Israel - Hamas War V

[dbergkvist]

24 minutes ago, Ran said:

I would disagree with anyone who would blame or berate them, too!

You just support bombing and starving them until they overthrow Hamas. But you are not "berating" them. OK, good to know.

Edited October 25, 2023 by dbergkvist

[Ran]

7 minutes ago, dbergkvist said:

You just support bombing and starving them until they overthrow Hamas.

I support the IDF overthrowing Hamas if that's the only means of ending Hamas's reign of terror in Gaza. 

I prefer that Hamas be convinced to surrender, whether by internal pressure from the citizens of Gaza or external diplomacy. But everyone seems convinced that Hamas is incapable of it.

[fionwe1987]

14 minutes ago, Ran said:

I support the IDF overthrowing Hamas if that's the only means of ending Hamas's reign of terror in Gaza. 

I prefer that Hamas be convinced to surrender, whether by internal pressure from the citizens of Gaza or external diplomacy. But everyone seems convinced that Hamas is incapable of it.

You do realize what you're supporting blocks what you prefer, right?

And in this thread, no one is referring to Hamas's capability to surrender, we're all talked about the absurdity of saying it is up to the Gazans to convince them of this when 1) there's no offer from Isreal on what happens if Hamas surrenders, 2) Bombs are falling and the population is on the move, under crippling siege conditions.  

[Rippounet]

4 hours ago, Ran said:

By resistance I just mean resistance as a concept, not carte blanche to the means of resistance. If you believe Palestine is illegally occupied and the Palestinians have a right to resist it, it seems to me you are absolutely behind the concept of resisting.

Are people here more like ... 55% in favor of Palestinian resistance, kind of like, "sort of maybe a little bit"?

This question is bizarre tbh.
I can only answer for myself, but I would fall back on notions of international law. Hamas's attacks were war crimes because i) they targeted civilians and ii) they had no military objectives (their only goal was to inflict pain/terror).
So, it Hamas had attacked only soldiers instead (military bases), stolen military supplies, and captured members of the IDF, its actions would have been morally acceptable.
Mind you, I still wouldn't support them (one of the soldiers could be a distant cousin), but I would not be able to have a moral objection to them, because the Palestinians do have legitimate grievances.

As to the bombing of Gaza, the issue is simpler: all the people of Gaza are being punished for the crimes of a few. And try as you might, one cannot blame all people in the Gaza strip, including children, for what Hamas did.

[dbergkvist]

29 minutes ago, Ran said:

I support the IDF overthrowing Hamas if that's the only means of ending Hamas's reign of terror in Gaza. 

As we all know by now, Hamas only exists in Gaza because Israel created (and Netanyahu funded) them, in order to get rid of Fatah in order to prevent a two-state solution. So using this knowledge, we can clearly see that "IDF overthrowing Hamas" (at the cost of at least 1000s civilian deaths) is demonstrably not the only way to get rid of Hamas: it would also be possible to get rid of Hamas by creating and funding a different organization (or by funding Fatah).

[Ran]

6 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

all the people of Gaza are being punished for the crimes of a few.

If Israel is targeting civilians to punish them for the crimes of Hamas, I certainly will denounce it.

But they are targeting military objectives in preparation of a ground offensive. Every day there's a long list from the IDF of the targets they've struck. That's permissible in the laws of war. That the people of Gaza find themselves surrounded above and below ground with Hamas's military materials and infrastructure is the fault of Hamas.  This morning it said it had struck 320 targets such as: operational command centers, tunnels, military compounds, observation posts, anti-tank missile implacements.

[Rippounet]

3 minutes ago, Ran said:

But they are targeting military objectives in preparation of a ground offensive. Every day there's a long list from the IDF of the targets they've struck. That's permissible in the laws of war. That the people of Gaza find themselves surrounded above and below ground with Hamas's military materials and infrastructure is the fault of Hamas.  This morning it said it had struck 320 targets such as: operational command centers, tunnels, military compounds, observation posts, anti-tank missile implacements.

