Israel - Hamas War VI

[Rippounet]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

Most people here probably don't care.

My folks' kibbutz is currently hosting hundreds of people who were evacuated from the south and the north.

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

You seem to be subscribing to the belief that in a fight the person who punches first isn't responsible for the fight because they're weaker than the person they punched.

Not really. I'm saying i) that the fight didn't start on October 7th. You know that, I know that, everybody knows that, and you're doing yourself no favors to say otherwise and ii) if someone punches first, it doesn't absolve the other guy from any moral responsibility.

The reason why we despise Hamas is because they attacked civilians. The reason Israel is supposed to be morally superior is because it doesn't do that. But no one can take that moral superiority as a given, it must be continuously demonstrated.

A lot of people, like myself, insist so much on such demonstrations not because they want to defend Hamas, but to be able to support Israel. But we won't do it unconditionally, not when it seems a crime against humanity is under way.

Kal is correct - I second a lot of what he wrote today: the best thing Hamas has for it right now is the moral outrage against Israeli brutality. Take that away, and Hamas will be done, the entire world will want to make sure of it.
Conversely, keep up the current methods, and you can be sure, as Harari said, that something at least as bad will take its place down the line.

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

A point in the past that happened a few weeks ago that started the war? Odd take.

That's actually on Netanyahu. Many if not most leaders would have taken the time to have several days of national mourning to remember and celebrate the victims, before starting a war.

Edited October 30, 2023 by Rippounet

[Zorral]

18 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Kal is correct - I second a lot of what he wrote today: the best thing Hamas has for it right now is the moral outrage against Israeli brutality. Take that away, and Hamas will be done, the entire world will want to make sure of it.

I third that!  Which we all said immediately too, and have been saying all along.  Everybody is saying that, except for those who are determinedly believing that we must kill all the Palestinians because -- well, there's nothing else to do, or, rather, we can't think of anything else because we're stuck in that masculinist honor bs.

[Frey family reunion]

22 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Kal is correct - I second a lot of what he wrote today: the best thing Hamas has for it right now is the moral outrage against Israeli brutality. Take that away, and Hamas will be done, the entire world will want to make sure of it.

Except much of the world isn't just angry at Israel over "brutality".  They're angry at Israel for existing.  Israel could completely shell up like a turle behind their Iron Dome, it wouldn't stop militants from decrying that their existence came at the expense of Palestinian Muslims.  It also wouldn't stop countries with a vested interest in promoting unrest in the region.

Do you really think Iran's motives in propping up and training these militant groups are to help the Palestinians gain independence?

[Ran]

I have no idea how moral outrage made ISIS done, or Al-Qaeda done. It took military arms and a great deal of effort -- and in some cases many civilian lives -- before those forces were diminished into relative unimportance.

Hamas is in a fortress of tunnels and walls made up of the bodies of civilians. It's not going anywhere because of moral outrage from the world. What jihadist organizations have just faded away without actually being fought against?

9 minutes ago, Zorral said:

except for those who are determinedly believing that we must kill all the Palestinians

According to the rhetoric you've just put there, if we are not one of the "everyone" who says that, then we want all Palestinians to be killed.

Is that correct? That's what you intend to convey? For example, do you take from this thread that I want all the Palestinians killed?

Edited October 30, 2023 by Ran

[Gorn]

57 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

Kal is correct - I second a lot of what he wrote today: the best thing Hamas has for it right now is the moral outrage against Israeli brutality. Take that away, and Hamas will be done, the entire world will want to make sure of it.

No, the best thing Hamas has for it right now is a state with population of 2 million people which they control and govern, which they use as a safe base of operations, training and recruitment. The second best thing they have is the financing from Qatar, which will continue regardless of Israel's actions. The third best thing they have is the full support of a permanent UN Security Council member (Russia), which will again continue regardless of Israel's actions.

Could you elaborate on the last part? Let's say there's a permanent ceasefire right now, how exactly will the "entire world make sure that Hamas will be done"?

