homosexuality, women's rights etc. Not much better than the taliban.

briantrumpet

rick_chasey said:

Yeah I am absolutely in agreement with that. Running a system of apartheid like they are now will not ever solve the issue.

I would also add that the Hamas hatred of Israel is harder to nudge than just be kind enough to them, and there is a system of power that they have which is hard to dismantle, and they are a genuinely opposed to a solution. Their entire existence is founded on killing jews and destroying israel. They are really really awful. I mean, even just from a liberal democracy perspective, they're illiberal dictators who are opposed to homosexuality, women's rights etc. Not much better than the taliban.

Agree with that too. Both sides (hey, 'bothsidesism!) have made it pretty impossible to solve. But Ireland did give evidence that if the bigger/more powerful party to conflict wants to resolve a bad situation, it can be done. I've no idea how you handle a situation when the bigger party wants to use the situation for its own ends (as I suspect), regardless of cost to the smaller party, and is happy to breach international law, with no real consequences.

surrey_commuter

rick_chasey said:

TheBigBean said:

The onus is on Israel to prove it. Under international law, if there is uncertainty, then it must not be attacked. No amount of "but Hamas had a tunnel" will meet the required threshold for good reason.

.

I mean, Hamas wage their entire war via tunnels and they are not being dug for any other reasons; so "having a tunnel" is a pretty good indicator the Hamas military are using it for something, else why would there be a tunnel?

Like I said, there is precedent for Hamas using hospitals. Hell, it was like this in the last gaza war and sure enough, they did use it then.

I would consider people on here to be in the top couple of $ of sensible people and yet after the Israelis did not blow up the other hospital and we were told it did not matter because blah, blah, blah

I have come to the conclusion that the Israelis may as well do what the fvck they like because it will make no difference to the way they are judged

pblakeney

rick_chasey said:

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

*this is the problem with Hamas tactics*. There is a reason why human shields are actually against international law. Hiding behind civilians just encourages the enemy to reasonably assume civilians are potential threats and civilian infrastructure houses the enemy. Which, let's be real, in Gaza is almost entirely the case, as they're hardly operating our of barracks or military bases, are they?

Very happy to agree that the strategy of waging war against hamas is not going to achieve the long term strategic objective of peace in the area, but this idea the IDF can somehow effectively conduct an operations without blowing most of gaza up is up there with believing the world is flat.

I do not believe that the use of tanks and blowing up buildings is the best way to find terrorists. I'm not even sure that is the objective any more.

rjsterry

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

*this is the problem with Hamas tactics*. There is a reason why human shields are actually against international law. Hiding behind civilians just encourages the enemy to reasonably assume civilians are potential threats and civilian infrastructure houses the enemy. Which, let's be real, in Gaza is almost entirely the case, as they're hardly operating our of barracks or military bases, are they?

Very happy to agree that the strategy of waging war against hamas is not going to achieve the long term strategic objective of peace in the area, but this idea the IDF can somehow effectively conduct an operations without blowing most of gaza up is up there with believing the world is flat.

I do not believe that the use of tanks and blowing up buildings is the best way to find terrorists. I'm not even sure that is the objective any more.

This. The best argument against it is that it won't work. It won't make Israel safe.

rick_chasey

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

*this is the problem with Hamas tactics*. There is a reason why human shields are actually against international law. Hiding behind civilians just encourages the enemy to reasonably assume civilians are potential threats and civilian infrastructure houses the enemy. Which, let's be real, in Gaza is almost entirely the case, as they're hardly operating our of barracks or military bases, are they?

Very happy to agree that the strategy of waging war against hamas is not going to achieve the long term strategic objective of peace in the area, but this idea the IDF can somehow effectively conduct an operations without blowing most of gaza up is up there with believing the world is flat.

I do not believe that the use of tanks and blowing up buildings is the best way to find terrorists. I'm not even sure that is the objective any more.

They’re not just terrorists though are they? They’re soldiers with limited means.

You think the IDF just stroll into Gaza without being shot at?!

And if not, who’s doing the shooting?!

rick_chasey

I get a bit frustrated with the idea that Hamas somehow care about Palestinian civilians when plainly their tactics are designed to catch them in the crossfire so they can claim international outrage.

pblakeney

rick_chasey said:

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

pblakeney said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

briantrumpet said:

And having told 1m people to flee to the south, it appears they are moving the offensive to the south. I still think this is an operation to lay waste to the whole of Gaza and drive Palestinians out of it, or leave it so uninhabitable that they'll mostly leave.