I don't buy that Hamas ever had 320 targets for the IDF to destroy. "Operational command centers" probably included meeting places like individual apartments and coffee houses, "observation posts" probably included tall buildings that might be used as such, and "anti-tank missile emplacements" were probably buildings that were a bit too close to the roads.
I'm not even convinced Hamas has anti-tank missiles. They might have some, but I would assume that, like the rockets, it's mostly makeshift (though "makeshift" may include relatively efficient stuff - Qassam rockets are nothing to laugh at).

You're deliberately ignoring the considerable asymmetry of the conflict to defend harm to the civilians as collateral. But viewing this as a "standard" conflict with two bona fide militaries is already missing much of the reality of it. Paradoxically, you're gving Hamas way too much credit, and forgetting that slaughtering civilians is actually really easy: in the 2015 Paris attacks, less than 20 terrorists killed 130 people in a matter of hours.

[kissdbyfire]

2 hours ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I apologize for my dismissive comments towards you.I was trying to promote caution because often times there’s a lot of misinformation pursuant to these conflicts so it’s best to keep one’s bias in mind, but looking back I feel I wasn’t taking your ideas on Israeli lack of care of hostages seriously enough.

No apologies necessary, at all. We were just expressing our opinions on something. I have just been feeling anxious w/ the hostage situation, and feel somewhat disturbed by so many just assuming they’re all lost no matter what. 

[Kalbear]

2 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

I'm not even convinced Hamas has anti-tank missiles. They might have some, but I would assume that, like the rockets, it's mostly makeshift (though "makeshift" may include relatively efficient stuff - Qassam rockets are nothing to laugh at).

Nah. The IDF already captured some. Antitank missiles are not hard to come by in the Middle East thanks to decades of US and Soviet intervention. 

I'd be more surprised about anti-aircraft munitions, but antitank stuff? Ukraine literally had at one point more than 1 missile per soldier. They're easy to come by.

20 minutes ago, Ran said:

But they are targeting military objectives in preparation of a ground offensive. Every day there's a long list from the IDF of the targets they've struck. That's permissible in the laws of war. That the people of Gaza find themselves surrounded above and below ground with Hamas's military materials and infrastructure is the fault of Hamas.  This morning it said it had struck 320 targets such as: operational command centers, tunnels, military compounds, observation posts, anti-tank missile implacements.

To be clear - this is what IDF says  they are hitting. Whether that's accurate or not, whether those things are fairly innocuous, whether or not that's what they were but no longer are - it's very much up in the air. As stated before and as you agreed - if those are legitimate targets this is what that would look like, and if those are war crimes this is what that would look like. 

I'm still a little optimistic that some of it is legitimate largely because of reports that Hamas is hurting, but I also am willing to bet that Israel is going after anything that might be construed as Hamas-adjacent more than not. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

...okay? But I don't see how this means it's a justified response to "what is going to stop the bombing". You're asking someone who is repeatedly getting punched in the face to start thinking about how they can not be in that situation in the future while getting punched in the face. And you're putting the onus of change on the person getting punched.

But what's the counter solution? Eventually they will have to stand up and demand autonomy from Hamas. Otherwise the cycle just continues.

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

So @Ran should then be calling for israelis to rise up, protest heavily, take up arms against their government or refuse to fight for israel...right? 

Protests have been going on for ages against the government and the latter has become more unpopular at times. 

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

We have noticed the Israeli people/voters have been putting a great deal of pressure on Bibi's cohort corrupt government for a very long time concerning these issues and so many others, yet they haven't been able to unseat him/Them.  Why then are the immiserated, far less autonomous, equipped, etc. Palestinian women and children supposed to have unseated Hamas, and are blamed and berated for not doing so? 

They can't unseat him in part because the fear of Hamas and other actors eases his path to power. Rip out the root problem. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, fionwe1987 said:

Right, but it doesn't follow that it is the responsibility of Gazans, while dodging missiles, to get rid of Hamas, too. 

Whose problem is it then? You can't say people in Gaza don't need to end Hamas and then also say Israel shouldn't be taking the measures they think they need to do so to end Hamas. The latter has to go if you want peace in the region and the former are the only two parties that are going to be able to do it. If you say neither Israelis nor Palestinians should do whatever it takes to destroy Hamas, that means you're okay with them still being in power.

