U.N. Security Council demands humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza
- Thread starter William Haskins
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Yeah but if they officially call it a war crime, they might be asked to actually do something about it, other than wag their finger and ask people politely not to. And that's just not going to happen.
far less vile than shooting from schools and inviting your own people to be massacred so you can fight a PR war via twitter.
fuck hamas.
And fuck the Israelis sitting on couches on the hills above Gaza, eating popcorn and watching the show explode before them.
Apparently, Hamas are not the only ones. Pictures of Israelis cheering the bombing of the Gaza concentration camp.
http://abcnews.go.com/International...ring-watch-gaza-air-strikes/story?id=24554791
ETA: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
http://abcnews.go.com/International...ring-watch-gaza-air-strikes/story?id=24554791
ETA: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
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While the UN is at it, maybe they could add kidnapping and extortion to the list...on Hamas' side. Tunnels built to deliberately infiltrate Israeli cities and kidnap or kill soldiers and civilians...but that ain't a war crime? Not excusing the damage Israel has done, Lillith, but it works both ways.
I'm no expert, but...those people in the pictures don't look like they are cheering. They look like they are watching.
Watching battles has been a thing for as long as humanity has had wars. And while it has always struck me as a particularly stupid thing to do, considering how many explosions battles have, I don't think of it as a damning indictment of Israel.
Maybe of some Israelis, but not of Israel.
To me, this whole thing seems like a bloody, pointless waste of human life. But that's the damn thing: I didn't have a relative blown up or a friend killed. I don't have a stake in the fight, save for the general compassion I have for any human being - no matter which side they're on, or if they are on any side at all - getting killed.
Which, also makes me really unqualified to throw blame around.
So, basically...
Fuck.
Watching battles has been a thing for as long as humanity has had wars. And while it has always struck me as a particularly stupid thing to do, considering how many explosions battles have, I don't think of it as a damning indictment of Israel.
Maybe of some Israelis, but not of Israel.
To me, this whole thing seems like a bloody, pointless waste of human life. But that's the damn thing: I didn't have a relative blown up or a friend killed. I don't have a stake in the fight, save for the general compassion I have for any human being - no matter which side they're on, or if they are on any side at all - getting killed.
Which, also makes me really unqualified to throw blame around.
So, basically...
Fuck.
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Of course, I know you aren't. The UN waving it's finger at Hamas for a war crime is just despicable. And that is what hiding munitions in what should be neurtral ground is, a war crime. Neither side is clean in this, but I'm sick of people wagging their finger at Hamas like it's a naughty toddler. And I'm equally sick of people excusing Israel's actions as well. War crimes all around I say.
That's why I linked the story.
ETA: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
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You mean, they would actually need to do their job instead of playing disappointed parent. I'm adding the UN to the list of groups up to their necks in blood in regards to this conflict.
there's no moral equivalence here. hamas cannot win militarily. they know they can't. they can shoot rockets, do hit and runs through the tunnels and send in suicide bombers/donkeys.
their war is a PR war. they need dead palestinian children to convince western powers to exert leverage on israel for concessions.
it is amazing how thick-headed the die-hard hamas-enablers are.
israel benefits ZERO from dead palestinian civilians. they are not taking any fighters off the streets. they are not gaining any material or strategic advantage, they simply incur the wrath of the world.
hamas, however, can trot the photos of the dead out to their useful idiots and hope to harness the global handwringing into some tactical advantage. so they store rockets in schools and hospitals and fire rockets from schools and hospitals and offer up civilians like fucking cowards and wait for israel to respond and give them the gift of dead bodies to put on parade.
so, those so inclined may enjoy their war porn and relish in how superior it makes them feel to the dirty zionists who just got to kill em some babies and, presumably, bake bread with their blood or some shit.
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You know what that is also called? Guerilla warfare. The Norse did it, the French did it, the Polish did it. All against the Nazis. The stories were broadcast good old North America and we gobbled it up. It was a PR war. But more importantly, it was guerilla warfare because that is all they can wage.
My "war porn" is a follow to guardian, to Ruth Pollard (SMH journalist) and to Dr Abuwarda - a surgeon in Gaza. I have no dog in this fight beyond the fact that my twitter feed is filling up with pictures of bombings and dead Palestinian babies.
Can we agree that Palestinian babies had probably not involved themselves in the argument yet? That from the outside it might look as though the wrong people are dying?
ETA: And I really do take offence at
If you were directing that at me, as it seems you were. You might want to re-read my post.
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No, it was directed at me.
The Israelis are not pure. They engage in many of the tactics they accuse the Hamas of. See link below.
What I see is assymetrical war and that will always occur when the occupier covets what the occupied have. In this case the West Bank and Gaza. The 'facts on the ground' as Sharon called them was how Israel was created. And it is how Sharon, now Netanayu, and Likud intend to gain possession of the West Bank.
And while I understand the Jewish desire for a homeland, the Palestinians were there in 1948. And the Palestinians did not perpetrate the final solution on the Jews. The Germans did.
Israelis refuse to recognize that the Palestinians have rights to the land too. And the negotiation needs to be in good faith on the part of the Israelis.
The only ones being pushed into the sea right now are the Palestinians. A slo-mo genocide I have heard it called.
At some point the Israelis need to wake up and realized they are the big boys with power on the block and behave accordingly. They are no longer the weak and oppressed.
http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_5644167
Israelis use Palestinian as human shield
The Israelis are not pure. They engage in many of the tactics they accuse the Hamas of. See link below.
