Israel - Hamas War V

[Zorral]

5 minutes ago, Relic said:

Ahh, I wasn't there for covid.

It's obvious.

[Relic]

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

It's obvious.

Okay?

[Werthead]

10 hours ago, Ran said:

They should go in now and occupy the largely-emptied north Gaza, personally. That'll put immense pressure on Hamas, as it shows a commitment to move forward with the operation. Even if they don't move beyond that point and the rest of the invasion is eventually called off, holding north Gaza for awhile will allow them to find and collapse parts of the tunnel network there, further setting back Hamas for the future.

The northern part of Gaza is not largely-emptied. A large proportion of the population remains, a large number cannot leave for medical/mobility reasons, and thousands of people have actually returned from the south of Gaza, mostly because Israeli air strikes on the south have continued, so they believe they're just as likely to die wherever they are so they might as well die at home (statistically Israel seems to be hitting the north with 4 or 5 times the intensity of the south, but if the intensity in the south is still "a lot," I can see the logic in them thinking they won't be any worse off in the north).

[Ran]

1 minute ago, Werthead said:

A large proportion of the population remains

What is "large proportion" by your definition? Just saw a chart somewhere tracking the movement south suggesting that there may be a couple hundred thousand left, if that.

That is pretty empty compared to the population previous.

[Varysblackfyre321]

I’m hoping Israel calls the invasion off, if releasing more and more hostages increases this outcome I approve.

[Ran]

2 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I’m hoping Israel calls the invasion off, if releasing more and more hostages increases this outcome I approve.

What are your hopes for the future of Hamas in that scenario?

[DireWolfSpirit]

Hopes for a quick resolution of this conflict are futile wishes imo.

Its an intractable problem that requires way too much hoop jumping for proposed solutions, most are unworkable paths. These 2 parties havent been able to coexist in my lifetime so I have zero confidence they could resolve anything within a matter of months.

I expect the state of war will be the norm for at least a few years before anything changes. Not a one or two month conflict but a protracted hellscape with no escape for a long while.

See almost nothing in the way of optimistic outcomes for any parties. Fuck religion and all its superstition, theres no separating its culpability in this.

[fionwe1987]

A tough conversation, but a clarifying one, circling a lot of the topics we've been discussing here:

The Jewish Left Is Trying to Hold Two Thoughts at Once https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/24/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-spencer-ackerman-peter-beinart.html?smid=nytcore-android-share

 

Something I didn't know was that a significant portion of Gazan's population is descended from people who were expelled from or fled Israel, and that is part of the dynamic of why Gazans aren't fleeing south, because they refuse to become refugees from what is already, for all intents an purposes, a refugee camp. 

Edited October 24, 2023 by fionwe1987

[kissdbyfire]

8 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Fuck religion and all its superstition, theres no separating its culpability in this.

Hear, hear.

[Zorral]

Out of Zionism
JONATHAN M. KATZ
OCT 24, 2023

Gift Link to free article

https://theracket.news/p/out-of-zionism?

Quote

 

Over the last 24 hours, the Israeli military says it struck over 400 targets in Gaza, including in at least two refugee camps. Those airstrikes, an escalation over the already intensifying bombing a day before, killed over 700 people. That one-day death toll is according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry—which is the only source on death tolls in Gaza, in part because Israel has killed at least eighteen journalists on the strip during the war so far. In all, the latest brings the total number of reported deaths in Gaza to over 5,700 people. Nearly half were children.

I lead with that because it’s the news. I’m a journalist, and it’s an ongoing story. Pointing out the simple fact that Israel is committing mass murder in Gaza does not erase the suffering of the families of 1,033 Israeli civilians and around 300 soldiers who were brutally murdered by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad  fighters seventeen days ago. It does not ignore the over 200 Israeli and foreign hostages still believed to be trapped on the Gaza Strip—hostages whose lives are now in danger from both sides of a deeply unequal war. It is simply the most urgent thing that is happening right now. And it is a catastrophe that, unless action is taken quickly and pressure is brought to bear, is clearly only going to get much worse—as water runs out, hospitals shut down, and Israeli forces mass for a ground reinvasion in which Israeli leaders have pledged to “annihilate Hamas” and “wipe them off the face of the Earth.”

Hamas may well be exaggerating the death tolls—I don’t trust any government to be honest with such things, especially not them, and not now. But all you have to do is watch citizen feeds from Gaza or see the news photos or videos of school bombings or read the reports of independent experts or even Holocaust scholars to get the gist. As the Israeli historian Raz Segal—educated at Bar-Ilan and Tel Aviv Universities, who directs the Master of Arts in Holocaust and Genocide Studies program at Stockton University—says: Israel is carrying out “a textbook case of genocide” in Gaza. And, I might add, with building intensity in the West Bank as well. Protestations that this is unavoidable, that Israel is trying to preserve human life, that these civilians must die because Hamas is using them as “human shields,” fall apart under the Israeli military’s own assertions, such as when IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told the press on Oct. 10 that, the Gaza airstrikes, “the emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy.”