[Kalbear]

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

But what's the counter solution? Eventually they will have to stand up and demand autonomy from Hamas. Otherwise the cycle just continues.

You're not really talking to what I'm saying at all. And I don't honestly understand. 

Saying that you're hopeful that the Gazans will rise up against Hamas as a response to the specific bombings is not saying anything about the eventual goal. You're talking about some future system; Ran and I were talking about what's literally happening this second. 

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Protests have been going on for ages against the government and the latter has become more unpopular at times. 

Great - has it helped? Is it helping? Is it changing policy? Is it stopping bombs from being dropped? 

I mean, that's my point - that simply saying that popular uprising should be done more is not really useful either as a short-term fix or a long term one. If you have an issue with that as a suggestion you can argue it with Ran, I guess. 

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

They can't unseat him in part because the fear of Hamas and other actors eases his path to power. Rip out the root problem. 

I don't think that's true, at least not in the long term. Netanyahu is likely going to be gone because of his failure to defend Israel. Israel has historically been quite good at ensuring that its officials are held accountable for failures like this. 

But honestly, that fear is what Netanyahu used to stay in power too. He built on it, he continued to provoke it. Aren't you the one who says how you have to demand more from your citizens? If so, I'd imagine you'd be all in on making sure that Israelis take the blame for their government and they should know better, right?

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Whose problem is it then? You can't say people in Gaza don't need to end Hamas and then also say Israel shouldn't be taking the measures they think they need to do so to end Hamas. The latter has to go if you want peace in the region and the former are the only two parties that are going to be able to do it. If you say neither Israelis nor Palestinians should do whatever it takes to destroy Hamas, that means you're okay with them still being in power.

I think again you're willfully misreading this. The point is that it is not Gazans responsibility to end Hamas right this instant. There is basically nothing they can do to stop Hamas in the shortest term. 

Long term? Sure. But again, that doesn't mean you should blame Gazans right now for not doing more. Right now, the vast majority of the power to stop bombings resides with Israel. It is Gaza's problem, but it is Israel's responsibility. 

In the future it's going to take a whole lot of people to come together to figure things out and make changes if they actually want to change things, but right this instant? No, it isn't people in Gaza's responsibility to end Hamas. If you really wanted to make that their responsibility Israel could stop the bombing and say that in a month's time the bombing would continue again unless Hamas unconditionally surrendered, and Israel would give anyone willing to fight Hamas in Gaza weapons, material support and logistical support. But Israel ain't doing that, Israel has no interest in anyone doing that, and Israel isn't interested in Hamas' surrendering. 

[Ran]

41 minutes ago, dbergkvist said:

As we all know by now, Hamas only exists in Gaza because Israel created (and Netanyahu funded) them,

Huh? Israel did not create Hamas except in the broadest possible sense that Hamas came into existence as a reaction to Israel. It came into existence in 1987.

I have of course remarked on the cynical ploy of Netanyahu of boosting Hamas to split Palestinians and prevent statehood. I hope Netanyahu and his government get driven out in the aftermath of this mess.

But the conditions in which Hamas came to power -- a power vacuum due to the wild corruption of Fatah, followed by a bloody civil war to drive Fatah out of Gaza -- and Israeli tacit support allowed Hamas to drive far deeper claws into Gaza  than Fatah ever had. If Hamas is left in power and left unmolested, there is no way for an alternative to flourish -- they will just brutally crush them. This particular moment, where they have created an outrage that has made them ever more unpopular in the Arab world and beyond, seems like one that could be turned to something good: their destruction as a force and government in Gaza.

A demilitarized Gaza with an interim government would allow Gazan civil society to form its own government with the protection of whoever is doing the protecting. I doubt it will be Fatah, though. It will need to be something new.

 

Edited October 25, 2023 by Ran

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

You're not really talking to what I'm saying at all. And I don't honestly understand. 

Saying that you're hopeful that the Gazans will rise up against Hamas as a response to the specific bombings is not saying anything about the eventual goal. You're talking about some future system; Ran and I were talking about what's literally happening this second. 

I'm talking about past, present and future. Until Gazans throw Hamas out this will just be cyclical. Right now is a time where they should revolt assuming they can make a deal with Israel that stops the bombings and lets aid flow in. 