What I see is assymetrical war and that will always occur when the occupier covets what the occupied have. In this case the West Bank and Gaza. The 'facts on the ground' as Sharon called them was how Israel was created. And it is how Sharon, now Netanayu, and Likud intend to gain possession of the West Bank.
And while I understand the Jewish desire for a homeland, the Palestinians were there in 1948. And the Palestinians did not perpetrate the final solution on the Jews. The Germans did.
Israelis refuse to recognize that the Palestinians have rights to the land too. And the negotiation needs to be in good faith on the part of the Israelis.
The only ones being pushed into the sea right now are the Palestinians. A slo-mo genocide I have heard it called.
At some point the Israelis need to wake up and realized they are the big boys with power on the block and behave accordingly. They are no longer the weak and oppressed.
http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_5644167
Israelis use Palestinian as human shield
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nope. wasn't directed at either of you.
it was directed at those whose mentality is that the sum total of culpability is measured by dead palestinian civilians who are plastered across the web by media sympathetic to the palestinian cause, not considering that this only spurs hamas to offer up more.
onuilmar, i will direct this at you, since you've joined the discussion fairly recently. no one has claimed israel is innocent or they aren't engaging in actions that are criminal under international law.
it was directed at those whose mentality is that the sum total of culpability is measured by dead palestinian civilians who are plastered across the web by media sympathetic to the palestinian cause, not considering that this only spurs hamas to offer up more.
onuilmar, i will direct this at you, since you've joined the discussion fairly recently. no one has claimed israel is innocent or they aren't engaging in actions that are criminal under international law.
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I find the not-thinly-veiled accusations of antisemitism in some of these posts to be both disingenuous and uncalled for. It's reasonable to be critical of Israel's conduct here, and one should certainly be able to do so without being lumped in with a declaration of blood libel.
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Given recent poll results, Jewish Israelis over 18 (1000 of them) polled by Dr. Yuval Feinstein, a Sociology and Political Science researcher at University of Haifa, support Israel in this, civilian death photos notwithstanding.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/183441#.U9l78kD4LzQ
If there is that much support for the current campaign even after all of the bombings of civilian areas, then there isn't much internal persuasion to be careful about civilians, either.
Then there is this from a series of 3 polls:
http://jpupdates.com/2014/07/29/poll-80-israeli-jews-oppose-unilateral-cease-fire-periods/
45% believe it's insufficient firepower?! I'm really hoping that means that they think their weapons aren't precise enough, giving 'insufficient' that way. Otherwise, the public may be frighteningly hawkish and consider the civilian deaths collateral damage not worth worrying about, maybe. It's certainly possible.
Leaders looking at how to get votes will certainly keep things like those polls in mind, I'd think. It could, theoretically, be pretty political and callous. It's not like the world hasn't seen a lot of that before. But I don't know much about Israeli internal politics, so I'm speculating based on poll results and history in general.
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When Israel went after Hezbollah in Lebanon not all that long ago, many liked to accuse Israel of committing war crimes and the like, not only for killing civilians but for purposefully targeting civilian infrastructure.
What was true then is true now: if the Israelis really didn't care about loss of life and damaging infrastructure, they could do a far better job of killing and destroying. Far better. But they don't, oftentimes--then and now--making it clear when and where they will attack so as to allow civilians (and their actual enemies, btw) to get out of the way.
But as William says, Hamas has zero interest in minimizing civilian casualties on the Palestinian side. Zero. Hamas wants dead bodies, especially of children. The more people who tweet and post pictures of the same, the better. Social media is a boon to Hamas.
What was true then is true now: if the Israelis really didn't care about loss of life and damaging infrastructure, they could do a far better job of killing and destroying. Far better. But they don't, oftentimes--then and now--making it clear when and where they will attack so as to allow civilians (and their actual enemies, btw) to get out of the way.
But as William says, Hamas has zero interest in minimizing civilian casualties on the Palestinian side. Zero. Hamas wants dead bodies, especially of children. The more people who tweet and post pictures of the same, the better. Social media is a boon to Hamas.
hey, if the pointy hat fits...
there has been plenty of criticism of israel that has not been met with any accusations, thinly-veiled or otherwise.
but by the time one becomes so rigid in one's thinking as to strip away the fog of war, the actions of hamas and the cumulative effect of terrorism to the extent that one portrays israel as deliberately and without provocation targeting palestinian children out of mere bloodlust and malice, one enters into a caricature construct in which a little blood libel is small potatoes.
some good-hearted people simply expressing honest political disagreement with israel:
http://legalinsurrection.com/wp-con...nti-israel-protest-Haaretz-e1406397414131.png
http://www.newsweek.com/2014/08/08/exodus-why-europes-jews-are-fleeing-once-again-261854.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-...rface-as-gaza-stirs-the-pot-opening-line.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-...rface-as-gaza-stirs-the-pot-opening-line.html
Who aren't you directing that at, this time? Because I haven't seen anything like that here...
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This is not directed at you in particular raburrell, but just an observation.
It's interesting to see where the lines fall when it comes to prejudices, real or imagined. Here we have criticism of Israel and though no one has come right out and accused someone else of anti-semitism for such criticism, one can hardly deny the thought might be out there.
In other threads, we have criticism of the U.S. President and along with that, the same sorts of suggested--or even explicitly claimed--accusations, ala racism. Then there's the whole "white privilege" stuff that shows up from time to time.
In a way, all follow a similar pattern of usage as a defense mechanism, but the lines people are behind change dramatically. Food for thought. Well for my thought, at least.
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