Israel declares siege of Gaza as Hamas threatens to start killing hostages
theguardian.com
Highlight:
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no water, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant said. “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”
Jesus fucking Christ.
This feels like a humanitarian crisis that will soon become a full genocide.
It feels like the Israeli govt has used this terrorist attack to become terrorists themselves.
I mean they've been like that since forever, but now they're showing their true colors (more than they were).
I don't think it is outside of the realm of possibility that in 30 years we learn that the Mossad knew about this and were ordered to let it happen. The intelligence fuckup was so enormous that it seems plausible they at least knew something was up. And the Israeli government has proven itself cynical enough to lend such a thought possible.
There was rumor that they were observed training for this and the authorities told something was up. Which they seemingly ignored. Defense forces have to be right all the time however. Attackers only need to be right once. So be careful reading a lot into it.
Yep, I'd imagine most times when there have been air strikes, incursions, raids etc. Where they've destroyed weapons or captured/killed some terrorist leader could have thwarted similar events.
For a long time I've thought of the situation there as a slow-motion genocide. Looks like they're using the "surprise" attack by Hamas as an excuse to go full Hitler.
I think we'll see Israel just bomb the entire strip into a crater, they've spent the last 20 odd years working on weaponry that's specifically designed to destroy Palestine, they've just been waiting for something they can use as an excuse to use it all.
Now we know why Israel has been so reluctant to send military aid to Ukraine. They've been saving it for a special occasion.
Jewish space lasers... again?
They are "acting accordingly" by performing an ethnic cleansing. How disgustingly ironic.
ok Israel, tell us you're openly planning to violate the Geneva Convention without telling us...
They already have for decades. It's pretty well known they have killed wounded, children and civilian/non-combatants, and specifically target medical facilities. There's even no actual Red Cross in Israel, the President of Israel appoints the president of the Magen David Adom. Something that only happens in a few authoritarian contexts. The ICRC has spend decades trying to get them to international humanitarian standards, but they stubbornly refused and even used financial manipulation (from the American Red Cross on behalf of Israel) to pressure the movement into folding to their demands. Even after being admitted with the approval of the red crystal, they still continue to violate the conditions of their admittance to the movement. They are not supposed to operate outside of Israel but still act on the West Bank and break the conditions all the time. They're the only Red Cross who is mandated by their state to act as an arm of the army in the event of a war. Something that is explicitly against the principles of the movement and the Conventions.
Best not to
pokebomb the sleeping giant.No electricity, no food, no water…
If everyday people have the choice of sitting and starving or doing something about it, I doubt many would go quietly into the night.
Israel will create the next generation of extremists if they do not kill every single person in Gaza. We’ve seen this in every modern Middle East conflict in the past 40 or so years.
I always find it odd how people blame “extremists” and the Palestinians for this.
Israel starts to steal homes, land and killing men, children and women. No one bat an eye to that.
Then extremists and hate towards Israel came and bam, they are the bad ones suddenly.
Certainly what Hamas does is entirely wrong however - People cannot expect them be silent and get killed by Israeli forces.
This is what happens from decades upon decades of oppression.
This entire conflict was created by Israel stealing land and starting an genocide mission on Palestinians.
Israel is colonining with supperior force and mostly quite or support world order.
Palestinians are fucked. And have been for decades.
They deff should be fighting for it but this is a futile exercise.
Either way, the world until recently game Israel blank check but public opinion is changing on these human rights violations by an allegededly modern state.
Gen Z in the US does seem to be all that interested in continue US support. So Israel got about 20 years to either kill them off or having to deal with palestiains under different political conditions which won't b as favorable.
Even killing every person in Gaza will just bread more extremists. Gazans are not the only Palestinians and they are not the only ones affected by Israeli oppression.
Israel should negotiate with Hamas NOW and stop the siege on Gaza fully.
How do you negotiate with someone that just kidnapped and executed or planning to execute hundreds of civilians?
What do you ask for here? And what do you give up?
Release Palestinians illegally detained by Israel without trial in place fo the hoostages.
.... And stop settling the west bank, revert to the 1967 borders, etc.
You know what. Sure. I think Israel will go for this.
Release of all illegally detained Palestinians.
In return, Israel gets
Feels to me like that wouldn't work on Hamas' side. Another situation where Israel is the total winner.