Edited October 30, 2023 by Gorn

[Kalbear]

Just now, Ran said:

I have no idea how moral outrage made ISIS done, or Al-Qaeda done. It took military arms and a great deal of effort -- and in some cases many civilian lives -- before those forces were diminished into relative unimportance.

Hamas is very, very different.

Again, strawman. No one is saying that Hamas should not be fought. They are saying that the degree that Israel is fighting is significantly more than is needed and causes extra harm. Especially in this specific case. 

But let's get into it. AQ was fought with a very large coalition of allies. The first actual military operation on any AQ forces was literally a month after 9-11. The first actions against Afghanistan were to send CIA operatives to Afghanistan to establish relationships with locals opposed to the Taliban. Specific oversight was done to justify military value vs civilian casualties with significant reporting outside of the attacks, with many attacks called off because of civilian casualty possibilities. Other means to kill beyond bombing were commonly used. And it took years of time. It also required major agreements with many countries to operate on their soil - and if the US and others couldn't do that they would have never been able to hit senior leadership of AQ. Heck, you know what country supported putting in the Afghan interim government in 2002? Iran. And that was because of deals that the US made with them!

As another example there was major international outrage when Trump relaxed rules of engagement in Afghanistan and let more civilians be collateral damage. This resulted in an increase of civilian casualties of 330% from the previous year and a massive increase in 2019. The actual numbers? In that year, 700 civilians were killed in total. So in all the airstrikes in Afghanistan in the single worst year since 2001 1/10th of the civilians were killed compared to Gaza so far. So maybe it was worse in 2001? Yep, it was - about 2400 civilians were killed then (though numbers are not easy to come by). 

The important thing here is that the US (and many other countries) worked with Afghanis and cultivated a lot of relationships there. They did administer the country - with troops being put in harm's way - for years. Israel is apparently not willing to do any of that. If Israel isn't going to do that then someone else is going to. And right now, thanks to that moral outrage, no one is particularly willing to do it. 

And if no one does it? Hamas - or something like Hamas - is going to just come back. 

 

[Zorral]

29 minutes ago, Ran said:

I have no idea how moral outrage made ISIS done, or Al-Qaeda done. It took military arms and a great deal of effort -- and in some cases many civilian lives -- before those forces were diminished into relative unimportance.

Hamas is in a fortress of tunnels and walls made up of the bodies of civilians. It's not going anywhere because of moral outrage from the world. What jihadist organizations have just faded away without actually being fought against?

According to the rhetoric you've just put there, if we are not one of the "everyone" who says that, then we want all Palestinians to be killed.

Is that correct? That's what you intend to convey? For example, do you take from this thread that I want all the Palestinians killed?

I get the sense you don't care they are being killed in large numbers.  And the sense that trying not to kill all those women and children is a waste of time and effort because it may well be necessary in order to kill all of Hamas, even though we all know, including bibi&etc., who sponsored Hamas,  killing all Hamas and thus, unavoidably vast numbers of the 2 million women and children, it won't change a damned thing.

I also get the sense that you don't give a damn what the multitude of Israelis and Jews, who know far more than you do, and who are personally suffering from this decision, who don't agree with you.

Edited October 30, 2023 by Zorral

[Kalbear]

Just now, Gorn said:

No, the best thing Hamas has for it right now is a state with population of 2 million people which they control and govern, which they use as a safe base of operations, training and recruitment.

Could you elaborate on the last part? Let's say there's a ceasefire right now, how exactly will the "entire world make sure that Hamas will be done"?

First off the US and many others aren't requesting a ceasefire, they're requesting a pause on some activities. 

But let's go that far. Let's say that Israel - despite suffering an absolutely brutal terrorist attack that left the country and the world incensed - agrees to a ceasefire for humanitarian purposes for Gaza. That they stop all bombings and the ground invasion so that Palestinians can get more help, support, and get to safety. Let's say that they set up humanitarian corridors for refugees to flee with specific promises that once the war is done those refugees can return to their land if they so choose, and those promises are backed with international backing and support.

What does that cost Israel? 

