Ran Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 Continue discussion here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeanF Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 FPT, regarding the discussion on genocide, it's hard to think of any war that does not constitute "genocide", if we're defining it so loosely as to describe the deaths in Gaza in that manner. Ukraine, for example, has killed 6,000 civilians during the course of the current conflict (Russia, or course, many more) but I would not describe Ukraine's actions as "genocide." In terms of modern conflicts, probably only the Falklands War counts as one in which civilian casualties were tiny. Bironic 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craving Peaches Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 (edited) I am concerned about how Israeli attacks on the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing seem to have increased after Israel agreed to let aid through. It is almost like they are trying to delay aid getting in as much as possible by keeping the roads inoperative for as long as they can. And before someone says they were bombing Hamas targets or whatever: Quote But Mohsen Sarhan, chief executive of the Egyptian Food Bank, told the BBC that aid delivery could be obstructed if intense bombing at the Rafah crossing continues. “What’s preventing us from getting in is the carpet bombing of the entire section of Gaza by the Israeli army. We are stationed at the border now for eight days and bombs are dropping every minute,” he told BBC's Newsday programme. Quote “They were even bombing a wasteland where there are no animals, no humans. Israel Gaza live news: UN: Time running out to get aid into Gaza 'hellhole' - BBC News Also, Israel won't let fuel in. Which is bad news for hospitals. Edited October 20, 2023 by Craving Peaches kissdbyfire 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baxus Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 (edited) From previous thread, by @Ran Quote Indeed, but the easier and quicker the war on the ground, the better for civilians. Ground fighting is way uglier for civilians. Minimizing as much as possible that part of the conflict necessitates this sort of preamble of extended, targeted bombing. Well, the ground invasion might be easier and quicker, but getting to the point where the ground invasion starts can't be ignored, either. It's not as if civilians are safe from missiles that Israel is shooting all over Gaza. Edited October 20, 2023 by baxus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kissdbyfire Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 (edited) @Ran, I haven’t finished reading the previous thread yet but wanted to address something you said, quoted here: ”The fact is that people were wondering if the death toll would reach 20% or 70% of the population are on the back foot because it was very obvious to any pragmatic observer that the situation was never going to come to that, regardless of "international pressure". Indeed, way back at the start of this I already pointed out that a humintarian crisis was going to happen, but it wasn't a genocide.” I don’t know if this is what you were referring to, but I brought up those percentages. But I wasn’t wondering whether the death toll would reach 20 or 70%. The discussion was about the fact that collateral damage is always going to happen in any war, that there will always be lots of innocent civilians getting killed, that’s what happens in wars. And I asked what would be an acceptable number of civilian deaths then… would 20% be acceptable, would 70% be acceptable, etc. For me the point remains; yes, civilians will die but what is an acceptable number of dead civilians? The other thing I’m having a hard time with is the discussion about genocide, ethnic cleansing, apartheid and so on. Which is similar in a way to the discussions about war crimes, crimes against humanity, etc. We know these terms have proper definitions attached to them and our perceptions of them may not always be aligned with the specific technical meaning they have. But that shouldn’t change the fact that what we’re witnessing is horrifying and painful to watch. And getting caught up in whether it is genocide, or “only” a bit of ethnic cleansing, or “just” a minor case of apartheid ends up distracting from the fact that we’re at, what, some 1,200 dead kids? This may not be a crime against humanity in its pure technical definition, but as the world watches it happening live on out screens it sure seems to be a crime against the humanity of us all. ETA: here’s the post where I brought up those percentages: Edited October 20, 2023 by kissdbyfire Craving Peaches, Crixus and Rippounet 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daeron the Daring Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 19 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said: We know these terms have proper definitions attached to them and our perceptions of them may not always be aligned with the specific technical meaning they have. But that shouldn’t change the fact that what we’re witnessing is horrifying and painful to watch. And getting caught up in whether it is genocide, or “only” a bit of ethnic cleansing, or “just” a minor case of apartheid ends up distracting from the fact that we’re at, what, some 1,200 dead kids? Well, to be fair, it was on me too for doubling down on this (pointless) debate. However, the original point made was "How can palestinians be a subject of genocide while growing in numbers?", and not wether the actions of Israel in the past weeks is genocide or not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luzifer's right hand Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 (edited) 15 minutes ago, Daeron the Daring said: Well, to be fair, it was on me too for doubling down on this (pointless) debate. However, the original point made was "How can palestinians be a subject of genocide while growing in numbers?", and not wether the actions of Israel in the past weeks is genocide or not. It is not just growing numbers though but a population growth rate among the highest on the entire planet. Other numbers like life expectancy are comparable than some US states. I guess there is a case to be made for wealth inequality in the US being a genocide. Edit: Misremembered something. I guess COVID actually dropped the life expectancy in some states even lower than I remembered. Male life exactly in Mississippi has dropped below 70 years? That is actually significantly below Gaza and the West Bank. Edited October 20, 2023 by Luzifer's right hand Ran 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JGP Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 Crimes against Humanity like apartheid and genocide aren’t lists where every line item need be checked. Regarding the hairsplitting, how about let’s not and say we did. It’s more than a little fucking ghoulish. Daeron the Daring, Crixus and Relic 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Chatywin et al. Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 Genocide has an actual definition and it's not accurate to claim what Israel is doing is genocide. War crimes, sure, that's fair game, but they're not trying to wipe out Palestinians. OTOH, Hamas has openly said for ages they want to wipe out Israel. If they had the means to do so they probably would, and that's what genocide is. I'm not accusing anyone here, but over the years there has been a push to accuse Jews of committing genocide and/or being fascists because the implication is they're just like the Nazis. This often comes from people who also deny the Holocaust happened or was really all that bad. Calling Israel an apartheid state is fair game in my book though it's not an exact analogy. Bael's Bastard, SeanF and Bironic 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daeron the Daring Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 15 minutes ago, Luzifer's right hand said: I guess there is a case to be made for wealth inequality in the US being a genocide. You're free to do so. Class struggle is the most important conflict of our age. Zorral 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoannaL Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 11 minutes ago, JGP said: Crimes against Humanity like apartheid and genocide aren’t lists where every line item need be checked. Regarding the hairsplitting, how about let’s not and say we did. It’s more than a little fucking ghoulish. No. lets do some hairsplitting: words have power and it does matter if it is ok to say Israel is committing genocide. This grows hate and then hate crimes. Around the world antisemitic crimes exploded over the last week. We should not use a language which incite this. IMO If someone really thinks he needs to use a word like genocide , then there must be proof. Bael's Bastard 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bael's Bastard Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 Nobody seems to care or acknowledge why Gaza is apparently running out of everything except rockets/weapons. Heartofice and Ran 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JGP Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 2 minutes ago, JoannaL said: No. lets do some hairsplitting: words have power and it does matter if it is ok to say Israel is committing genocide. This grows hate and then hate crimes. Around the world antisemitic crimes exploded over the last week. We should not use a language which incite this. IMO If someone really thinks he needs to use a word like genocide , then there must be proof. Yeah, a bunch of eggheads on a message board will be the arbiters. Go ahead. I'm going to pass. Rippounet and Crixus 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoannaL Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 here one article about the rise in antisemitism https://www.theguardian.com/news/2023/oct/20/a-lot-of-pain-europes-jews-fear-rising-antisemitism-after-hamas-attack from the article: "Seeing the hostilities against Jewish people elsewhere in Europe, Pavoncello said: “It feels as if we’re going back in time. People say it’s not antisemitism but anti-Zionism. But at the end of the day, this is the outcome.” Ran and Bael's Bastard 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanteGabriel Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 17 minutes ago, JoannaL said: No. lets do some hairsplitting: words have power and it does matter if it is ok to say Israel is committing genocide. This grows hate and then hate crimes. Around the world antisemitic crimes exploded over the last week. We should not use a language which incite this. IMO If someone really thinks he needs to use a word like genocide , then there must be proof. Likewise, one should be careful of throwing around accusations of anti-Semitism for criticizing actions by the government or military forces of Israel. JGP, lessthanluke, Matrim Fox Cauthon and 5 others 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Chatywin et al. Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 3 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said: Likewise, one should be careful of throwing around accusations of anti-Semitism for criticizing actions by the government or military forces of Israel. Some criticisms are certainly warranted. The frustrating part is they're overwhelming against Israel with a casual Hamas is also bad when Hamas was the attacker knowingly using their own people as shields when the inevitable response came. The disproportionality of blame in these threads is chilling. Jace, Extat and Bael's Bastard 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ran Posted October 20, 2023 Author Share Posted October 20, 2023 From The Atlantic, an interesting document said to have been recovered from the Hamas fighters who attacked on October 7th. If accurate, it implies things didn't go as Hamas planned, as they seemed to intend to do long-term standoffs inside of Israel rather than spiriting hostages away to Gaza. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 Preemptively bombing a passage to prevent anyone bringing supplies through is the state equivalent of punching a hole in the wall next to someone's head so you can gaslight them about how you didn't touch them. You're blockading supplies from 2m civilians that you've also cut off fuel, food, electricity and most (all?) water. I'm not sure on the water situation, last I saw was the pipes were open but that it was functionally useless without electricity to run the pumps. And if you have not just air domination and fire control, but are actually bombing the area then you're as much in control of it as anyone else so that border with Egypt isn't much use even if Egypt was inclined to be a whole lot more helpful. Matrim Fox Cauthon, Crixus, Rippounet and 1 other 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Varysblackfyre321 Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 1 minute ago, Tywin et al. said: The disproportionality of blame in these threads is chilling. No it isn’t. At a certain point the response to an action is worse than the action that caused it and can’t be excused with invocation of how bad the proceeding action was. Rippounet 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Varysblackfyre321 Posted October 20, 2023 Share Posted October 20, 2023 5 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said: Some criticisms are certainly warranted. The frustrating part is they're overwhelming against Israel Who specifically are you even referencing? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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