Well since Hamas has already executed civilians, and Israel has both the military advantage and support of world leaders, they are not exactly negotiating from a position of strength.
I don't think your plan would even remotely lead to a joint country solution, more like Israel just wins.
I didn't suggest any plan leading to a joint county solution.
You know what would not even remotely lead to such a solution? Kidnapping and murdering civilians.
Just so we're clear, everyone loses here. But Israel is not going to negotiate with terrorists, nor should they.
Ah sorry I mixed up the threads. In another one, I was asking people what they would do if they were Hamas to reach a joint state solution. My bad.
I agree. Hamas are dumb as fuck.
And Israel won't care about civilian lives either. Not wanting to negotiate with terrorists doesn't mean all those kids in Gaza had to die. This is not what "not negotiating with terrorists" looks like. What it looks like is wanting to ethnically cleanse Palestinians.
In your example above, Israel takes all while Palestinians just get "prisoners" back (prisoners that are not really being tried for anything, a literal war crime, so for all intents and purposes they are not detained under any reasonable law and they don't have the most basic of rights)... and Palestine gets nothing.
Seems to me like maybe Israel should negotiate with terrorists if it means less dead civilians. But Israel doesn't care about that. And this is why we are here today.
Palestine also get the benefit of not having their cities ravaged while Israel troops hunt down enemy combatants. They get to keep some semblance of an autonomous nation. They also minimize civilian casualties in their end, if they actually cared about that.
It's very hard to make the argument that Israel should care about less dead civilians when the other side specifically targets civilians. I'm not sure why you keep expecting Israel to negotiate with restraint when they have no incentive to negotiate at all.
What will happen if Israel does not come to the table? Hamas will kill innocent people? And if Israel negotiates and comes to peace with Hamas, the killing will stop? History shows otherwise.
And since that killing innocent part already happens, there's nothing left to bargain for is there?
I also take issue with the fact that bringing accountability to Hamas for what happened is considered one sided negotiations for Israel. How is justice for a terrorist act considered a total victory?
This should never be a "benefit" nor is it a "benefit" to any other group of people.
Yeah just a "fake" self determination, never a real fulfilling one.
If they actually cared about that? What is that supposed to mean? Sounds to me like you are making shitty generalizations about Palestinians.
You don't. There's no negotiating with terrorists, it's too late. There is no good solution. The best Israel can do right now is make every effort to target Hamas, minimize civilian casualties and try to rescue as many people as they can.
If they go nuts and start trying to exterminate in Gaza they'll just fuel the next terrorist standoffs and keep this going for several more decades.
Hey, guess what's going to happen!
I hope I'm wrong.
But I doubt it.
I hope so too, but measured and calm behavior is not what I've come to expect from Bibi unfortunately.
I think the goal might just be to kill every single person in Gaza
You think the ones who escape are going to turn over a new leaf? Or the ones looking on from without?
I imagine if Germany or Japan had the same mentality, they wouldn't be where they are now. A good leader would focus on the future of their own people, not bringing them into destruction.
No, decades of extremist indoctrination that is Gazan education system make extremist. Disinformation is what makes extremists. And it's all being supported by the whole world. Noone in Gaza needs to work, they have EU+US+Qatar welfare system, they have literal nazi shit in their textbooks, they have their stupid religious excuses too, what do you think a young man raised in that filth would do with his free time except slitting throats and launching rockets?
Utterly psychotic. Israeli supporters, India bjp supporters, China ccp lap dogs and Russian shills all share the same brain I swear.
what a deranged view.
True, just look at Japan and Germany. They took so much devastation, yet they can rise above others because they don't have the same mentality as these people.
What the actual fuck are you talking about. The Japanese literally used suicide attacks and were so brainwashed they believed suicide was preferable to enemy capture. The Germans literally committed the multiple genocides. They were rehabilitated over time but it took time and effort. Both committed horrific atrocities, yet through international effort, are largely reformed.
That's the fuck I was talking about. They admitted their defeat, and moved on to rebuild themselves
With extensive economic aid and overall support from the western allies. Also while being in control of their borders and recognized as sovereign nations.
You are not comparing apples with oranges here, but cars with trees or something.