Quote

Great - has it helped? Is it helping? Is it changing policy? Is it stopping bombs from being dropped? 

Helped? Probably not, but it's played a role in diminishing support for Bibi. 

Quote

I don't think that's true, at least not in the long term. Netanyahu is likely going to be gone because of his failure to defend Israel. Israel has historically been quite good at ensuring that its officials are held accountable for failures like this. 

But honestly, that fear is what Netanyahu used to stay in power too. He built on it, he continued to provoke it. Aren't you the one who says how you have to demand more from your citizens? If so, I'd imagine you'd be all in on making sure that Israelis take the blame for their government and they should know better, right?

They should know better than to keep trusting these conservative asshole hawks who do everything they can to enflame the situation. The Israeli government has a ton of blood on its hands and the citizens keep electing bad people. They don't get to dodge blame for that just like we don't get to do so here.

[Werthead]

19 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Per @Werthead the answer is 'yes' - it's killing a ton of Hamas leadership, destroying a lot of supplies, and causing a lot of overall damage to their organization.

 

Verified deaths of Hamas leadership is around 18 significant figures and maybe several hundred Hamas fighters killed, plus the 1500 lost in the attack on Israel. Likely hundreds more have been killed, so we might be looking at around 2,000 Hamas personnel killed in Israel's counter-attack, out of a claimed 35,000 in the Gaza Strip (that's probably an exaggeration from Hamas leadership and counts people who are in an alliance of convenience/necessity with Hamas, but still not insignificant). A lot of legwork needs to be done.

The main problem, which I don't think has even been raised by anyone, is that Hamas's supreme leadership is out of the country, many of them based in Qatar which Israel doesn't want to start bombing (yet). So they're completely untouchable during this conflict.

18 hours ago, Kalbear said:

It's a fair question. Note that Hamas has said nothing directly; this comes from sources and intel that is from their internal workings. But even then you should be skeptical. One reason that I think this is more likely to be true is because of Hamas' actions. They are acting like they do not want the bombings to continue. Their allies are acting like they've been heavily wounded. Now, this could all be a ruse - that's entirely possible. I don't know why they would lie about it, but it's possible they could. From a strategic standpoint I would think Hamas would want the bombings to escalate more and get more indiscriminate because their only real strategic success has been to get some of the Arab and Muslim nations around them to threaten Israel and cause some of the opinion of Israel to decrease. I guess it's possible that they're using reverse psychology and that that's their goal, but...eh? Seems too complicated to me. Mostly, I trust @Werthead to do the heavy lifting and state things that are likely to be true because of his track record. If he says it chances are good it's been well-sourced and fairly unbiased, based on other sources that have a good track record. 

But yes - I would say very much that be VERY skeptical about everything. About death numbers, about Israel's claims, about atrocities, about all of it. Especially be skeptical of any claims that confirm your biases. 

Meh, I'm much more cautious about the information flying around in this conflict. The OSINT community has much less material to work with, the dense population means that it's hard to find weapons footage without horrendous casualty signs around it (mental health in the OSINT community is a thing at the moment after two years of seeing bad stuff in Ukraine, and this is possibly even worse) and the official information from Hamas is often bullshit and from Israel has been suspect. Also, a lot of the OSINT community, even some of the more pessimistic ones about Ukraine, are very pro-Israel which tends to skew some of the reporting in a way it doesn't in Ukraine, or at least to the same degree.

The mainstream press is probably doing a better job here, as they have Palestinian correspondents not affiliated with Hamas.

Edited October 25, 2023 by Werthead

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

5 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I think again you're willfully misreading this. The point is that it is not Gazans responsibility to end Hamas right this instant. There is basically nothing they can do to stop Hamas in the shortest term. 

Long term? Sure. But again, that doesn't mean you should blame Gazans right now for not doing more. Right now, the vast majority of the power to stop bombings resides with Israel. It is Gaza's problem, but it is Israel's responsibility. 

It was their responsibility to end Hamas a long time ago. They'd be so much better off right now if they kicked them out when it would have been easier and elected a moderate government that could work with Israel and the West and Arab world more generally. 