Now, what would they get out of it? They would likely get other countries to participate in the next action. It would not only be Israel involved in attacking back. The US may be at that point willing to aid. Some of Europe may as well. Heck, you might even get Saudi Arabia to work with you at that point depending on how much the US would be willing to spend. You also likely get Iran and Hezbollah and Syria to back off on their posturing. And, possibly, you get Qatar to give up the senior leadership of Hamas. After evacuations and people leaving you can go back to the war. That war may be a bit harder than it would have been in terms of military casualties, but the peace will be significantly easier. 

This would take time, of course. Likely months. It would be politically untenable for Netanyahu. But it would save a whole lot of people's lives and make it far more likely to have something possible afterwards. 

I 100% agree with folks who have said that as long as Hamas is part of the process there can be no lasting peace. Hamas must go. But Hamas will not go unless you establish something better to replace it, and that can't be done in the haphazard way that the war has gone so far. That is how you get things like ISIS. 

[Ran]

Yes, I'm aware of coalitions. I noted Macron proposed the anti-ISIS coalition expand to "fight Hamas"... But to fight Hamas, you have to do it in Gaza. The Arab world isn't going to open its doors to refugees from Gaza, Israel has obvious reservations, so how in the world is a coalition of any kind actually going to fight them with minimal loss of life for civilians who are these crowded, dense cities?

You know what you actually need for that to happen? Boots on the ground actually fighting house to house, room to room, and clearing tunnels. Which means a lot of coalition troops dying, and hey, civilians too. What coalition is willing to do that?

You know how we tried to do it in Afghanistan? With Afghani troops on our side. In Mosul? With Iraqis and Kurds. They took the brunt of the losses.

But they are not leaping into this fight, and European nations have extremely limited tolerance for casualties on their side, so what coalition of the willing is actually going to make this happen? Biden, rightly, is not volunteering US troops.

Hamas has to go, and I've yet to see any realistic take on how to do that without dismantling the military capability that keeps Gaza on its control. Only Israel is capable and willing to do it. No amount of good will from the rest of the world is going to shake Hamas out of Gaza.

Bennett's plan is about as low collateral damage as I can imagine, sadly, and it'll be months of people rightfully yelling about civilians who are trapped or refuse to take humanitarian corridors or who Hamas is blocking from leaving. Much of the world basically dislikes Hamas but doesn't understand that their grip on Gaza needs to be broken to allow any kind of peaceful interim government.

[Corvinus85]

17 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Again, strawman. No one is saying that Hamas should not be fought. They are saying that the degree that Israel is fighting is significantly more than is needed and causes extra harm. Especially in this specific case. 

But let's get into it. AQ was fought with a very large coalition of allies. The first actual military operation on any AQ forces was literally a month after 9-11. The first actions against Afghanistan were to send CIA operatives to Afghanistan to establish relationships with locals opposed to the Taliban. Specific oversight was done to justify military value vs civilian casualties with significant reporting outside of the attacks, with many attacks called off because of civilian casualty possibilities. Other means to kill beyond bombing were commonly used. And it took years of time. It also required major agreements with many countries to operate on their soil - and if the US and others couldn't do that they would have never been able to hit senior leadership of AQ. Heck, you know what country supported putting in the Afghan interim government in 2002? Iran. And that was because of deals that the US made with them!

As another example there was major international outrage when Trump relaxed rules of engagement in Afghanistan and let more civilians be collateral damage. This resulted in an increase of civilian casualties of 330% from the previous year and a massive increase in 2019. The actual numbers? In that year, 700 civilians were killed in total. So in all the airstrikes in Afghanistan in the single worst year since 2001 1/10th of the civilians were killed compared to Gaza so far. So maybe it was worse in 2001? Yep, it was - about 2400 civilians were killed then (though numbers are not easy to come by). 

The important thing here is that the US (and many other countries) worked with Afghanis and cultivated a lot of relationships there. They did administer the country - with troops being put in harm's way - for years. Israel is apparently not willing to do any of that. If Israel isn't going to do that then someone else is going to. And right now, thanks to that moral outrage, no one is particularly willing to do it. 