The palestinians receives fundings/donations not only from the west, but also from the majority of muslim countries. Every ramadhan, the number of donation increases significantly. So where do you think all those money gone to?
Japan and Germany both received massive amounts of financial support and investment to basically shape them into allies. If Germany/Japan had just been beaten the shit of and left to fend for themselves under financial and social sanction then we would have already had WW3. What a ridiculous comparison that you need to stop using for this racist tirade of yours.
I'm not being racist, it's just that most of you fail to see the reality of the situation here. Germany and Japan know when to admit defeat. Do you really think they got the assistance straight away after the war? No, they sort themselves out first, and rebuilt their society. The fundings came much later. Germany even had to pay for the cost of the war for years. Over the course of 80 years, you think how many fundings palestine had received from muslim countries AND the west? The funding which were used to buy weapons to attack their neighbour and further radicalized their own children. Don't forget that it was the palestine who rejected the two-state solution and the muslim countries who jointly attacked israel first. Even now some muslim country still rejects israel's right to exist.
I was an avid supporter of palestine for decades, blindly supporting them just because we had the same religion. But now, I'm also thinking from the perspective of the israeli here. If my surrounding neighbours keep threatening my existence, will I just sit around and let them plot my demise? If they just focus on improving themselves, I wouldn't mind with whatever they're doing with their lives.
May I remind you that Germany not knowing when to admit defeat is what caused WW2? The entire reason Germany and Japan were propped up economically was because the Americans basically shut down the French and British diplomats for causing the fuckup with their treaties after WW1.
That's the point. You have to know when to admit that you were already defeated, so you can focus on your own nation. As an investor myself, why should I invest in a fucked up country?
Oh god. My heart goes out to the civilians of Gaza.
Cool so they're announcing they're doing war crimes?
They never weren't, but they at least had the decency to pretend like they weren't before.
Taking and killing hostages are both war crimes.
Oh, so war crimes are justified as long as the other side does it first?
Potentially, sure. Things like carpet bombing civilian areas, certain uses of minefields, certain munitions, etc are banned by convention but the thing about the Geneva Conventions are that they are a mutual treaty. Your nation agrees not to do it to other signatories or nations or forces that have otherwise agreed to the limitations as well.
In this case? No. Not at all justified. Hamas might not agree to the Conventions, and thus don't benefit from the protections, but the moment they suspended elections they lost the right to claim they represent the Gaza Strip, even if Israel didn't claim it as territory regardless.
Israel is a signatory of the Conventions, and the Gaza Strip is their claimed land, this is a war crime against people they claim as their own, the actions of what amounts to a domestic terrorist network is irrelevant to whether they can starve people into submission.
A standard genocidal tactic of imperialists everywhere, mind you, from the Irish famine, to the Holodomor, to the Bengal Famines.
Israel doesn't claim Gaza though
Fair enough, it's just the rest of the world that says they act like they do whatever they officially claim, while they refuse to recognize everything necessary for Palestine to exist as a functional state.
Oh most certainly. Palestine as a whole isn't a functional state, just the Gaza Strip (albeit under varying degrees of blockade since Hamas was elected and won the civil war). I'd consider the W.B to be occupied/undergoing a slow process of annexation. I think the most realistic solution for the citizens of the W.B is that they at some point in the future get the option to become Israeli citizens with all the rights (and responsibilities) that entails.
How do you explain the illegal Israeli settlements there then?
There aren't any.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_statistics_for_Israeli_settlements_in_the_Gaza_Strip
well, I stand corrected.
You're thinking of the West Bank.
yeah probably
Israel unilaterally removed itself from the gaza strip all most 20 years ago. They only sell infrastructure to the gazan government.
Yes but this particular news story is about Israel publicly announcing a war crime.
And war crimes justify war crimes?
Murder is against the law in western countries but of someone tries to kill you, you can kill them in self defense.
So yea of someone is committing war crimes against you, you can fo ahead and fight back to get them to stop
War crimes are war crimes, doesn't matter if the other side started them first. Israel is stooping just as low as Hamas is with these tactics, you can and should fight in self defense without targeting Civilians
They don't target civilians. Hamas does.
When you build your headquarters inside a civilian hospital, and that hospital gets bombed, you are to blame for the war crime of positioning your HQ in a civilian hospital, not the person who bombs you.