Subscribed

Yet if all you consume is a carefully manicured diet of mainstream and certain Israeli news sources; if you are, perhaps, an American Jew of a certain age and disposition whose primary window on the world is Facebook, everything I just wrote—sources, details, caveats, and all—may have sounded like an incendiary, antisemitic (or in my case, “self-hating”) pack of lies.

 

 

Edited October 24, 2023 by Ran
Copyright

[Craving Peaches]

I have read that numerous babies in incubators could soon die if there is no more fuel to generate electricity for them. As someone who was in an incubator, my parents were very worried when I was in relatively less danger, so I can only imagine how these poor parents feel...

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/gaza-neonatal-unit-warns-babies-risk-within-minutes-if-power-fails-2023-10-23/

[Mudguard]

While I do think Israel was justified in doing something in response to the Hamas massacre, I think their response has moved past reasonable into indiscriminate collective punishment.  Gaza appears to be on the brink of a humanitarian disaster. 

They bomb hundreds of targets each day, and essentially justify everything as Hamas using civilians as human shields, essentially giving them a green light to bomb whatever they want, including hospitals, schools, churches, residential areas, etc.  But their intelligence in Gaza was exposed as absolute shit by their failure to detect the massacre.  How can they have any reasonable confidence that all these thousands of targets that they've bombed are really legitimate targets?  You are telling me that they couldn't detect wind of a massive Hamas operation, but they are sure that a particular house or building is used by Hamas?  And they've identified thousands of these Hamas structures?  Come on.

I don't understand Israel's end game.  Even if they are able to eradicate or severely cripple Hamas, all this death and destruction is just going to create the next version of Hamas.

[Craving Peaches]

5 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

While I do think Israel was justified in doing something in response to the Hamas massacre, I think their response has moved past reasonable into indiscriminate collective punishment.  Gaza appears to be on the brink of a humanitarian disaster. 

They bomb hundreds of targets each day, and essentially justify everything as Hamas using civilians as human shields, essentially giving them a green light to bomb whatever they want, including hospitals, schools, churches, residential areas, etc.  But their intelligence in Gaza was exposed as absolute shit by their failure to detect the massacre.  How can they have any reasonable confidence that all these thousands of targets that they've bombed are really legitimate targets?  You are telling me that they couldn't detect wind of a massive Hamas operation, but they are sure that a particular house or building is used by Hamas?  And they've identified thousands of these Hamas structures?  Come on.

I don't understand Israel's end game.  Even if they are able to eradicate or severely cripple Hamas, all this death and destruction is just going to create the next version of Hamas.

Also, the IDF spokesperson said they were emphasising damage over accuracy so...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/10/right-now-it-is-one-day-at-a-time-life-on-israels-frontline-with-gaza

[Kalbear]

5 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Also, the IDF spokesperson said they were emphasising damage over accuracy so...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/10/right-now-it-is-one-day-at-a-time-life-on-israels-frontline-with-gaza

That is incredibly misleading. He was talking about one specific strip of land and highway that is a major conflict point, not all of Gaza.

What the actual fuck, man.

[Mudguard]

5 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Also, the IDF spokesperson said they were emphasising damage over accuracy so...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/10/right-now-it-is-one-day-at-a-time-life-on-israels-frontline-with-gaza

Also, this was a statement from the Israeli president:

Quote

“It is an entire nation out there that is responsible,” Herzog said at a press conference on Friday. “It is not true this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up. They could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d’etat.”

He did walk the statement back a bit after the reporter asked some follow up questions, essentially falling back to the missiles in every household justification, but I think his first statement is how he really feels.  And I think that belief is not that uncommon.

[Craving Peaches]

10 minutes ago, Kalnak the Magnificent said:

That is incredibly misleading. He was talking about one specific strip of land and highway that is a major conflict point, not all of Gaza.

Quote

On Monday night, Israelis were told by the Home Front to prepare a safe place to shelter and enough food, water and other supplies to last 72 hours – a clear sign that a ground offensive into Gaza is imminent. The move will undoubtedly claim many more Palestinian and Israeli lives. Speaking on Tuesday morning, IDF spokesperson R Adm Daniel Hagari made the startling admission that “hundreds of tons of bombs” had already been dropped on the tiny strip, adding that “the emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy”.

???