Possibly though how else would you go about destroying Hamas?

Seriously.

Is that how the UK government went about the IRA?

Different conflict, different factors at play.

I'm not asking how you'd deal with the IRA. If you want to destroy Hamas militarily, how would you do it?

If I'm an IDF soldier, and I think Hamas are in the building down the road, I'm going to blow it the f*ck up. That's entirely rational. You don't really want your head to end up on a stick and paraded around the streets do you?

To complain that this is terrible is sort of weird; this is why war is bad in the first place, but in the context of the war, it seems pretty rational behaviour.

How do you expect even the innocent Palestinians to react to that given there are Palestinians in the building? "Oh, that's understandable. We will just carry on peacefully.".

I guess the answer is that they shouldn't be there. Which takes us to ethnic cleansing.
Is ethnic cleansing okay?

*this is the problem with Hamas tactics*. There is a reason why human shields are actually against international law. Hiding behind civilians just encourages the enemy to reasonably assume civilians are potential threats and civilian infrastructure houses the enemy. Which, let's be real, in Gaza is almost entirely the case, as they're hardly operating our of barracks or military bases, are they?

Very happy to agree that the strategy of waging war against hamas is not going to achieve the long term strategic objective of peace in the area, but this idea the IDF can somehow effectively conduct an operations without blowing most of gaza up is up there with believing the world is flat.

I do not believe that the use of tanks and blowing up buildings is the best way to find terrorists. I'm not even sure that is the objective any more.

They’re not just terrorists though are they? They’re soldiers with limited means.

You think the IDF just stroll into Gaza without being shot at?!

And if not, who’s doing the shooting?!

No. War does not come without casualties. Imo Israel is going too heavy handed.
I doubt that is their objective. Time will tell.

briantrumpet

rick_chasey said:

I get a bit frustrated with the idea that Hamas somehow care about Palestinian civilians when plainly their tactics are designed to catch them in the crossfire so they can claim international outrage.

I've not seen that opinion, and apart (I suspect) from a J. Corbyn (and some of his disciples), I don't think it's widely shared (unless I've missed something).

rick_chasey

briantrumpet said:

rick_chasey said:

I get a bit frustrated with the idea that Hamas somehow care about Palestinian civilians when plainly their tactics are designed to catch them in the crossfire so they can claim international outrage.

I've not seen that opinion, and apart (I suspect) from a J. Corbyn (and some of his disciples), I don't think it's widely shared (unless I've missed something).

I mean, is that not why they do those horrendous atrocities? To generate a response from Israel that eventually turns international opinion against them?

If Hamas cared for their own people they wouldn’t use civilian infrastructure (and they have used hospitals historically) to house their armed men and they wouldn’t goad Israel with as horrendous crimes as possible, surely.

They are properly awful.

Palestinians are almost certainly victims of apartheid but they’re also victims of Hamas who are about as bad as they get.

Sharia law, violence, the lot. You wouldn’t want to be a woman, gay or any other minority in Palestine, even before you get to the apartheid and Israeli treatment.

You see it on this forum.

The Hamas tactic of using the hospital has plainly worked. It’s got the international community all revved up against Israel.

Here’s nato explaining the same thing. Even refers to the human shield tactic to allow for “law fare” Ala BB.

https://stratcomcoe.org/cuploads/pfiles/hamas_human_shields.pdf

ddraver

Hmmm, with respect BT, it's not a controversial opinion.

Hamas has taken x gazillion in aid and used it to build tunnels which, understand, are exclusively for them - Palestinian civilians are told to ask the UN for help, not Hamas. Their job is to destroy Israel...

You could argue it's even worse than "don't care about civilians" and that they think they are doing them a favor as they go straight to paradise as martyrs.

pangolin

Rick you seem to be falling into the trap of assuming that people suggesting Israel are behaving badly means they think Hamas are great.

rick_chasey

pangolin said:

Rick you seem to be falling into the trap of assuming that people suggesting Israel are behaving badly means they think Hamas are great.

Look, I’ve been more critical than most on here on the strategic value of occupying Gaza. There is a reason they left in 2005 and that hadn’t changed.

But to criticise the IDF tactics for acting rationally in response to Hamas human shield tactics is stupid.

Hamas fire rockets deliberately from heavily populated areas. Why do you think that is? The nato link summarises it well.