If you build an HQ in a hospital that's (likely? I'd assume so) a war crime. If your opponent then bombs that hospital to bomb you they are also committing a war crime. Some of you are insane, would you agree with the police shooting hostages because "well they took the hostages first, it's their fault we shot them". Fuck no, you'd cry for whoever did that to go to prison. Just because Hamas is stooping so low does not suddenly make it OK for Israel to stoop just about as low.
Yeah I'm aware. Show me on the doll where ((George Soros)) and the ((globalists)) hurt you.
fancy how it always ends up being this according to people defending Israel as rightful. I don't give a shit about Israel being mostly jewish. Should I give them a free war crime pass because they suffered from genocide in the past? That how you think this should work?
I don't care about your beliefs, because you are largely ignorant of the actual situation. I'm calling out the fact that your information sources are blatantly anti-Semitic.
You're just their rube.
In the real world - sadly, yes.
It's legally how the Geneva Conventions work. You are only bound to them if the other side agrees to it as well.
However, Hamas is not the Gaza Strip, it is not Palestine, and Israel claims the Strip as its territory anyways so to claim the civilian population doesn't accept the Convention so they aren't bound by it is ludicrous.
One of these is a state. A state with US military support.
so wait. Siege is a war crime? Not taking a side, I'm just a technicalities kind of guy. Its not like locking people in a house. And don't hostage negotiators do just that in the US? (Could be just on tv). But it's a big place. Fuel and electricity are nice to haves. They should have some amount of food and water stored up. And the southern border is with egypt, so I assume they can't actually do anything about that. Doesn't seem like a straight up war crime. But I have never read yhe definitions they have at the UN.
Using hunger as a weapons against a populace is 100% a war crime, yes.
I just took a gander at the list as a refresher, and it is not 100% a war crime. You can argue this is an unjustified or excessive attack on civilians, but a judge may rule that is is required to defend against the enemy (Hamas).
Item 2.b.25 from the list seems to match up:
"Intentionally using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare by depriving them of objects indispensable to their survival, including wilfully impeding relief supplies as provided for under the Geneva Conventions; "
Is the intent to starve civilians or to deprive hamas combatants of any and all supplies?
If you are blocking an entire region from getting food and water then yes, the intent is to starve the civilian population.
Regardless of what we feel is intended or not, that is what war is - hell for everybody involved. Let's just hope that this doesn't get drawn out.
That's not what "intent to starve a civilian population" means. This is not a program of starvation. It's cutting off resources before an invasion
This isn't your homebrew DnD game where you can make rules mean whatever you want.
It is though. A program of cutting off resources would be blocking fuel and other goods, not fucking food and water. Ukraine was rightfully put in the corner for cutting off water to Crimea after 2014. There is no excuse to starving people, it's a horrendous crime which should land the people involved in prison. Besides what do you think will happen now? Who will the Palestinians in Gaza trust more, the murder hobos who got them into this mess or the Israelis who decided collective punishment is an appropriate response? War crimes are called war crimes for a reason, just because one side commits them doesn''t suddenly make it ok to commit them back.
It isn't, and whoever told you it is such is just lying to you.
Idk where you people get your "news" but whatever podcasters you listen to are fucking braindead.
You're exactly equivalent to the dumbest of the MAGA by believing that tripe.
Well the EU just called it a war crime. So between the text of the rule, the spirit of the rule, and the fucking international body of governments' interpretation of the rule, I think I'm gonna stick with interpretation that intentionally cutting off food, water, and power to the entire region constitutes intentionally cutting off food and water to civilians.
I guarantee you there is 0 fallout in the real world.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/9/israel-announces-total-blockade-on-gaza
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67051292
Gaza is completely blockaded, by Israels own admission. If you don't want to call it an attack on the entire population there, please go ahead and stay delusional. This is not OK, no matter who does it. It was not OK when Ukraine did it to Crimea, it's not OK now. It's heinous and despicable.
Lmao of course the propaganda you fall for is pro-russian too.
So business as usual, eh?
It's just crazy to me that Israel went from forced migration, following ghetto concentration, to concentrating others with the same dehumanizing rhetoric in the space if a generation.
Not to excuse Hamas' actions in the slightest, the rocket attack is unjustifiable no matter anyone's political beliefs. But it boggles my mind that a national identity can flip so drastically that Palestine can be put into de facto concentration camps by people who remember being in camps (albeit in tiny surviving numbers nowadays).