And if no one does it? Hamas - or something like Hamas - is going to just come back. 

 

This feels like apples & oranges to me because of the logistical needs the US military had to deal with, to successfully remove the Taliban from power and hunt down AQ. I wonder how things would have played out if there was a tiny, semi-autonomous nation wedged between the US and Canadian borders, ruled by a terrorist organization which attacked the US.  

Furthermore, all that money that the US poured into Afghanistan over 20 years and all the lives lost amounted to nothing. Afghanistan's "Hamas" are back in charge. The only difference is that the Taliban are not inclined to launch terrorist attacks on the US, though like 20+ years ago, they may provide shelter to terrorists again.

To be fair, the tactics that the US tried by "winning the hearts and minds" of Afghani should have and should still be attempted by Israel, because the US could have easily bombed the shit out of Afghanistan and then fucked off, but they didn't. Israel needs to obtain lasting peace because those they see as enemies are their neighbors, and that should be done by having positive relations with them.

Edited October 30, 2023 by Corvinus85

[Frey family reunion]

The other issue that Israel has, is that the longer they wait the greater the possibility that they'll see a second front open up at the West Bank.  And while everyone on this forum seems very content with the fact that Israel shouldn't be concerned with the Palestinians being able to overun them, I'm not so sure Israel shares that level of comfort.

[Zorral]

Is A Two State Solution Really No Longer Possible?

"Even if the Israelis are successful in toppling the Hamas government in Gaza and destroying its military capacity, such a success will be no more than a holding pattern if it is not followed by a broader political settlement involving both Gaza and the West Bank. In Israel the events of October 7th 2023 have represented a watershed in matters of politics and national security. The question is a watershed to what?"

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/is-a-two-state-solution-really-no-longer-possible

Quote

 

What can be called a “peace process” between Israel and the Palestinians ended with the failure of the Camp David summit and the onset of the Second Intifada in late 2000. Over the subsequent years, as settlement activity continued, it became increasingly common, especially among the more hard-bitten and realist-minded, to say that the time had run out on a so-called “two state solution.” From different quarters this verdict had different meanings. For Israeli maximalists it was a concluding judgment on the folly of the Oslo Accords and refusal of territorial concessions. For Palestinians it signaled a rejection of territorial compromise born of disappointment with the failure of Oslo. More concretely it was a simple statement of the reality on the ground. The West Bank had become so shot through with settlements — not just the large agglomerations along the 1967 border but lines of control reaching much deeper into Palestinian areas — that it simply wasn’t possible to create a viable state even if there was the will to create one. And quite clearly there wasn’t the will to make one.

On the Israeli side, the Oslo Accords had been born of a strategic recognition on the part of significant elements of the Israeli national security establishment. It wasn’t possible to keep the West Bank and Gaza Palestinians in a permanently stateless/occupied status. Nor was it possible to absorb them into Israel since Israeli Jews would cease to make up the overwhelming majority of the population. The years between 2000 and 2008 represented a kind of back and forth holding pattern. Benjamin Netanyahu’s return to power in 2009 was based on a very different premise: that the Palestinian issue could be managed indefinitely rather than resolved and with no major repercussions.

Among American opponents of the occupation, there’s often been a caricature of Netanyahu as an inveterate hawk, always hungry to annex more territory, expel more Palestinians, fight new wars. That’s not quite true. In national security and war-making, risk-aversion and extemporizing have been his hallmark. His argument to Israelis was something like, ‘You don’t need to resolve anything. Don’t worry about Palestinians. You can have your affluent, high-tech society and first world life style. I’ve got the Palestinian thing covered. Yes, your sons and daughters will do occupation duty in the West Bank and we’ll have occasional flareups of rocket barrages. But it’s all manageable and I’ll manage it.’

For those of us who never believed this could be true, it did slowly become a matter of reason over experience. That couldn’t go on forever. And yet, year after year somehow it did. Israel’s economy grew stronger. It normalized relations with more Arab countries. It even managed a de facto normalization and something close to a de facto, though sub rosa, alliance with Saudi Arabia. It couldn’t work and yet it kept working. Until it didn’t.

