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Updated Google Maps shows destruction of the city of Rafah

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neom · 1790612818 · focus · HN ↗
If you want to compare before and after:
<a href="https://earth.google.com/web/search/31%2e297226,+34%2e243649/@31.30298025,34.24860513,42.11479352a,3824.8490315d,35y,0h,0t,0r/" rel="nofollow">https://earth.google.com/web/search/31%2e297226,+34%2e243649... - then click "show historical imagery" next to the search box.
1. drcongo · 1790613188 · focus · HN ↗
  The horror of the "Playground" marker here: <a href="https://earth.google.com/web/@31.28532193,34.25349609,77.61108146a,766.40635391d,35y,0h,0t,0r/data=CgRCAggBOgMKATBCAggASg0I____________ARAA" rel="nofollow">https://earth.google.com/web/@31.28532193,34.25349609,77.611...
  1. kelnos · 1790640825 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm a little confused by this one, because if you hit the "Show historical imagery" button, and go back through the prior years, I don't really see much or anything of a playground there.
    abdelhai · 1790662238 · focus · HN ↗
    Usually a football field.
    slim · 1790716304 · focus · HN ↗
    That's a playground when you are poor
  2. prolly97 · 1790670888 · focus · HN ↗
    idk if it's the same "playground" we found, but honestly just looks like an site prepared for building: <a href="https://earth.google.com/web/search/31%2e297226,+34%2e243649/@31.28059504,34.25727424,75.11256272a,4637.72526689d,35y,-0h,0t,0r/data=Cj8aEQoNL2cvMTFweDFkMWZjaxgCIiYKJAkJ8D37ATU3QBEG8D37ATU3wBkQUpxU2WBKQCGJl9Iyl4dKwEICCAE6AwoBMEICCABKDQj___________8BEAA" rel="nofollow">https://earth.google.com/web/search/31%2e297226,+34%2e243649...
  3. olwmc · 1790735171 · focus · HN ↗
    Cried seeing this. So much loss.
igleria · 1790613075 · focus · HN ↗
Atomic dome vibes when looking at some of the few buildings still standing
1. umeshunni · 1790613200 · focus · HN ↗
  Yes - Historic imagery can show you the destruction of the cities of Hiroshima or Berlin in the 40s as well.
  It's sad how much destruction can happen to a group of people when they allow the extremists among them to dominate their ideology and attack neighboring countries.
purpleflame1257 · 1790613109 · focus · HN ↗
Urban warfare destroys buildings. Film at 11.
1. ardit33 · 1790613151 · focus · HN ↗
  nah... it is explicit genocide, and the deliberate destruction of every civilian possible. Everyone knows what's going on.
  1. umeshunni · 1790613234 · focus · HN ↗
    yup, some muslims tried to eliminate the jewish homeland and got their asses whooped.
  2. the_origami_fox · 1790619317 · focus · HN ↗
    It was not a genocide. It was the deliberate destruction of the urban tunnel and terror network that the government of Gaza aka Hamas built in preparation for war with Israel. The population of Gaza is already at pre-war levels (of we exclude the 100,000 who evacuated) and was not "genocided"
    mittensc · 1790621836 · focus · HN ↗
    Imagine this was Jerusalem and someone made a similar comment.
    What would you respond?
    Sabinus · 1790630067 · focus · HN ↗
    If Jerusalem was lined with the largest tunnel system on earth, laced with booby traps and radical fighters that had just committed a deliberate civilian massacre and retreated into the city for protection among human shields, that they have prepared to defend for a decade?
    newspaper1 · 1790631021 · focus · HN ↗
    You just described all cities in Israel, only they've been hyper-militarized since Nakba, the ethnic cleansing on Palestine in 1948. Israel has mandatory conscription and most of its inhabitants serve or have served in the IDF.
    Sabinus · 1790638761 · focus · HN ↗
    I was not aware that every city in Israel has an extensive military tunnel network. Is that the case?
    If Hamas were to take one of those tunnel cities and Israel were doing guerrilla warfare from them I wouldn't blame Hamas for bulldozing.
    Israel does have mandatory conscription. They also have a firm and visible distinction between when someone is serving in the military and when they are civilian. While in the military they're all fair targets, and if they're not serving, and at a music festival, they're not.
    newspaper1 · 1790639120 · focus · HN ↗
    Israeli cities have far more threatening military infrastructure than tunnels. They literally have nuclear weapons.
    > They also have a firm and visible distinction between when someone is serving in the military and when they are civilian.
    When you murder someone and squat on their land, you're not a "civilian". When someone murders your family and steals your land, you don't have to dress up in any particular outfit to defend yourself.
    Sabinus · 1790641788 · focus · HN ↗
    >Israeli cities have far more threatening military infrastructure than tunnels. They literally have nuclear weapons.
    And Hamas is permitted, as per the rules of war, to target that military infrastructure. If Israel has co-located it with civilian buildings, and attacks miss their targets, then too-bad for Israel.
    >When you murder someone and squat on their land, you're not a "civilian".
    This is very arguable for the West Bank settlers, but the Israeli civilians that were targeted by October 7 are not settlers and are in very solid Israeli land from a conflict 80 years prior. Arguing that all civilians in Israel proper are valid targets makes you no better than Smotrich and Ben-gvir, and you are essentially advocating for the genocide of Israelis.
    Which is your right to do, I guess, but that's certainly not going to convince the (nuclear armed, remember) Israelis to moderate and compromise, or actually bring about justice for Palestinians.
    > When someone murders your family and steals your land, you don't have to dress up in any particular outfit to defend yourself.
    Military uniforms are for the protection of civilians. If you forgo them, then your civilians will receive more harm. Israel is responsible for their actions and many war crimes, but Hamas is responsible for theirs.
    laimewhisps · 1790642117 · focus · HN ↗
    Zionists are not civilians, they're literally living on stolen land. It doesn't matter that they've been stealing it for 80 years, it's not their land and the relatives of the people they murdered have every right to defend themselves and get their land back, by any means necessary.
    Sabinus · 1790642738 · focus · HN ↗
    If that's the way you want the conflict to be sorted, which is a genocide competition, then Israel will win that competition. I assume you don't want that? "You're on stolen land and you've done it this time with the genocide, Israel, now you have to dissolve yourself and migrate back to Poland, Brooklyn and Iraq" is not a realistic ultimatum to deliver to a nuclear armed state established precisely because it's citizens experienced centuries of persecution living as scattered minorities.
    Israel under Netanyahu has done plenty to criticise but I would actually like to see an Israel/Palestine deal not the West following both sides into radicalisation.
  3. therealdrag0 · 1790647946 · focus · HN ↗
    > deliberate destruction of every civilian possible.
    Clearly not? Sometime like 2% of gazans have been killed. IDF could kill many many more if it wanted.
    slim · 1790648828 · focus · HN ↗
    no, they can't. it's their maximum geoncide capacity
    someonebaggy · 1790698419 · focus · HN ↗
    You mean until April 2024 I assume because that's when the statistics end due to Israel blowing up the statistics department.
  4. khazhoux · 1790671871 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't think the goal is to kill every Palestinian. It's more of a flagrant disregard for Palestinian life. Those are different things.
2. mobelkh · 1790616165 · focus · HN ↗
  cities do not get systematically flattened with bulldozers in urban warfare, you only completely wipe out cities when you don't want any the civilians to come back.
  1. db48x · 1790619483 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
[deleted] · 1790613144 · focus · HN ↗
[deleted]
lenerdenator · 1790613288 · focus · HN ↗
Another one to look at is the maps of Ukraine [0]
[0] <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/google-maps-mariupol-ukraine-putin-b2327152.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/google-maps-...
wilburx3 · 1790613361 · focus · HN ↗
The icons from what was there before are a haunting digital ghost. School, Restaurant, Pharmacy all the city is just rubble.
peter_retief · 1790616170 · focus · HN ↗
[dead]
1. ImPostingOnHN · 1790616743 · focus · HN ↗
  Calling this "propaganda" is propaganda.