Propaganda works folks. Don't be a sucker.
It's more understandable when you listen to the Jewish arguments about needing to protect themselves against people who want to kill them, they see themselves as being inside the walls and defending themselves so they see their actions as justifiable because the alternative is another genocide.
It's hard because neither side is entirely right or wrong, Hamas is a terrorist organisation that gets help from other terrorist organisations - the thousands of missiles they fired over the last few days didn't come from nowhere, we can't deny that Iran is a repressive and brutal regime that would love to see all Jewish people dead for religious reasons, just like they hate gay people, women, and so many other groups.
That of course isn't to say there aren't awfull racist Jewish people who hate Muslims, but Israel as a nation is starting to work well with many Arab nations such as Jordan and Saudi Arabia. The country has a lot of problems but is doing a lot of good things in the region also, and it's doing them working with many Arabs and Arab nations. They see themselves as trying to be good people and they know if they tore down their walls then they'd be massacred, it is understandable how they justify looking the other way when the IDF are brutal or their government makes questionable choices.
Many Palestinians will end up dying from this. Hamas destroyed any chance there was of peace happening.
Peace was literally never an option Israel offered.
That's untrue, Israel offered peace a lot of times to Palestine before the Hamas took control in 2007. After Hamas it of course was never an option, the main purpose Hamas sees in itself is the complete destruction of Israel
People here are not fans of the facts you are inconveniencing then with
Israeli politicians bicker and argue over who can find a final solution to the Palestinian problem fastest.
I agree.
If only the Ukrainians did the same and offered the "peace" that Russia offers them.
Just compromise and give up your ancestral lands.
Thats a bit too much... food and water at minimum
Maybe don’t bite the hand that feeds you. It is and it continues to be a complete disaster.
What about the hand that is wrapped around your throat...?
Maybe don't be a hand that feeds. Palestinians didn't choose to live in the Gaza Strip. They were relegated to the Gaza Strip.
Sure, if you say so. Reality remains the same. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
No, just accept surrender and be dehumanized.
Or accept one of the countless proposals for peace.
Like which one? Give me one that you think sounded reasonable that the Palestinians did not accept.
Any of them. Pick one you don’t like and I’ll say that one.
I asked first
I answered too. Any one of them.
I don't think any of them are reasonable. Please show one where Israel was "moderate". You made the claim so please provide an example since it's not uncommon to hear that Israel's peace negotiations were shit and unfair. So please list a few that you think were reasonable anf the Palestinians missed out.
I don’t think I made any claim like that. I’m saying the Palestinian side has rejected all proposals - rightly or otherwise. Multiple wars have been lost, and they have no leverage other than terror. If they want peace, they have to choose it.
Honestly, I think the situation is so beyond toxic and arguing right or wrong is pointless. If the Palestinians had the power to enforce their will, they would. I don’t expect anything else from Israel.
"Man those slaves don't understand how nice they have it. We provide them a hole to sleep in and food and water whenever we have some to spare or remember to give it to them...
God why can't they just be good and respect how much worse we could treat them?! Ugh they act like they are humans when you can see how feral they truly are, watch I'll beat this one and it doesn't even learn it's lesson, just gets angrier and more deranged.
Well guess we just have to show the wild animals that they aren't people and if they continue to bite the hand that feeds them we take away their kids to punish them for thinking they have any control.
Stay subservient cause I'm better and more human than you."
Hey. Go fuck yourself.
Do you need help building a bigger straw man?
Blaming the oppressed for being upset about being oppressed and downtrodden is a dick move. I figured maybe hyperbold would make you see that you are a jackass but nah you'd happily be holding the whip it seems.
Many have pointed this out, but I'll say it again: this only affects innocent people.
Hamas has long stockpiled food, water, fuel, guns, and ammunition. They will be the last to run out.
This does nothing but radicalize the rest of the population, something I would assume the zionist government wants.
Waco of the middle east, times a thousand
Looks like someone got a blank check for a genocide finally...
Don’t tell me that Hamas didn’t know how Israel would react. To keep the hate flowing is the goal of all extremists.