What exploded Netanyahu’s legitimacy and reputation on October 7th wasn’t just an abject national security failure. It exploded the whole idea that the occupation could be effectively managed and that Benjamin Netanyahu could manage it.

Which brings us back to the matter of two states.

People who face realities will tell you that two states is no longer possible. That window has closed. Two states is happy talk people use to evade or avoid facing the reality of the situation on the ground. Looking at a map it’s hard to disagree.

That’s what we’re told. And yet the exact opposite is the case.

Many think a two state reality or hope can only be borne of optimism. Quite the contrary. The current array of Israeli settlements across the West Bank are an immovable impediment to creating two states … until a future war wipes them from the map. Or until a future war drives out all the Palestinians living adjacent to current settlements. Indeed, it is hard to think of any two peoples for whom displacement, expulsion and exile are more central to historic experience and national identity. Who is so starry-eyed and foolish to think all of that must be in the past rather than the future?

It’s the so-called one state solution that is a sort of absurd daydream. Positing a binational secular state with equality and justice for both peoples is much easier than creating one. Any democratic polity, even by the most elastic definition, relies on some threshold level of consensus among a large majority of the population. Imagine looking at these two damaged peoples, capable of brutalizing each other to the extremes we are now seeing and actually thinking they could all be piled into a single state that wouldn’t immediately break down into paramilitary violence and civil chaos. Indeed, one of the surest, albeit bloodiest and misery-wracked paths to two states would be to try one state, allow the ensuing civil breakdown to play itself out and then partition that state into two states along the emerging battle lines. You might say this is a dark view of human nature. But absurdity is its own darkness.

From the other side of the equation, the surest path to, if not to a single state then a confederation, would be the creation of two states which could build trust over time and increasingly collaborate on issues such as water, security and trade. Both of these models are validated by the history of the Balkans in the 1990s and there the antagonism and violence were of much newer vintage than anything between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

I can’t speak to the Palestinian side of the equation because I don’t know their experience and who they are as I do the Israelis, though that understanding is certainly very incomplete. But with Jewish Israelis, the single state model imagines an ability to recognize equality, share power and more generally disenthrall themselves when they as a people have proved wholly unable to make much simpler concessions to create two states. There are certainly comparable improbable imaginings on the Palestinian side.

The Roman philosopher Seneca tells us that fate guides the willing and drags the unwilling. Peace and partition can come in many ways — through painful negotiation or bloody inter-communal violence. The current status quo may perpetuate itself for years or decades but it will never be free of violence and instability. People who believe a two state solution is no longer possible are guilty of a failure of imagination. But unlike what many think, it is not only a failure to dream but an equal failure to think of the nightmares that are always possible and have actually visited the two peoples in question many times.

Even if the Israelis are successful in toppling the Hamas government in Gaza and destroying its military capacity, such a success will be no more than a holding pattern if it is not followed by a broader political settlement involving both Gaza and the West Bank. In Israel the events of October 7th 2023 have represented a watershed in matters of politics and national security. The question is a watershed to what?

 

 

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Ran said:

Yes, I'm aware of coalitions. I noted Macron proposed the anti-ISIS coalition expand to "fight Hamas"... But to fight Hamas, you have to do it in Gaza. The Arab world isn't going to open its doors to refugees from Gaza, Israel has obvious reservations, so how in the world is a coalition of any kind actually going to fight them with minimal loss of life for civilians who are these crowded, dense cities?

You don't know that no country is going to take people. Palestinians are reluctant to leave anyway and Egypt is reluctant to take them based on history, but there are diplomatic ways to actually solve that. Or...there might have been. That door is absolutely closed now, and Israel showed no sign of even thinking about wanting it. It took significant diplomatic pressure to allow any humanitarian aid into Gaza at all, and that was after Israel took away all food and water. 

4 minutes ago, Ran said:

You know what you actually need for that to happen? Boots on the ground actually fighting house to house, room to room, and clearing tunnels. Which means a lot of coalition troops dying, and hey, civilians too. What coalition is willing to do that?