  1. peter_retief · 1790617666 · focus · HN ↗
    Sure, buildings were demolished, is that unusual in a war zone?
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790617825 · focus · HN ↗
    > Sure, buildings were demolished, is that unusual in a war zone?
    I'm going to assume good faith in your framing, rather than intentional minimization. Suffice it to say, more has happened than "buildings were demolished", and those more things are the subject of the article. Like, for example, an entire city systemically flattened with every single civilian inhabitant killed or exiled on their own land.
    To answer your question in that context: yes, that is unusual in war these days, because it is tantamount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
saturn_vk · 1790616232 · focus · HN ↗
It's sad that most world leaders do nothing to combat such genocide. There are so few sanctions against the state, or specific people, of Israel. Foreign forums are very much still open for business to them.
1. bjork · 1790617326 · focus · HN ↗
  Still no genocide no matter how much Macklemore wants it to be.
  1. ImPostingOnHN · 1790617639 · focus · HN ↗
    Please. We can judge for ourselves, and don't need you to try this "jedi mind trick" schtick.
    Please try posting more constructive content than unconvincing, blanket denials. It doesn't make for good discussion.
  2. phantompeace · 1790618646 · focus · HN ↗
    History will look back on people like you quite unfavourably.
2. lenerdenator · 1790629687 · focus · HN ↗
  1) Ultimately, money means more to foreign nations than what happens with internal affairs of their trading partners
  2) Accusations of genocide, whether they stand up or not, are great fodder for whataboutism discussions. Let's say the world's two largest economies, the US and China, decided to start sanctioning Israel for what's happening in Gaza. You could expect other countries to start threatening actions against the US and China over their previous or current genocidal behaviors. These are obviously not things that the US and China want to deal with.
3. bamboozled · 1790636445 · focus · HN ↗
  What do you think world leaders should've done differently?
  1. skywhopper · 1790637409 · focus · HN ↗
    One good start would be to stop providing the weapons that have done this damage. Also, forbidding companies under their economic purview from providing support for this activity. Advocating in international government organizations for sanctions against the country doing the damage. Arresting leaders who have been credibly accused of war crimes. Just a few ideas to start.
  2. sdenton4 · 1790637619 · focus · HN ↗
    Cut off weapon gifts+sales to Israel, impose sanctions. Same way we dealt with the South African apartheid state.
    dboreham · 1790639434 · focus · HN ↗
    Israel has both nuclear weapons and the Epstein files, so that's not really an option (granted: SA had nuclear weapons too, but nobody really to drop them on).
    almogo · 1790642917 · focus · HN ↗
    Nuclear weapons sure, but what is this about Epstein?
    slim · 1790648294 · focus · HN ↗
    he's referring to the fact that epstein is a mossad agent and that compromised world leaders are being blackmailed to support the genocide
    MC995 · 1790648297 · focus · HN ↗
    Epstein (and Ghislaine Maxwell in particular) are widely believed to have operated as a massive Mossad blackmail operation, collecting (and creating) blackmail material against western politicians and influential individuals to ensure their support for Israel.
    I won't go into details that support or refute this claim, but that is what the parent poster likely meant.
    KoftaBob · 1790674803 · focus · HN ↗
    and it seems pretty likely that's exactly what was happening.
    The idea that a nation-state was/is running a child sex trafficking ring, and we're *not* turning over heaven and earth to investigate that so that country faces unprecedented consequences...I don't even know what to say
    bamboozled · 1790675731 · focus · HN ↗
    Why is it likely ? Why not Russia ? I’ve heard it’s Russia ?
    someonebaggy · 1790680879 · focus · HN ↗
    Because Epstein had ties to Israel and not to Russia. There might be a similar ring run by Russia as well, who knows.
    bamboozled · 1790682467 · focus · HN ↗
    Didn't he have ties to basically all powerful people? Is there something special about his Israel ties that are different to his Bill Gates ties?
    I thought this was interesting, from Al Jazeera to boot:
    Political Reactions: While critics and unverified intelligence memos pointed to the deep relationship as a sign of state ties, current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly dismissed the notion, stating on social media that Epstein's close ties to Barak (a political opponent of Netanyahu) actually "proves the opposite" of Epstein working for the Israeli state.
    someonebaggy · 1790684703 · focus · HN ↗
    He has ties to all powerful people as his clients, but he has ties to Israel that look closer to them being his employer.
    bamboozled · 1790687167 · focus · HN ↗
    Without some pretty good evidence, it sounds like conjecture, which is fine, but nothing of substance is being presented here.
    someonebaggy · 1790690903 · focus · HN ↗
    Of course. A very valid way to view it, and the same way I would've viewed it in 2016 if you told me there was a global elite pedophile ring that helped get Trump elected.
    cassepipe · 1790691135 · focus · HN ↗
    Epstein definitely had ties to Russia. I don't know how to assess how important those were but they did exist
    someonebaggy · 1790680794 · focus · HN ↗
    Epstein is thought to have been working for Mossad. If that's true, they probably have copies of all the video tapes (which we know were made) of all the stuff rich people did on Epstein island. This theory would single-handedly explain why almost everyone in the Epstein files supports Israel so strongly.
    crote · 1790660135 · focus · HN ↗
    So you're suggesting that Israel would drop a nuke on a Western country imposing a boycott? Somehow, I doubt it.
    lelanthran · 1790666805 · focus · HN ↗
    > Same way we dealt with the South African apartheid state.
    Who's this "we" who dealt with the SA apartheid state?
    The international pressure on SA did absolutely nothing to change their mind (I'm old enough to have seen PW Botha's Rubicon speech live on TV). The NP (political party in charge) was slowly and carefully convinced to push out the hardliners.
    The people left, like FW De Clerk, actually did the dismantling - unbanned the ANC, released Mandfela from prison, switched to allowing black voters, etc.
    The rest of the world's pressure had absolutely no effect on the leadership. Change only came when leadership started changing.
    See this for more background: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negotiations_to_end_apartheid_in_South_Africa#Early_contact:_1980s" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negotiations_to_end_apartheid_...
    sdenton4 · 1790689899 · focus · HN ↗
    The actual on the ground resistance was of central importance in the end of South African apartheid, but the international pressure and sanctions greatly increased the need for negotiations to begin. The point is to increase the pressure to change leadership through democratic means.
    This could hopefully happen somewhat faster with Israel, given that the government isn't a literal Nazi remnant, as the South African government was. (Though, ironically, the main arms supplier to South Africa during the arms embargo was Israel, often reselling weapons from the United States. Sigh.)
    "By the late 1980s, the South African state was in profound crisis, crippled by international sanctions, a stagnant economy, and widespread resistance. Recognizing the unsustainable nature of the perpetual conflict, the government under P.W. Botha began tentative, secret contact with the imprisoned Nelson Mandela and the exiled African National Congress (ANC) leaders."
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Africa_(1948%E2%80%931994)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Africa_(1948%...
  3. cogman10 · 1790637983 · focus · HN ↗
    A lot.
    Literally on Oct 7, Hamas tried to return civilian hostages, who the IDF killed. This is why Hamas changed policies to only give up hostages through 3rd parties. They reached out to israel to try and return hostages and were ignored. They reached out to the US to return hostages and were ignored. [1]
    So for starters, the US could have pressured Israel to negotiate with Hamas to return the hostages.