Edit: That Netanyahu openly admitted to support Hamas on some occasions, shows that Hamas AND Netanjahu want each other as permanent enemies: https://kbin.social/m/worldnews@lemmy.ml/t/526488/Anyone-who-wants-to-thwart-the-establishment-of-a-Palestinian
Since many of you seem to think of themselves as having viable solutions for the Israel/Palestine conflict- go ahead: Tell us how Israel should act after this Terrorist Attack.
Please refrain from bad faith arguments and stuff like „Israel should dissolve itself“ (because you and I know, that’s not going to happen)
They should take down the walls, negotiate with Hamas, return lands to Gaza, end the blockade and start a very long fucking peace process.
Hamas has made it clear that taking down the wall would result in tens of thousands of dead Israelis. It's impossible to negotiate with an adversary which has vowed your demise at any price.
But from Hamas' side, the exact same thing is true about Israel.
I think it’s clear that you’re soundly in the pro Palestine camp after they murdered hundreds of Israelis. You find a way to justify that which works for you, that’s your business, it isn’t reflective of reality, it’s just your take on an issue that goes beyond your age by a number of decades.
If you’re purely in defense of one group or the other here, you’re just wrong and what’s worse is you’re feeding into the exact narratives each group is desperate to push.
Hamas is a terrorist organization that just committed the 3rd largest terrorist attack in human history. Israel is committing war crimes in retaliation and will no doubt invade and occupy Gaza which will cause thousands more deaths.
The complexities of this geopolitical issue have gone well beyond ‘this is all Israel’s fault, this is all Palestines fault’. If you can’t get past that, you’re just another ignorant fuck spewing half baked ideas on the internet that has no real idea what they’re talking about.
That sort of rhetoric is better served on twitter, not here.
The problem with your comment is that it assumes that this whole thing started with the Hamas attack. Go back in time 2 weeks and your whole argument applies with the sides swapped.
Israel has been killing Palestinians for decades. Hamas did what it did in response to that.
Like get some fucking context. Palestinian innocents died and got injured in much MUCH larger numbers than Israel for a very long time.
I'm pro-Palestinian people. I don't support Hamas and I think their tactics are bad and they can't butcher civilians.
You are replying to a person you think I am, not who I am.
Yeah but that list changes a lot if you count what Israel has done to Palestinians. When you remove that from the picture, you skew reality.
I don't have Twitter, and will never have Twitter, so get used to me being around here. Cheers.
There is a power imbalance. Israel could kill everyone in Gaza, with or without the wall. Taking down the wall would result in too many Palestinians killing too many innocent Israelis, so it will never happen. Nor should it.
And not taking it down will soon result in 2 million dead Palestinians.
You do realize that Israel withdrew completely from Gaza territory in 2005, right? They haven't occupied any land in the area for almost 20 years.
You left out the part where they put them under siege and control the influx of water, fuel, electricity, goods, and people.
So they haven't occupied them, they have just put them in an open air prison.
It's the sort of thing that happens if you keep attacking your neighbors. Hells, not even Egypt wants anything to do with the Hamas gov:t in Gaza. That's how bad it is.
You still are leaving out the part where Israel is the one controlling the siege. Things with Egypt are politics. The checkpoint there under Egypt's current government has been "open" (as open as it gets in this situation), which still doesn't mean much and you can't get anything through.
These people are under a blockade, completely controlled by Israel, with their own neighbours betraying them.
How Egypt and Israel feel about the Hamas gov't does not justify holding 2 million people hostage with no water or fuel or electricity.
Regardless of what we feel is justified or not, that is what war is - hell for everybody involved. Let's just hope that this doesn't get drawn out.
Isreal now sees Hamas as an existential threat. The only way to end the bloodshed would be Hamas offering an unconditional surrender.
And then what happens? Will Palestinians be guaranteed their basic rights? If Palestinians are not given the chance to be full citizens and have self-determination, this will only repeat in another 2-3 years.
I do not think you understand how bad this is going to get for Palestinians in Gaza. Hamas has just perpetrated the worst terrorist attack in Isreals history.
From everything I am reading these are not just retaliatory strikes. Isreal is preparing for a full offensive on Gaza involving tanks, artillery and infantry. This could very well end with Gaza looking like Grozny, Mariupol, or Bakhmut.