You know how we tried to do it in Afghanistan? With Afghani troops on our side. In Mosul? With Iraqis and Kurds. They took the brunt of the losses.

How does this have to do with the massive amount of bombing that's been going on? There haven't been boots on the ground until this weekend. I don't understand the point you're trying to make. 

4 minutes ago, Ran said:

But they are not leaping into this fight, and European nations have extremely limited tolerance for casualties on their side, so what coalition of the willing is actually going to make this happen? Biden, rightly, is not volunteering US troops.

Certainly not right now as it stands, no. And Israel isn't asking, which is kind of the point. But imagine for a second that Israel didn't attack immediately after 10-7 and went to their allies to say exactly that - that the only way to get rid of Hamas was to do a prolonged ground assault with their allies. Do you think those allies wouldn't have helped? Do you think the US wouldn't have helped? 

I don't honestly know, but I know it was at least a possibility then. It is absolutely not a possibility now. 

4 minutes ago, Ran said:

Hamas has to go, and I've yet to see any realistic take on how to do that without dismantling the military capability that keeps Gaza on its control. Only Israel is capable and willing to do it. No amount of good will from the rest of the world is going to shake Hamas out of Gaza.

I agree! Mostly, at least. You have to dismantle the military as part of getting rid of Hamas. 

That does not mean using a JDAM to possibly kill one Hamas militant in a house, as Israel has said they've done repeatedly. That does not mean bombing refugee camps - even if there are legitimate military targets nearby. That does not mean bombing near hospitals. That does not mean you need to cut off humanitarian aid. That does not mean you have to cut off food and water and internet and electricity. That does not mean you need to close the border off completely. 

Again, there seems to be this weird disconnect from people saying how Israel is bombing way too much and being way too lax with civilian casualties to mean 'and therefore Israel should do nothing'. 

The real important thing is that if you continue down this route then just like your statement that only Israel is capable and willing to go in then no one will be willing to go in and keep the peace. And if Israel doesn't, then Hamas (or again, someone worse like Islamic Jihad or ISIS) are just going to go in again. And it'll be another mowing the grass situation, just like it has been every time Israel has gone into Gaza in the last 15 years.  

4 minutes ago, Ran said:

Bennett's plan is about as low collateral damage as I can imagine, sadly, and it'll be months of people rightfully yelling about civilians who are trapped or refuse to take humanitarian corridors or who Hamas is blocking from leaving. Much of the world basically dislikes Hamas but doesn't understand that their grip on Gaza needs to be broken to allow any kind of peaceful interim government.

I think you need to imagine a whole lot better then. Especially since what is going on is going to make it politically impossible for most nations that could help with the situation to do so. 

[Rippounet]

2 minutes ago, Frey family reunion said:

Except much of the world isn't just angry at Israel over "brutality".  They're angry at Israel for existing.

I don't actually buy that. Oh sure, the idiots and the brainwashed always find a way to hate some kind of other, and this stupidity can be used - is often used -  by unscrupulous leaders, just like xenophobia and islamophobia are used by populists in the West. But let's stop with the essentialist bullshit, uh? Most Muslims don't give a fuck about Israel except when it does debatable shit, and educated folks throughout the world understand how complex the situation is.

Yes, Hamas wants Israel gone. But Hamas is not the Muslim world. Before October 7th, it didn't even have the support of a majority of Palestinians. Remember the polls we read about just a few days ago?

Taking anti-Semitism for granted is the best way to fuel it. Don't do that.
 

3 minutes ago, Gorn said:

Could you elaborate on the last part? Let's say there's a ceasefire right now, how exactly will the "entire world make sure that Hamas will be done"?