    As Israel started to show genocidal intent (for example, killing aide workers multiple times). The US could have at a minimum threaten to withhold aide. In fact, there are laws on the books that a country such as Israel committing war crimes is ineligible for aide.
    Finally, the UN should have deployed peace keepers to gaza specifically to stop the genocide.
    Actions could have been taken, but they weren't because our politicians are so bribed by Israeli lobby money as to turn a complete blind eye to it's misdeeds.
    [1] <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/israel-politics/2026-09-15/ty-article/.premium/hostage-families-release-list-of-govt-decisions-preceding-oct-7/000001a0-a521-dea8-afe0-e5adef4a0000" rel="nofollow">https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/israel-politics/2026-09-...
    bamboozled · 1790639274 · focus · HN ↗
    So you feel like after October 7, there should've just been a talk about what happened and some form of negotiation ?
    cogman10 · 1790639345 · focus · HN ↗
    Quote exactly where I even implied that.
    ebbi · 1790640739 · focus · HN ↗
    Well what else do you expect when you subjugate a native population for decades? Just expect perfect victims?
    The peaceful route didn't work. Only idiots will think continuing with the status quo will result in anything different.
    bamboozled · 1790641801 · focus · HN ↗
    Sorry buddy, you can't just attack children ad a music festival and get away with it, even if you're desperate.
    ebbi · 1790642014 · focus · HN ↗
    sorry buddy, you can't just kill 700k people, displace the rest into an open air prison for decades, and expect no blowback.
    You can't just continue to 'mow the lawn' where children are killed and kidnapped, put into Israeli prisons, and expect no blowback.
    You can't just shoot people in the knees while protesting peacefully, and then expect no blowback
    You can't just rape Palestinian prisoners (most of whom have been arrested under no charges), and expect no blowback.
    You can't just install bombs in pagers, and set it off amongst civilians, which resulted in children being injured or killed, and expect no blowback.
    Sorry buddy, but your days of gaslighting is over.
    bamboozled · 1790642452 · focus · HN ↗
    You provided a list of reasons why you feel like teenagers at a music festival should be murdered, right?
    Like my personal sentiment is, war is senseless, and both sides are wrong in some way or another. But yeah, I don't think children should be murdered period, so I'm not going to try and give a list of reasons why it's OK, because there isn't one.
    Anyone committing war crimes should be punished for it, period.
    My original question was simply, what should have been done differently "by the world leaders"?
    ebbi · 1790642953 · focus · HN ↗
    How many teenagers were killed by Hamas? And are there independent sources that verify this?
    Also, is Oct 7 enough justification to shoot 335 bullets at 6 year old Hind Rajab?
    Your questions reek of bias by trying to centre everything to Oct 7, as though history began there. If you really cared about children, you'd have referenced the thousands of Palestinian children killed by Israel before Oct 7.
    someonebaggy · 1790681613 · focus · HN ↗
    World leaders should stop giving free money to the guys who are doing a holocaust. I think we can all agree on that.
    bamboozled · 1790687635 · focus · HN ↗
    What do you think Israel should do now? What would be a sensible course of action going forwards?
    someonebaggy · 1790692533 · focus · HN ↗
    Their options are to prolong this forever-war (it's worked so far, 75 years, but getting precarious), or actually do the thing and destroy Palestine once and for all (won't be hard - they have nukes), or negotiate peace (also not difficult - it's always Israel who rejects reasonable peace deals), or accept their own destruction and flee.
    cindyllm · 1790702394 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    hamsteredf · 1790640340 · focus · HN ↗
    > Hamas tried to return civilian hostages
    What a bizarre claim and outright lie. They kept them locked up and starving. They could’ve just dropped them off near the border with Israel or Egypt, or handed them over to the Red Cross (which wasn’t even allowed to visit and check on the hostages).
    cogman10 · 1790641356 · focus · HN ↗
    Oh look, brand new account doing hasbara. Where have we seen this before? Are you a part of Israel's $1B spent on online propaganda? [1]
    I cited my source. But there were also sources in October 2023 about Hamas wanting to return the hostages. The Haaretz articles reveal that it was privately even earlier than expected and the Netanyahu was warned of the attack in advance yet he chose to do nothing about it.
    Why not just drop them off? Well for 1 they actually wanted the hostages to get home alive. The IDF didn't care about killing hostages as they relentlessly bombed the region.
    Why not let the Red Cross see them? Because the IDF was closely watching and, shocker, if you take someone directly to the hostages guess what building gets blown up next?
    > They kept them locked up and starving.
    What a strange lie. Yes they were locked up but the hostages themselves reported that Hamas treated them well. Why wouldn't they? They aren't Israel who anally rapes their hostages [2]. The Israeli government would LOVE for Hamas to have mistreated the hostages. But alas, this is just projection.
    [1] <a href="https://quincyinst.org/research/the-eighth-front-inside-israels-1-billion-influence-campaign/" rel="nofollow">https://quincyinst.org/research/the-eighth-front-inside-isra...
    [2] <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-detention-base.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/world/middleeast/israel-g...
    tourist2d · 1790644003 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    monideas · 1790664585 · focus · HN ↗
    Essentially your point is that Hamas protected the hostages from the IDF by not returning them.
    This is abject insanity and it’s a good representation of what is going on in the minds of most of humanity.
    someonebaggy · 1790681212 · focus · HN ↗
    Are they wrong? On October 7, Hamas released three hostages. Israel shot and killed the hostages, so Hamas said they won't release any more hostages without some kind of security deal. That sounds like protecting them to me.
    monideas · 1790681524 · focus · HN ↗
    These are the types of conflicts over basic values and senses of right and wrong for which distinct countries with borders and militaries exist. Basically I don’t think discussions like this are fruitful. Historically these types of cross cultural exchanges were very rare, now they’re very common because of the internet.
    someonebaggy · 1790685952 · focus · HN ↗
    Very interesting to compare this wording with your previous comment.
    When it's about Hamas imprisoning hostages: "Hamas kept them underground in chains in near starvation conditions. This is abject insanity."
    When it's about Israel murdering hostages: "Well, you know... We don't always agree on right and wrong. That's why different countries exist. Is this discussion really fruitful?"
    monideas · 1790686327 · focus · HN ↗
    Again to use the word murder to describe the accidental killing of hostages is insane and why we have countries and militaries.
    someonebaggy · 1790686648 · focus · HN ↗
    My dude, they pointed a sniper rifle at an unarmed naked Israeli man holding a white flag and shouting for help in Hebrew, centered him in the scope, and pulled the trigger.
    monideas · 1790686842 · focus · HN ↗
    Obviously it was not done on purpose. That wouldn’t make any sense to do on purpose. If they knew they were Israelis they wouldn’t have pulled the trigger. Surely despite how mentally ill you are this should be understandable.
    What was done on purpose was killing 50k Palestinian terrorists, destroying all the buildings, killing Nasrallah and blowing up thousands of Hezbollah terrorists with beepers, in many cases wounding their genitals and eyes.
    What are you going to do about that?
    halflife · 1790689852 · focus · HN ↗
    That is completely incorrect. The terrorists that were put in charge of these hostages fled and left them alone in a war zone. They were definitely NOT released.
    They were killed because of mistaken identity, which is horrible, but it happens in war, some IDF soldiers died from friendly fire.
    Hamas definitely didn’t ask protection for the hostages, they asked protection for themselves.
    There are many hostages reports of Hamas terrorists saying to hostages that if IDF will draw near, they will shoot the hostages.
    someonebaggy · 1790690849 · focus · HN ↗
    They accidentally sniped the naked guy holding a white flag and shouting in Hebrew?
    halflife · 1790701174 · focus · HN ↗
    Yes, because Hamas routinely does that to lure IDF soldiers.