I hope that doesn't happen, but if Hamas cared at all about the Palestinian people they would do everything in their power to avoid that. Unfortunately they only care about power and I think this is going to get very ugly in the next phase of the war.
but if Israel cared at all about the Palestinian people they would do everything in their power to avoid that.
Everything goes both ways exactly the same.
Israel is out for revenge and as I have written elsewhere: When they enter Gaza, they want to get attacked. Because after an attack they will retaliate and every dead civilian, while retaliating against Hamas, will be considered collateral damage.
Hamas made the whole Gaza Invasion an easy sell for a lot of people. And no, I don’t think that it is ok to kill civilians.
My illusory wish for the Middle East would be something like a joint state of Palestinians AND Israelis - so that they can all access their holy sites. Forcing both sides to work together.
Hmmm, so if you were Hamas, for example, and you decide to deescalate in hopes of eventually reaching an agreement over a joint state, what would you do?
Also the same question but if you were Israel, what would you do (let's say today) to deescalate and seek a joint state solution?
At the moment there probably isn’t any will on either side to cooperate. Reasonable people with a will to compromise have to get involved…
Hamas publicly admitting that they fucked up by killing the civilians, releasing the hostages and calling for negotiations would be a first step in my opinion. Netanyahu would probably not know what to do in that situation.
If Israel were to make a first step: Netanyahu would only have to say that it cannot continue like this.
I mean look at France and Germany for example. Being archenemies for centuries caused immeasurable death and destruction in Europe and the whole world. Only after the Second World War those people realized that it cannot continue like this… and both countries murdered the shit out of each other before becoming something like friends.
Only if both parties are willing to break the cycle of violence, this will end.
Sounds pretty balanced. I agree that Netanyahu would probably not know what to do readily since it would be very unexpected.
I'm was also watching the latest TL;DR video on YouTube about this and it seems that the reports say civilians are the ones who carried out the kidnapping of lots of civilian hostages while Hamas focused on military targets. I don't know to what extent this is confirmable (since the source is Hamas itself).
If you are Hamas you cannot do anything now, they are bloodlusted and will not stop until you are dead and your culture is wiped off the earth.
Okay, but for the sake of this example, imagine you are Hamas and have changed your mind, what would be step 1?
Step 1 is to accept your demise. The West will no longer tolerate your version of your beliefs because they are incompatible with the rest of the world's status quo; a certain version of Islam that hypocritically hates the West but enjoys all the products they produce (including cultural like Hollywood action films), but also wants to destroy it and have something akin to what the Taliban have.
Women deserve bodily autonomy and the right to exist as a man or love another woman. Hamas version of Islam hates that way more than regular Islam or even the Catholics and Jews do.
Okay, but let's say your step 1 is what you would do if you didn't want to accept your demise (because I don't think this choice is one that anyone would really take).
That is not something Hamas would ever consider though so we are just in the realms of fantasy at this point.
So if Hamas "surrenders" to Israel, how is this going to stop Israel's daily oppression of Palestinians? What would Israel have to give back to Hamas?
How the fuck do you negotiate with a state that does not beleive Israel should exist?
The Palestinians brought this on themselves.
How?
They support a government that refuses to talk peace. The position of Hamas, in its founding documents, is that the state of Israel should be exterminated. You reap what you sow.
But the state of Israel is also trying to "exterminate" Palestinians. Everything from their far right gov't to people chanting "Death to Arabs" on the street.
It takes two to tango. If Hamas should step down, then Israel should step down at exactly the same moment.
How do you negotiate with a state that does not believe Palestine should exist?
False. From its inception, Israel has recognized the need for Palestinian autonomous territory.
The Israeli rhetoric is that Palestine never existed.
Members of Netanyahu's cabinet openly advocate annexation of large parts of the West Bank and have accelerated settlement construction.
Cutting off food and water for 2.3 million people.
The irony of Israel recreating the Warsaw ghetto is amazing.
Then why does Israel keep occupying Palestinian territory?
You did it Hamas!
Did what? Cut water and electricity off 2 million Gazan civilians?
This. Hamas leaders either have so very low IQ to not be able predict how israel would retaliate, or they just don't care about their own people's lives. Hamas and their terrorist goons do not deserved to be called a human.
Unfortunately they are just as human as anyone. This is the point, humans do this.