Quote

In the future it's going to take a whole lot of people to come together to figure things out and make changes if they actually want to change things, but right this instant? No, it isn't people in Gaza's responsibility to end Hamas. If you really wanted to make that their responsibility Israel could stop the bombing and say that in a month's time the bombing would continue again unless Hamas unconditionally surrendered, and Israel would give anyone willing to fight Hamas in Gaza weapons, material support and logistical support. But Israel ain't doing that, Israel has no interest in anyone doing that, and Israel isn't interested in Hamas' surrendering. 

I guess the bolded is more or less what I am saying. Under the immediate conditions a rebellion can't happen, but I don't view long term as years from now. I would fully support ending the bombing, restoring the utilities, providing aid and providing arms to a credible Gazan force that's anti-Hamas if there's a real belief they could topple them. I do think, however, that the last part would require an Israeli occupation which I don't think anyone wants. 

[Kalbear]

34 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I'm talking about past, present and future. Until Gazans throw Hamas out this will just be cyclical. Right now is a time where they should revolt assuming they can make a deal with Israel that stops the bombings and lets aid flow in. 

Great, but that wasn't what we were talking about.

34 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Helped? Probably not, but it's played a role in diminishing support for Bibi. 

But not enough. 

34 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

They should know better than to keep trusting these conservative asshole hawks who do everything they can to enflame the situation. The Israeli government has a ton of blood on its hands and the citizens keep electing bad people. They don't get to dodge blame for that just like we don't get to do so here.

So shouldn't you be focusing a lot of effort on making sure everyone knows that?

27 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

It was their responsibility to end Hamas a long time ago. They'd be so much better off right now if they kicked them out when it would have been easier and elected a moderate government that could work with Israel and the West and Arab world more generally. 

That has a lot of blame to go around then - Fatah and their gross incompetence and corruption, Israel for supporting the division and not doing enough to stop Hamas (and in fact deciding to keep them around as a lever to support it), the US for supporting Netanyahu and doing fuckall, Egypt and Jordan for not supporting Palestinians, Iran and Lebanon for supporting Hamas directly, Qatar for harboring their leadership...there's a long list!

Note also that Hamas knows this too and spent a lot of time building things up in Gaza to make it looked like they cared. And honestly, compared to what it was like it probably is a fair degree better. As stated before Palestinians have had protests over the years against Hamas both in Gaza and in WB as well. It hasn't changed much. 

27 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I guess the bolded is more or less what I am saying. Under the immediate conditions a rebellion can't happen, but I don't view long term as years from now. I would fully support ending the bombing, restoring the utilities, providing aid and providing arms to a credible Gazan force that's anti-Hamas if there's a real belief they could topple them. I do think, however, that the last part would require an Israeli occupation which I don't think anyone wants. 

Again, this wasn't what Ran and I were talking about. 

[Varysblackfyre321]

1 hour ago, kissdbyfire said:

No apologies necessary, at all. We were just expressing our opinions on something. I have just been feeling anxious w/ the hostage situation, and feel somewhat disturbed by so many just assuming they’re all lost no matter what. 

That’s fine but I will never forgive you for our disagreements on ASOIAF.

Because I don’t know what they were/s

Anyway I too think people—including myself— have been too quick to count the hostages as good as dead. If Israel shows restraint think they can be saved.

Edited October 25, 2023 by Varysblackfyre321

[Rippounet]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

Nah. The IDF already captured some. Antitank missiles are not hard to come by in the Middle East thanks to decades of US and Soviet intervention. 

I'd be more surprised about anti-aircraft munitions, but antitank stuff? Ukraine literally had at one point more than 1 missile per soldier. They're easy to come by.

My bad, let me correct myself: Hamas does have a lot of Soviet-era anti-tank missiles, with a sprinkle of Iranian and North Korean stuff. Not convinced any of it is going to be great against Merkavas (I believe they've been mostly used against buses so far).

Though, to be fair, they apparently got their hands on a few more modern Russian Kornets. Dunno about those to be honest.
They also do have some anti-air stuff, as a matter of fact, most of it makeshift - though again, "makeshift" doesn't mean worthless. Maybe a few actual AA sytems.