    Let’s use occams razor hear.
    Option A - mistaken identity because the enemy wears no uniform, embeds itself in civilians, and uses inhumane tactics to confuse IDF soldiers (like putting explosives on dead bodies, placing speakers with hostages recording as bait)
    Option B - IDF decided to kill the hostages they came to rescue for some evil reason
    someonebaggy · 1790714917 · focus · HN ↗
    Awfully convenient for them that whenever a hostage gets released they can just say "whoopsie" and justify it as they thought it was a lure.
    halflife · 1790726296 · focus · HN ↗
    It happened once.
    And I see you’re sticking with the “evil IDF just decided to kill these 3 hostages without any reason” plot.
    monideas · 1790664463 · focus · HN ↗
    What he means is they could have been traded for all of the concessions Hamas wanted in exchange for them.
    And yes this is true but the reason you couldn’t comprehend his point is because his point is insane.
    cogman10 · 1790681095 · focus · HN ↗
    This is an uncharitable reading of my point and not what I meant.
    monideas · 1790681847 · focus · HN ↗
    What did you mean then?
    cogman10 · 1790685292 · focus · HN ↗
    > They reached out to israel to try and return hostages and were ignored. They reached out to the US to return hostages and were ignored.
    That Hamas was open extremely early on in the conflict to negotiations for returning hostages and Israel and the US knew this while they waged a bombing campaign and pretended like Hamas wasn't trying or willing to return hostages.
    Negotiations weren't happening because Israel didn't want those negotiations, not because they weren't available.
    And, I don't know if you are aware, but negotiations involve give and take. Israel didn't need to "traded for all of the concessions Hamas wanted in exchange for them".
    The reason the hostages weren't returned sooner is because Israel didn't want them. In 2024 Hamas accepted all of Israel's terms multiple times only for Israel to change terms. Israel knew they'd have fewer justifications for their genocide if they got the hostages back.
    That's my point.
    monideas · 1790685478 · focus · HN ↗
    This is exactly what I said you were saying
    cogman10 · 1790685628 · focus · HN ↗
    You said.
    > What he means is they could have been traded for all of the concessions Hamas wanted in exchange for them.
    Where in my writing did I say that Israel needed to accept all concessions. Please quote me.
    Do you think it's unreasonable or "insane" for Israel to have accepted some concessions for the safe return of hostages?
    monideas · 1790686087 · focus · HN ↗
    Yes it would have been insane to accept any concessions. If you don’t understand that then you have work to do on yourself. This is a very weak and suicidal position to take.
    cogman10 · 1790686332 · focus · HN ↗
    > Yes it would have been insane to accept any concessions.
    Any? Like even a temporary ceasefire? That's a suicidal position?
    Notice how you had to change from "all" to "any".
    monideas · 1790686608 · focus · HN ↗
    There were many temporary ceasefires in exchange for hostages but this was done as part of the broader war effort, ultimately Israel is not bound to anything in these “agreements”. It’s basically just saying and doing whatever needs to be said and done to accomplish the war goals.
    cogman10 · 1790687038 · focus · HN ↗
    A ceasefire is a concession. And my point, which I think is clear, is there's a pretty wide gap between "They have to accept all hamas concessions" and "they have to negotiate".
    It's pretty hard for you to argue against the fact that there are, in fact, reasonable concessions that aren't "suicidal".
    monideas · 1790687265 · focus · HN ↗
    The context of this discussion is the idea that war could have been avoided if Israel had been willing to negotiate with Hamas over the hostages.
    cogman10 · 1790688396 · focus · HN ↗
    That is not the context of the discussion. The context is "what should world leaders have done differently".
    And, I never said that the war was either avoidable or that Israel was wrong to use force after Oct 7.
    What I am saying is that the war could have ended years ago and that Israel has committed genocide. I'm also saying that the pretext that it was about "getting the hostages home" was false.
    And with that context, yes there are things world leaders should have done to stop Israel from committing genocide.
    cromka · 1790640660 · focus · HN ↗
    > Finally, the UN should have deployed
    UN has no such power. I am still amazed how people do not get this.
    Members need to vote for such things to happen. It wouldn't, not in this climate.
    cogman10 · 1790641587 · focus · HN ↗
    The question was
    > What do you think world leaders should've done differently?
    Members should have voted in the UN to deploy peace keeping troops. The UN does have that power if it's voted for. This isn't a question of the current realities but a question of what the right actions are.
    bamboozled · 1790641983 · focus · HN ↗
    This is where you notice that the world is more complicated than social media posts.
    Like it would've been a nice idea, until you realize that Hamas is heavily backed by Iran, Iran is helping Russia, Russia is invading Ukraine, and it starts to look like that level of intervention is a step towards a world war.
    Then you notice world energy markets are going to be effected by a massive conflict etc.
    If the UN went into Gaza, got attacked by Iran, then had to respond, next minute they're attacking a close Russian ally, and maybe even China might have to get involved in that.
    What would've been good is if October 7 didn't happen, and that goes for both sides.
    cogman10 · 1790643088 · focus · HN ↗
    Iran would WELCOME UN peace keepers in gaza, are you kidding? Hell, I think even Hamas would welcome their presence. UN peace keepers would mean the likes of UNRA could operate once again in Gaza to deliver aid. It would also mean that Israel would have to stop it's aggression.
    > Iran is helping Russia
    lol, no, other way around. Though the Russia hasn't really been involved with Iran since Ukraine started. It's actually China that's the biggest Iranian trade partner.
    The only party that'd be upset over UN peace keepers in Gaza is Israel.
    bamboozled · 1790682584 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't think what you're saying is actually right, if peacekeepers came in, it would (likely) mean a freezing of the current borders / situation, and isn't that what most people say justified October 7, "the theft of land"?
    manyaoman · 1790684116 · focus · HN ↗
    Allowing international journalists in would make the genocide even harder to deny and at that point there's no more returning to the "current situation". Regarding the border, at least for Hamas the 1967 borders would be just fine: <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/hamas-2017-document-full" rel="nofollow">https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/hamas-2017-document-full (article 20).
    bamboozled · 1790687493 · focus · HN ↗
    Are you actually sending the Hamas charter and expecting me to read that and think it's reasonable ?
    manyaoman · 1790689661 · focus · HN ↗
    By all means enlighten me, what's unreasonable about it?
    yyyk · 1790753973 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    manyaoman · 1790758440 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm immune to Hasbara and not wasting more time debating it, but just leaving some Wikipedia snippets below as a kind of a "community note".
    > They never cancelled their original charter
    Wikipedia [0]:
    This document [the 2017 charter] reflects our position for now (...) The old charter was a product of its era, 30 years ago. We live in a different world today.
    > Also, Hamas literally operated the 'March of Return' (demanding the 'right of return') that year.
    Wikipedia [1]:
    The first demonstrations were organized by independent activists, but the initiative was soon endorsed by Hamas, the governing party of Gaza, as well as other major factions in Gaza.
    [0] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988_Hamas_charter#Since_2017" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988_Hamas_charter#Since_2017 [1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_Gaza_border_protests" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_Gaza_border_...
    cogman10 · 1790684286 · focus · HN ↗
    Only if you think Israel is entirely correct in their assessment that every single civilian building actually houses dangerous hamas terrorists. I don't think that assessment is correct so I don't think the UN peacekeepers would be behaving exactly like Israel and the IDF has behaved in Gaza. Nor do I think the UN would put the same restrictions on aid coming into Gaza. They wouldn't stop peanut butter and baby formula from entering.
    yyyk · 1790753686 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    cromka · 1790673878 · focus · HN ↗
    That's not how that answer was phrased. It directly indicated that the UN should have taken that action.
    cogman10 · 1790680986 · focus · HN ↗
    Make it make sense. The question is what should have happened. You say I answered what should have happened. But you also say "that's not how the answer was phrased".