If Israel were to suspend its campaign now, allow for humanitarian aid, and come up with a long-term plan for Gaza, it, the US, and the EU could pressure Qatar into stopping financing Hamas.
In fact, if Israeli actions were more rational, that should be one of the top 3 objectives right now: to make sure no organization like Hamas can rely on any kind of international funding ever again.
Saudi Arabia was already siding with Israel before Octobre 7th... As were a lot of Muslim countries in fact. They are only pulling away now because their leaders can't go against their public opinion.
If Israel had a long-term strategy, it could rely on a lot of international support, and have much better chances of moving forward. Who'd be left? The Iranian regime, whose blatant use of anti-Semitism is rightfully drawing popular anger? Putin's Russia, to open a second anti-Western front? Oh sure, the "entire world" won't actively work against Hamas, but it won't hinder Western efforts to get rid of it. Whereas right now, I don't think the West can hope for much - not even long-term popular support for Israel.

It's not rocket science. The current methods and strategy will only take Israel so far. I think it's worth repeating that even the most brutal military campaign won't actually eliminate Hamas. It will eliminate its operational capabilities, for some time at least, but there is zero solution to identify Hamas fighters who choose not to fight today, and thus no certainty that it won't rearm in the future.
That's why the hawkish perspective is so wrong. By refusing to acknowledge the grievances of the Palestinians (supposedly in the name of defending Istael), it is blind to what allows Hamas (or any other terrorist organization) to exist in the first place. Because of that, none of the hawks are proposing any plan that actually leads to the long-term elimination of Hamas.
 

1 minute ago, Ran said:

I have no idea how moral outrage made ISIS done, or Al-Qaeda done. It took military arms and a great deal of effort -- and in some cases many civilian lives -- before those forces were diminished into relative unimportance.

The US government is to some extent limited by US public opinion, at least when it's a Democrat in the White House and/or when Democrats control Congress.
Republicans, imho, play by slightly different rules, which has led the Republican Party to where it is now. I don't think that anyone wants to condone that.

[Frey family reunion]

1 minute ago, Rippounet said:

the idiots and the brainwashed

don't underestimate the number of idiots and brainwashed in the world, on all sides.

[Kalbear]

14 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

This feels like apples & oranges to me because of the logistical needs the US military had to deal with, to successfully remove the Taliban from power and hunt down AQ. I wonder how things would have played out if there was a tiny, semi-autonomous nation wedged between the US and Canadian borders, ruled by a terrorist organization which attacked the US. 

I mean, we kind of had that with Bundy. We waited them out for months. In any case while logistics mattered we still could have bombed the shit out of Afghanistan if we so chose to. Heck, the authorization of war didn't happen for a whole week after 9-11! The US could have acted significantly faster if it so wanted to do so. The main difference would be that there was worry about immediate attacks afterwards in Gaza that weren't there after 9-11, and that's a fair point - but Israel's response has not been mostly about stopping follow-up attacks.

14 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

Furthermore, all that money that the US poured into Afghanistan over 20 years and all the lives lost amounted to nothing. Afghanistan's "Hamas" are back in charge. The only difference is that the Taliban are not inclined to launch terrorist attacks on the US, though like 20+ years ago, they may provide shelter to terrorists again.

That seems like a pretty big fucking only difference! I don't want to make this into all the ways we fucked up Afghanistan, but Afghanistan turned out the way it did even though the US had more people on the ground, more money, more allies, a dedicated war effort, limited civilian casualties and even installed another government. 

How do you think it will go if you don't do all of those things? How fast will something like IJ come into power if there are is no counterinsurgency, no troops on the ground, no rebuilding effort, no international presence, no interim governmental plan and no care from Israel other than to occasionally launch air strikes? 

12 minutes ago, Frey family reunion said:

The other issue that Israel has, is that the longer they wait the greater the possibility that they'll see a second front open up at the West Bank.  And while everyone on this forum seems very content with the fact that Israel shouldn't be concerned with the Palestinians being able to overun them, I'm not so sure Israel shares that level of comfort.

I would love to see this as a worry mentioned by anyone, anywhere. Hezbollah and Lebanon? Sure, maybe, though that's more likely the more civilian deaths occur. But the West Bank? Come on, man. 

