White House says it has evidence Hamas using Al Shifa hospital to run military actions

goat@sh.itjust.works to World News@lemmy.world – 102 points –
White House says it has evidence Hamas using Al Shifa hospital to run military actions
reuters.com
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You minimize civilian casualties as much as possible while still ensuring that it has a military purpose to the best of your ability. Beyond the use of specific weapons which causes unnecessary suffering with no military purpose, there is no specific limit. We may not like it but this is war. It comes with the territory because there is no other choice.

And how has the general bombardment of entire cities and evacuation routes minimized civilian casualties?

Heck, how has the IDF's methodology even benefited their claimed attempts to wipe out Hamas?

What Israel is doing is not leveling entire cities. Look at Allepo or Mosul. Israel is far more targeted but they get blamed every time a building collapses because there was an unsafe tunnel under it.

Israel is systemically eliminating underground tunnels, enemy concentrations, and command structures prior to entering the city when they can clear buildings individually and dismantle the command structure.

So, they're blowing up entire families supposedly on the claims of tunnels being below said homes.

Aren't those tunnels the places where the majority of the hostages are being kept? So the IDF are actively trying to kill the hostages?

They are at war so yes. The bed to take the city and they need to take the tunnels out to take the city. This is not a new problem in war. These aren't insurance they are dealing with. Israel does not occupy the ground yet.

My perception is that negotiation with hostage takers only encourages them to take more hostages. I'm not smart on this so don't take my word for it.

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So in other words, whatever the number of dead innocents is which might give you pause (and you aren't sure such a number even exists) it's definitely more than are being killed currently.

Is that an accurate summary?

The goal is to achieve victory while minimizing civilian casualties. Any strategy that prioritizes minimizing civilian casualties over achieving victory inevitably leads to defeat because the enemy can choose to put arbitrarily many civilians at risk. In other words, if there's some particular number of dead innocents that would give you pause, all the enemy has to do is strap that many innocents to their soldiers, and the enemy has both the ability and the willingness to do that.

So any number is OK as long as they guys giving the orders say it's necessary for victory and give lip service to trying to avoid it. Thank you for confirming.

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