    How is my "should have" happened not a direct answer to the question?
    someonebaggy · 1790681029 · focus · HN ↗
    That would result in the USA going to war against the UN. There is a reason the UN only takes action when the security council agrees. Countries on the security council can plausibly use their military might to prevent any UN action, so to prevent the senseless deaths of peacekeepers, they are given a verbal veto instead.
    cogman10 · 1790684019 · focus · HN ↗
    No it wouldn't? We are talking hypotheticals. When talking about what world leaders should do I include the US in world leaders.
    I wasn't engaging in what's likely, just what should be. Biden and Trump should have been on board with deploying peace keepers. They were not.
    someonebaggy · 1790684662 · focus · HN ↗
    If Biden or Trump would simply cut off funding there probably wouldn't be a need for peace keepers any more.
    cogman10 · 1790685497 · focus · HN ↗
    I tend to agree. The US bears a pretty large amount of blame here and I don't think Israel would have continued their aggression had the US withdrawn aid (or threatened to). But if they had continued, then that's where UN peacekeepers should have been deployed.
    yyyk · 1790641604 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    cogman10 · 1790642699 · focus · HN ↗
    > Lie. It was a deal to get complete immunity for a massacre. Also, 'Civilian' per Hamas is anyone over 60. 'Let Hamas murder and keep nearly all hostages' was not in Israel's playbook.
    You are making stuff up. Nobody reports that Hamas was shooting for a "get out pillaging free" card. And the fact still remains that they tried to return 3 hostages to show good faith who the IDF proceeded to kill.
    > Lie. There was repeated negotiations for two years after, with plenty of Hamas demands for the hostages. It was totally public too.
    Hamas, on multiple occasions, agreed to all the terms only for Israel to reject the agreement and change the terms. That was all public. It's why the hostage families became really mad at the government.
    > Literally not relevant. The US has much bigger errors in the current conflict.
    Two wrongs don't make a right and yes, it's relevant when the IDF explodes clearly marked aid vehicles rendering aid. There's no reason to not do that.
    > Snort. Look at how successful they were in Lebanon. Peace keepers need to be willing to fight to keep the peace, and in this case, it meant fighting both sides. LOL.
    Does that really matter? The question wasn't "how effective will this be" it's "What world leaders should have done". That's what world leaders should have done.
    > I suggest looking at the far bigger Qatari and Saudi expenditures (didn't they just grant an entire 747?). It's more that US politicians recall the war on terror, and know all this nonsense will one day be sent back at them with much greater force (wasn't it 4 million deaths or so?), they have no wish for the precedent to be set and deployed at them.
    These are weaker lobbies because of US laws. The likes of AIPAC and CUFI get around campaign finance restrictions because they are operated by US citizens (in behest of Israel). No other nation has that sort of organizations in the US. The closet you can find is things like the weirdo Shen Yun cult.
    This allowed them to spend $60M in a democrat primary. You won't find that sort of direct spending from Qatar or the Saudis (barring the clear bribe in the Jet. They aren't exactly giving away jets to every primary run).
    yyyk · 1790644009 · focus · HN ↗
    >Nobody reports that Hamas was shooting for a "get out pillaging free" card
    'Israel to withdraw and grant all other Hamas demands' is a 'get out free' card.
    > they tried to return 3 hostages to show good faith who the IDF proceeded to kill.
    These hostages _escaped_ and were shot in error. Not 'tried to return'. Note that there was a week's ceasefire a month earlier and Hamas could have returned everyone then if they cared to.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Gaza_war_ceasefire" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Gaza_war_ceasefire
    <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/12/21/world/israel-hostages-camera-dog-intl-hnk/index.html" rel="nofollow">https://edition.cnn.com/2023/12/21/world/israel-hostages-cam...
    >Hamas, on multiple occasions, agreed to all the terms only for Israel to reject the terms.
    You mean all of 'Hamas's terms'. Right. The Israeli government had very different terms as the final deal (very different from what Hamas demanded) shows. The Israeli gov insisted on controlling the Egyptian border, Gaza demilitarization, etc.
    >It's why the hostage families became really mad at the government.
    Of course. They wanted the hostages out ASAP, and could only pressure the Israeli government (obviously Hamas wouldn't care for the families).
    >Two wrongs don't make a right
    Right, but there's such a thing as hypocrisy. One could make a 'genocidal' case against the country who started a war by bombing a schoolhouse and spoke of 'destroying an entire civilization' (it would still be wrong though). But they're a little too strong, and it's easier to pick on Israel.
    >That's what world leaders should have done.
    Most world leaders want to be reelected (or not be overthrown if they're dictators). Sending out troops to die in a foreign land for an arguably hopeless cause is not very helpful to that end. They're likely aware of the history of military involvement in the Middle East.
    >The likes of AIPAC and CUFI get around campaign finance restrictions because they are operated by US citizens
    Qatar etc. gets around it by donating billions to US universities or using organizations like ISNA. Everyone seems to have found a way.
    someonebaggy · 1790681155 · focus · HN ↗
    Isn't it interesting how Israel always seems to do bad things in error. Have they ever improved their processes to stop doing things in error? Nope. In fact it seems they just continue doing more and more very bad things in error.
    Remember they know exactly who everyone is and where everyone is at all times. Gaza is the most thoroughly surveilled place on earth.
    halflife · 1790643792 · focus · HN ↗
    That’s a complete misrepresentation of the facts.
    Hamas was willing to return hostages if israel freed all thousands of Palestinians prisoners, including those captured in Israel while committing the Oct 7 massacre.
    And that is exactly what sinwar wanted to achieve in every one of his wars, just like when in 2014 Israel traded 1 captured Israeli soldier for 1000 Palestinians prisoners.
    So basically Hamas wanted israel to surrender, accept Hamas terms, and ignore Oct 7.
    someonebaggy · 1790680908 · focus · HN ↗
    Typo correction: Palestinian hostages
    jameshilliard · 1790720079 · focus · HN ↗
    > Literally on Oct 7, Hamas tried to return civilian hostages, who the IDF killed.
    This is literally terrorist propaganda, they tried to offer a return of a subset of the hostages in exchange for Israel not invading and dealing with the Hamas security threat. Obviously Israel was not going to leave such a severe security threat like Hamas intact.
  4. thinkingtoilet · 1790638500 · focus · HN ↗
    If you had to guess, what do you think they might do? I feel like questions like this are in bad faith. Think about it for a minute, and try to come up with some things that they might do.
  5. hedora · 1790643288 · focus · HN ↗
    Send all collaborators to the international criminal court. (In the US, especially congress critters and members of the executive branch.)
    Also, blockade Israel proportionally to the Gaza blockades. I doubt they would have kept murdering red cross members in Gaza once the supermarkets started running out of food.
    selfmodruntime · 1790676920 · focus · HN ↗
    How can they forcibly imprison the leaders of a soverein, nuclear armed state?
    hedora · 1790689379 · focus · HN ↗
    The remaining non-corrupt members of the executive branch (or the state governments) would uphold the oaths they took, lock potus and friend in boxes, and ship them off.
    As for Israel, as I understand it, the next election will mean domestic jail time for the incumbents unless the polls are wildly wrong.
    At that point, it would be easy for Israel to start climbing out of lawlessness too.
    noumenon1111 · 1790778268 · focus · HN ↗
    And while they're at it, forget about Israel being an ethnostate and give the 5 million Arabs without any representation a vote.
  6. 7734128 · 1790660363 · focus · HN ↗
    At the very least diplomatic condemnation and a South African level sanction.