I thought he was talking about whole of Gaza, since that is the location last mentioned before the 'tiny strip', and Gaza is quite small. If it was just that stretch of border road, wouldn't the Guardian specify? I have looked at other sources and seen nothing that indicates he did not mean the whole of Gaza when making that comment.

Quote

A spokesman for the Israeli military has said that “hundreds of tons of bombs” had been dropped on Gaza as troops prepare for a ground invasion, saying that “the emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy”.

The Telegraph reports that Rear-Adml Daniel Hagari, made the comments Tuesday and that “separately, an unnamed Israeli defence official told broadcaster Channel 13 on Wednesday that Gaza would be reduced to a “city of tents” by the end of the campaign”

https://gript.ie/gaza-bombings-israeli-military-says-emphasis-on-damage-not-accuracy/

Regardless of the size, that attitude is not a good idea in a densely populated area.

Edited October 24, 2023 by Craving Peaches

[Mudguard]

8 minutes ago, Kalnak the Magnificent said:

That is incredibly misleading. He was talking about one specific strip of land and highway that is a major conflict point, not all of Gaza.

What the actual fuck, man.

After reading the relevant paragraphs in the article, I think the statement refers to the Gaza strip as a whole.

Quote

On Monday night, Israelis were told by the Home Front to prepare a safe place to shelter and enough food, water and other supplies to last 72 hours – a clear sign that a ground offensive into Gaza is imminent. The move will undoubtedly claim many more Palestinian and Israeli lives. Speaking on Tuesday morning, IDF spokesperson R Adm Daniel Hagari made the startling admission that “hundreds of tons of bombs” had already been dropped on the tiny strip, adding that “the emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy”.

The question now is whether the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, will continue with his promise to “flatten” the enclave, home to 2.3 million trapped civilians, or re-occupy it. Israel pulled out occupying ground forces from Gaza in 2005. The strip was taken over by Hamas during the Palestinian civil war with the secular Fatah party two years after that, leading Israel and Egypt to besiege it, and there have now been five wars and several smaller escalations between Israel and Gaza’s fighting factions since.

I doubt that they've dropped hundreds of tons of bombs on a tiny highway.  The second paragraph also uses the term "strip" to refer to Gaza as a whole.  And "flatten" the enclave obviously refers to the whole of Gaza.

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Craving Peaches said:

???

I thought he was talking about whole of Gaza....

Regardless of the size, that attitude is not a good idea in a densely populated area.

He was not, and the guardian also sucks for doing that sort of alarmist headline.

As to the attitude - yeah, it sucks. It also may be the least bad thing they can do for Israel. They have a few shitty options:

- bomb all targets, at high civilian cost and political cost but relatively safe for Israeli soldiers

- bomb less and not with xivilians, making it basically useless to kill hamas units as they'll just hide in civ centric areas

- invade now, at great cost to troops and still will kill lots of people

- stop everything and let hamas exist to do more of these attacks

 

[Werthead]

I have seen some other ideas floating around but they feel a but unrealistic.

One is that the UN agrees to administer Gaza (it already has a lot of boots on the ground), the Gaza Strip is demilitarised, Hamas is allowed to leave and they can go join Hezbollah or whatever the fuck, and if they cause trouble there, they can get flattened. Gaza is rebuilt by the UN, the work permit situation resumes and perhaps they can build to a point where Gaza becomes a self-governing enclave or the two state solution is revived again.

This plan sounds great but is based on Hamas voluntarily giving up power on Palestinian soil, which seems unlikely, and the UN being trusted not to fuck the situation up (they have some sketchy form in a lot of areas in recent years).

[Mudguard]

7 minutes ago, Kalnak the Magnificent said:

He was not, and the guardian also sucks for doing that sort of alarmist headline.

As to the attitude - yeah, it sucks. It also may be the least bad thing they can do for Israel. They have a few shitty options:

- bomb all targets, at high civilian cost and political cost but relatively safe for Israeli soldiers

- bomb less and not with xivilians, making it basically useless to kill hamas units as they'll just hide in civ centric areas

- invade now, at great cost to troops and still will kill lots of people

- stop everything and let hamas exist to do more of these attacks

 

I agree that there really aren't any good options, but indiscriminate bombing has got to be among the worse.  With knowledge of the extensive tunnel systems, is the leveling of buildings really achieving much?  To me, statements that the President of Israel made of missiles being stored in homes is idiotic.  The Hamas terrorists are almost certainly hiding out in the tunnel system along with all of their weapons.

Unless they are are just going to use bunker buster type bombs all over Gaza to flatten Gaza, thereby killing all the hostages in the process, blowing up buildings is probably just killing mostly civilians at this point.

And sending soldiers into hundreds of miles of tunnels seems like suicide.