[Altherion]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

Certainly not right now as it stands, no. And Israel isn't asking, which is kind of the point. But imagine for a second that Israel didn't attack immediately after 10-7 and went to their allies to say exactly that - that the only way to get rid of Hamas was to do a prolonged ground assault with their allies. Do you think those allies wouldn't have helped? Do you think the US wouldn't have helped?

The US is helping in the two ways that it can help: we're keeping a massive amount of fire power in the area to prevent Iran and others from escalation and, as soon as Congress gets its act together, we will give Israel some aid in the form of weapons and munitions. However, what the US will absolutely not do is send troops to fight in Gaza. And nobody else will do it either because everyone knows that there are exactly two ways urban warfare can go:

1) A bombing campaign like the one Israel is currently carrying out.

2) The meat grinder that is created when one sends in soldiers into a densely built up, densely populated area where the enemy has had time to lay traps and fortify.

I think most of your objections stem from the fact that you either do not understand or do not agree with this military reality. The Israelis are not bombing Gaza for their own amusement or for revenge or anything of the sort. They're doing it to soften up the defenses because they know that when they send in boots on the ground, their own casualties will be extremely high and they're hoping that by taking out at least some fortifications, they can reduce them a bit.

[Rippounet]

1 minute ago, Frey family reunion said:

don't underestimate the number of idiots and brainwashed in the world, on all sides.

I don't. That's why I want them to have nothing real to work with. If they have to invent stuff they're a much smaller threat. Conversely, stooping to their level will always help them.

[Hmmm]

19 minutes ago, Frey family reunion said:

The other issue that Israel has, is that the longer they wait the greater the possibility that they'll see a second front open up at the West Bank.  And while everyone on this forum seems very content with the fact that Israel shouldn't be concerned with the Palestinians being able to overun them, I'm not so sure Israel shares that level of comfort.

It is not the West Bank that Israel is worried about. Not at the moment anyway. If you "read between the lines" of the actions that the United States, Israel, and a number of other countries have taken during the last couple of weeks it is clear that they perceive a high risk for a much larger war against Iran and its proxies and allies. The US is not moving two carrier battle groups and dozens of anti-ballistic missile launchers to the region because of Hamas, that's for sure. 

Edited October 30, 2023 by Hmmm

[Ran]

14 hours ago, Zorral said:

Is A Two State Solution Really No Longer Possible?

Always appreciate reading Marshall, even when at times he's wrong. This time, I thoroughly agree with him, especially the absurdity of imagining some sort of binational state.

I think Israelis post-Netanyahu can really get to the position where they're willing to accept Gaza and the West Bank as a state, provided it was demilitarized (at least for the time being, with security guarantied by Israel and maybe the US  or Jordan or something). They are going to almost certainly be Islamic states with a great deal of griping about Israel's existence, but... maybe.

But the problem is Palestinians absolutely do not believe a two-state solution will happen, for the most part. This is no doubt in reaction to Netanyahu and his coalition, and maybe this can change. But the other thing is that what Palestinians mean by a two-state solution is not what most people think. It's not the Jewish state of Israel and the Palestinian state of Palestine. No, it's the Arab state of Palestine... and the state of Israel with millions of returned Palestinians, which basically turns Israel into a binational state and Palestine as an Arab state.

This is, one can imagine, a problem. It's a recipe for civil war at the least. Pluralism is simply not something that flies in the Middle East, with the notable exception of Israel. You can read many scholarly articles and OpEds trying to figure out why it fails to take root, but the fact is, it has indeed failed to take root. Maybe that will change in the future.

There was a time, twenty years ago, where the PLO seemed willing to accept only a token amount of returners (100,000 or so), but that too is buried right now. But maybe, if Hamas is out of the picture, if the PLO is revitalized with a reasonable leadership after Abbas goes or alternatively some other Palestinian party presents itself, if Netanyahu and his government of the far-right and theocrats are out of the picture,  then maybe we can get back to that. 

But Hamas has to let go of Gaza, or be made to let go. And the settlers need to stop expanding and expelling people and visiting violence in the West Bank. It's nonsense. Until these two things happen, honest negotiations can't start. 

Edited October 31, 2023 by Ran