  7. someonebaggy · 1790680705 · focus · HN ↗
    Immediately stop all exports and money flows to Israel. Food and medical aid should still be allowed to both sides, of course.
4. 762236 · 1790638596 · focus · HN ↗
  Do not forget that world leaders are heads of sovereign states that are in charge of their self defense. Those that actually have to defend themselves, like the US, rather than relying on strong allies, need to make public statements that are not hypocritical about what they would do for self defense. This is why both U.S. administrations support Israel's actions
  1. dboreham · 1790639386 · focus · HN ↗
    Pretty sure that's not why US administrations support Israel's actions.
    762236 · 1790643154 · focus · HN ↗
    Bad phrasing on my part. That is one of many reasons
  2. slim · 1790647903 · focus · HN ↗
    need to make public statements that are not hypocritical
    wow, you hold a very high opinion of american politics. you must have been reading new from paper news paper for the last 30 years
  3. rixed · 1790650428 · focus · HN ↗
    Sure, the need to self defense against US dangerous neighbors. Looking at you, Canada!
  4. dartharva · 1790654312 · focus · HN ↗
    Have you been living under a rock? The time when "public statements" used to work is long, long gone.
  5. crote · 1790660967 · focus · HN ↗
    > Those that actually have to defend themselves, like the US, rather than relying on strong allies
    Sure, but are we going to ignore about the US having to rely on its "helpless" allies to provide staging points and cannon fodder for its illegal imperialistic wars? How much of a superpower would it be without its overseas bases?
bognition · 1790616426 · focus · HN ↗
Its really telling to see the destruction limited to where the structures used to be rather than to all of the surrounding green spaces. If the destruction of civilian dwellings was purely an accident you'd expect to see the destruction spread evenly over the area. Instead it looks much more like a prolonged set of surgical strikes to destroy the buildings while preserving as much of the surrounding areas as possible.
For a great example of this, look at this pin <a href="https://maps.app.goo.gl/ZcMbdFcx87PrqoYNA" rel="nofollow">https://maps.app.goo.gl/ZcMbdFcx87PrqoYNA
And here's a pin of where the farms were spared <a href="https://maps.app.goo.gl/iZbbTH4iH27FCz4s9" rel="nofollow">https://maps.app.goo.gl/iZbbTH4iH27FCz4s9
1. ImPostingOnHN · 1790616680 · focus · HN ↗
  They just use bulldozers to flatten whatever the bombs don't. They can drive a bulldozer pretty precisely, especially when they don't care who's in front of it or under it.
  Caterpillar even supplies the IDF with bulldozers just for this purpose, which then get up-armored and sent into Palestinian civilian areas to do this (including unmanned versions).
  <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDF_Caterpillar_D9" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDF_Caterpillar_D9
  1. AuthAuth · 1790617747 · focus · HN ↗
    By the time the bulldozers are there civilians have long moved out of the area.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790618578 · focus · HN ↗
    Interesting claim. Where did you hear that? The IDF is pretty infamous for crushing people alive with these bulldozers, and also for denying search & rescue access to find civilians buried in the wreckage (and also for just killing said SAR and hiding the bodies and lying about it*).
    * surprise, it was in Rafah, the city formerly located in the wasteland from the article we're discussing: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafah_paramedic_massacre" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafah_paramedic_massacre
    porkshoe · 1790635589 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    johnnyApplePRNG · 1790635638 · focus · HN ↗
    Rachel Corrie would like a word. [0]
    I suggest that you learn more about the Nakba, friend. [1]
    [0] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Corrie" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Corrie
    [1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
    yyyk · 1790641667 · focus · HN ↗
    That's 2003. Really really relevant.
    laimewhisps · 1790642173 · focus · HN ↗
    Of course it's relevant. Regardless, there are many instances of Israel killing civilians with bulldozers in Gaza.
    antonvs · 1790652470 · focus · HN ↗
    Only a child thinks 2003 was a long time ago.
    yreg · 1790668516 · focus · HN ↗
    Worth noting that Corrie was killed 23 years ago during a different phase of the conflict and under a previous government.
    johnnyApplePRNG · 1790726388 · focus · HN ↗
    That's not really a response to the point being made.
    The claim I was responding to was: "By the time the bulldozers are there civilians have long moved out of the area."
    Rachel Corrie's case is a counterexample to that general claim: she was a civilian physically present in the area of an Israeli military bulldozer operation.
    Saying that it happened 23 years ago, under a different government, doesn't make the counterexample cease to exist.
    It only tells us that the example isn't evidence about every Israeli bulldozer operation today.
    If you're arguing that civilians currently leave before demolition operations in Gaza, then make that case.
    "That happened under a previous government" doesn't establish that.
    yreg · 1790852735 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm not arguing for anything. I'm just adding context, because your comment read as if it happened during the 'current phase' of the conflict. That's a crucial detail to omit, imho.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790887749 · focus · HN ↗
    > your comment read as if it happened during the 'current phase' of the conflict
    I don't think anyone else "read" it like that.
    > That's a crucial detail to omit
    It really isn't. No international body decided on "phases" to delinate combat, and given that there is not yet apology or atonement or peace since, that "phase" never ended.
    yreg · 1790929230 · focus · HN ↗
    Everyone who has not heard of her before thought that you are referring to something that happened now and not decades ago.
    I was surprised and felt mislead.
    I'm not sure what are you even arguing with me about. If it doesn't weaken your argument than it shouldn't matter to you that I've added factual context.
    someonebaggy · 1790697559 · focus · HN ↗
    Interesting: the word "nakba" translates to Hebrew as "shoah" which is what many Jews call the (German) Holocaust - they're not even trying to hide what they're doing.
    johnnyApplePRNG · 1790725501 · focus · HN ↗
    Wow. I had no idea.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790739007 · focus · HN ↗
    "nakba" translates to "catastrophe".
    if you translate "catastrophe" to hebrew, you might get "shoah".
    guess it just goes to show how different cultures independently come up with similar names for similar things
    someonebaggy · 1790756604 · focus · HN ↗
    First sentence. "The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was ..."
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790823267 · focus · HN ↗
    Interesting how both peoples independently used the same word, but I guess when something truly is a catastrophe, other words can fail you.
    manyaoman · 1790761357 · focus · HN ↗
    Thanks for sharing. At this point I'm so numb to the destruction that this piece of trivia got to me more than the new satellite photos.
    AuthAuth · 1790790796 · focus · HN ↗
    Different war I am referring to the 2023 Gaza war but my point still stands the incident you linked is not a civilan being run over. "the IDF was engaged in an operation involving the demolition of Palestinian houses in Rafah. Corrie was part of a group of three British and four American ISM activists attempting to disrupt the IDF operation." If you are embedding yourself in Gaza 2003 during the 2nd intifada and doing this you arent a civilan.
    tpowell · 1790646491 · focus · HN ↗
    And then they bomb them in their tent cities while blocking aid, all while murdering hundreds of journalists so no one sees...
    Been watching it for years. A great stain on history, with weapons paid for and built by Americans, not to mention a complicit media.
2. biimugan · 1790619643 · focus · HN ↗
  I don't quite understand your argument here. In your first pin I'm struggling to find a single building that isn't leveled, or at least severely damaged. Even buildings far away from the city center in the boonies are leveled.
  1. cogman10 · 1790637175 · focus · HN ↗
    They are saying that this is genocidal destruction. In a war sometimes civilian infrastructure is hit as collateral. But here, all infrastructure is destroyed and it's clear this wasn't done by 1 or 2 errant bombs but rather because of direct targeting. It can't be argued to be an accident because in farmland you see no bombs which hit the farmland by mistake. In other-words, this is entirely purposeful.
    [deleted] · 1790641760 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    teleforce · 1790642011 · focus · HN ↗
    >this is entirely purposeful
    Please check Norman Finkelstein's latest book namely Gaza's Gravediggers on this matter [1].
    He also has a very telling and chilling interview recently on Palestine and Gaza [2].
    [1] Gaza's Gravediggers: An Inquiry into Corruption in High Places [book].
    [2] Norman Finkelstein Reveals Shocking Discoveries While Researching History of Israel’s Gaza Obsession [video]:
    <a href="https://youtu.be/Jmv2h1WYnNo" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/Jmv2h1WYnNo
    yyyk · 1790642389 · focus · HN ↗
    What a nice, objective guy:
    <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/chomsky/comments/uyqjn2/norman_finkelstein_russia_has_the_historical/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/chomsky/comments/uyqjn2/norman_fink...
    bluealienpie · 1790643214 · focus · HN ↗
    He also promotes transphobia. Chomsky was friends with Epstein and acquaintance of Steve Bannon. I don’t think that discredits his entire body of work, but I think we should stop promoting him when there are sources that are less problematic.
    cogman10 · 1790643566 · focus · HN ↗
    You are mixing Chomsky (the subreddit) up with Norm (the book author). Norm was friends with Chomsky but not Epstein or Bannon. I'm unaware of him having transphobic views.
    Sabinus · 1790643728 · focus · HN ↗
    I would caution against uncritical consumption of Finkelstein's work. He is a bit unhinged, and limited in what content he can analyse as he can't read Arabic or Hebrew.
    Also Tucker Carlson? Seriously?
    cassepipe · 1790681298 · focus · HN ↗
    Norman Finkelstein's treatment of sources is dubious at best , dishonest at worst, and he is not very good at defending his position when challenged on them
    At least that was my takeaway after watching his debate with Destiny (the streamer) and Benny Morris (the historian):
    You be the judge: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1X_KdkoGxSs&list=PLrAXtmErZgOdP_8GztsuKi9nrraNbKKp4&index=85" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1X_KdkoGxSs&list=PLrAXtmErZg...
    monirmamoun · 1790704668 · focus · HN ↗
    Save your Hasbara. It is backfiring.
    cassepipe · 1790759447 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't know what that means and I am not going to search for it. Have fun with your ingroup that uses words that only you all know what they mean to recognize each other from the outgroup.
    manyaoman · 1790762279 · focus · HN ↗
    The irony here is so perfect that I don't know what to say. Absolutely masterful.
    cassepipe · 1790798727 · focus · HN ↗
    I am glad to know you like what's happening in your own head. Good for you
    rbanffy · 1790645192 · focus · HN ↗
    A war requires at least two militaries. This is what happens when a well armed military engages a mostly unarmed civilian society unable to mount significant opposition.
    pchristensen · 1790647534 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    torton · 1790649958 · focus · HN ↗
    "Before the October 7, 2023 attacks, the total size of Hamas’s military wing (the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades) was estimated by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and intelligence agencies to be between 25,000 and 30,000 fighters, with some intelligence assessments placing the upper limit as high as 40,000. This army was organized into five regional brigades and 24 battalions."
    "Hamas's military force prior to October 7, 2023, was roughly 3 to 4.5 times larger than the United States military when measured as a percentage of their respective total populations."
    k4rli · 1790664120 · focus · HN ↗
    Source: the aggressors
    choo-t · 1790665445 · focus · HN ↗
    No link to a source ?
    Anyway, IDF as ≈170k active duty personnel and 465k reservists[1]. Literally a different order of magnitude. Add to it the vast different of resources, access to an air force and nuclear weapons and it become even more clearer that there is no comparison possible.
    (And comparing personnel count to the USA is laughable as it is vastly different military type. Both a fighter jet pilot and a foot soldier count as one personnel, but it's neither the same force projection nor the same investment of civilians working for the war machine).
    1: <a href="https://eu.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2023/10/14/idf-explainer-on-israeli-defense-forces-idf/71133855007/" rel="nofollow">https://eu.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2023/10/14/idf-explai...
    rbanffy · 1790671398 · focus · HN ↗
    You don't need to compare the military forces. You can compare the casualties on both sides or, for a different perspective, you might count the civilians killed inside their own territories (you might count the West Bank if you really want accurate numbers).
    Forced displacement is also considered a war crime and, considering what is happening in Gaza and at the West Bank, it would qualify as genocide as well.
    jayGlow · 1790677096 · focus · HN ↗
    comparing the casualties just shows that Hamas are incompetent not that they aren't trying.
    rbanffy · 1790679502 · focus · HN ↗
    I was hoping the numbers would make it obvious the reaction is disproportionate and careless with the lives of civilians.
    lukan · 1790689430 · focus · HN ↗
    Yeah, there even is this old archaic rule from the bible/torah/quran, "eye for an eye" that is usually considered barbaric and outdated. But here they go by 35:1 ratio.
    gegtik · 1790689578 · focus · HN ↗
    new Voight-Kampff test just dropped
    rbanffy · 1790692151 · focus · HN ↗
    I wish I could turn off empathy at my convenience.
    erkt · 1790689599 · focus · HN ↗
    They are not civilians.
    They launched a war against their neighbors, poorly.
    They hid the tunnels of their army, poorly.
    There is only one solution to the Gaza problem, no more Gaza.
    jibalt · 1790692341 · focus · HN ↗
    It is obvious, but it is also to be expected that a significant number of people here, as elsewhere, will rationalize genocide ... and the comment you responded to is particularly crude in its lack of humanity.
    jayGlow · 1790896386 · focus · HN ↗
    Hamas has launched 19,000 missiles at Israel should they just stop intercepting them to make the death toll more even? If someone refuses to stop attacking you what's the appropriate response do you just sit there while they try to kill you?
    <a href="https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/06/11/19000-rockets-launched-at-israel-since-hamass-october-7-atrocities/" rel="nofollow">https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/06/11/19000-rockets-launch...
    jayGlow · 1790896501 · focus · HN ↗
    Hamas has launched 10s of thousands of rockets and mortars at Israel what is an appropriate response for them? Should they just sit there letting someone try to kill them or should they retaliate? How many casualties is an acceptable amount?
    <a href="https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/06/11/19000-rockets-launched-at-israel-since-hamass-october-7-atrocities/" rel="nofollow">https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/06/11/19000-rockets-launch...
    newspaper1 · 1790898496 · focus · HN ↗
    What do they expect when they murder an entire country full of people and steal their land? Israel shouldn't exist, problem solved.
    jayGlow · 1790958063 · focus · HN ↗
    When did they murder an entire country? Last time I checked people still live in Palestine, in fact the population been steadily increasing over the past 40 or so years. Is your solution that the people of Israel should just die instead of fighting back?
    newspaper1 · 1790959079 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
    Every Israeli prime minister has been European. Every one. The answer is to return to their homeland and let the remaining Palestinians return to theirs.
    erkt · 1790689398 · focus · HN ↗
    Maybe they should be treated like the festival goers?
    mossTechnician · 1790692433 · focus · HN ↗
    The IDF has killed not just a higher number but also a higher percentage of civilians, and a much higher percentage of children, than the October 7 attacks[0]. Even if collective punishment was considered not cruel but moral by the larger community, Israel has far surpassed it.
    [0]: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Gaza_war" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Gaza_war
    someonebaggy · 1790697149 · focus · HN ↗
    They would be better off if they were.
    hmijail · 1790772264 · focus · HN ↗
    That percentage comparison is fascinating. Say only 1 fighter remains in a tunnel when all the civilians have been finally bombed out and sniped off. By that measure that would mean Hamas is what, 50 times larger than the USA's military?
    bonesss · 1790664118 · focus · HN ↗
    There were a lot of arms used over the border on October 7th, more confiscated on video and being used on video against the IDF, and the constant stream of unguided rockets being shot at civilians year after year. Rockets are weapons.
    Hamas describes its fighters as their “military wing”. They engage in military training exercises and wear uniforms (when not fighting). That’s a military.
    While it may be dumb, gross, and a hate crime against their civilians: war was the exact and predicted outcome of the attacks Hamas launched. They made statements to that effect, kicking off a regional war was central to the plan on October the 7th.
    iririririr · 1790668058 · focus · HN ↗
    almost as if they didn't have the best interest of the civilians in mind uh
    rbanffy · 1790671530 · focus · HN ↗
    As Emiliano Zapata once said, "Better to die standing than to live on your knees".
    While I don't condone violence, it's a legitimate way to defend against occupation.
    someonebaggy · 1790678769 · focus · HN ↗
    This is actually codified in international law IIRC - a nation that's subject to some kind of apartheid occupation has literally unlimited rights to resist its occupiers.
    SiempreViernes · 1790681729 · focus · HN ↗
    While Hamas does have a right of armed struggle against the occupation, the taking of hostages and the killing of civilians are not permissible forms of resistance.
    That said, it is almost impossible to imagine that the Israeli response would have been something lesser than the current genocide attempt if Hamas had just taken POWs during the October 7 attack. Bibi would have arguably been even more humiliated if Hamas had been acting with restraint, so the impulse for revenge would be even greater.
    rhasimus · 1790682655 · focus · HN ↗
    Making up scenarios sure is fun. Let me try!
    It is almost impossible to imagine Israel would even look at the direction of Gaza had they just taken the statehood offers presented to them in 1947, 2000, 2001, or 2008, instead of repeatedly choosing terrorizing civilians over gasp compromising.
    someonebaggy · 1790684870 · focus · HN ↗
    What were the offers?
    ta8903 · 1790687846 · focus · HN ↗
    >It is almost impossible to imagine Israel would even look at the direction of Gaza had they just taken the statehood offers presented to them in 1947, 2000, 2001, or 2008
    It's very much possible to imagine that.
    someonebaggy · 1790697229 · focus · HN ↗
    Considering every single offer that was accepted by both sides was immediately violated by the Israeli side
    rhasimus · 1790716556 · focus · HN ↗
    Hey another flat out lie by the same user... "the Second Intifada began immediately after the collapse of major peace negotiations." You seem to be mixing up the aggressor with the Aggressé, seemingly intentionally, multiple times in a row.
    throwaway198846 · 1790686316 · focus · HN ↗
    This show how little you understand Israelis. First this isn't about Bibi, second ot wasn't humiliation but failure, third no atrocities on civilians would certainly changed the response - probably equivalent to a larger cast lead operation which also act as precedent of how Israel acted on the past.
    gosub100 · 1790691959 · focus · HN ↗
    Bibi was aware of the plans, and allowed the attack to manufacture support for the greater Israel project.
    rhasimus · 1790681959 · focus · HN ↗
    Why would one just plainly lie like that? (╭ರ_•́)
    According to International Humanitarian Law: Targeting, killing, or kidnapping civilians is strictly prohibited and constitutes a war crime, regardless of the legality of the underlying cause. Torture, hostage-taking, and executions of captured individuals are strictly forbidden under all circumstances.
    All of which are actions that were done by Hamas and Gazans who invaded on Oct 7th. A lot of which was recorded on video, by Hamas and Gazans.
    lukan · 1790689092 · focus · HN ↗
    Targeting military - yes, under certain conditions.
    Targeting civilian homes and a festival - nothing legitimate about that.
    erkt · 1790689077 · focus · HN ↗
    Then maybe the civilians should kill their Hamas neighbors, instead of cheering them in the streets and supporting the actions of Oct 7th…
    LorenPechtel · 1790697743 · focus · HN ↗
    Hamas chose this war, expecting the results they got.
    What you are missing here is that Hamas' primary weapon is parading dead Gazans in front of the camera.
    what · 1790647575 · focus · HN ↗
    If it was genocide, why would you spare the farmers? Doesn’t really make sense.
    aetch · 1790659945 · focus · HN ↗
    It’s more efficient to spend your ammo on housing and city buildings.
    echoangle · 1790665528 · focus · HN ↗
    Wouldn’t it actually be much more efficient to just destroy all the food infrastructure and just have everyone die from hunger instead of destroying all the houses?
    a_paddy · 1790665846 · focus · HN ↗
    You're right, it is, hence the strikes on World Central Kitchen and the blockade on food entering the area.
    iririririr · 1790668148 · focus · HN ↗
    they send armed settlers for the farms. they can't destroy those
    choo-t · 1790666532 · focus · HN ↗
    Food production was target, even in different part of Palestine (west bank).
    Farmers were killed, even in different part of Palestine.
    Killing farmers have nothing to do with the definition of genocide.
    neor · 1790670284 · focus · HN ↗
    Farmland wasn't bombed, but they did use Bulldozers to destroy a lot of fields.
    thinkindie · 1790670938 · focus · HN ↗
    there are videos of bulldozer in the West Bank eradicating secular olive trees from Palestinian farmland. There is no Hamas in West Bank, no tunnels, no fighters.
    t3po · 1790708187 · focus · HN ↗
    just a few discovered this week alone.
    tgsovlerkhgsel · 1790657626 · focus · HN ↗
    Looks the same in Ukraine, and at least there it's most likely not primarily because Russians wanted flatten the city (I'm sure they'd have preferred taking it in one piece) but rather because fighting happens from buildings resulting in the buildings getting targeted.
    Doesn't mean that here the targeting couldn't have been done with the primary goal of displacing the population, but the buildings being destroyed doesn't prove the motive.
    newspaper1 · 1790657998 · focus · HN ↗
    Does it look the same in the Ukraine? I haven’t seen any footage of entire cities leveled like this.
    TiredOfLife · 1790659982 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-26/damage-data-reveals-extent-of-vicious-russian-tactics/101070918" rel="nofollow">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-26/damage-data-reveals-e...
    <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/5/24/satellite-images-show-scale-of-destruction-in-bakhmut-ukraine" rel="nofollow">https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/5/24/satellite-...
    And that just from the start of war.
    megous · 1790667309 · focus · HN ↗
    Yeah, we can look at how Mariupol looks on satellite images. It looks nothing like Rafah. You have to be completely blind to not see the difference.
    cpursley · 1790670549 · focus · HN ↗
    In fact, Mariupol looks like this now and those are locals walking around: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@MariupolVideo/videos" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/@MariupolVideo/videos
    virgilp · 1790674857 · focus · HN ↗
    Here: <a href="https://maps.app.goo.gl/TncezF72LxaWAKYY7" rel="nofollow">https://maps.app.goo.gl/TncezF72LxaWAKYY7
    brabel · 1790679871 · focus · HN ↗
    That’s Bahkmut which is still close to the frontline. They were talking about Mariupol which the Russians have actually rebuilt already, see here: <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mariupol,+Donetsk+Oblast,+Ukraine,+87500/@47.1012584,37.5358044,15z/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x40e6e6a7bee7582b:0xa5d118300a75b5ce!8m2!3d47.097133!4d37.543367!16zL20vMDRmcHZz?utm_campaign=ml-le-16204869&g_ep=Eg1tbF8yMDI2MDkyMl8wIOC7DCoASAJQAg%3D%3D" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mariupol,+Donetsk+Oblast,+...
    virgilp · 1790682071 · focus · HN ↗
    No, Mariupol was just one (arguably not the best) example answer to the original question, "Does it look the same in the Ukraine? I haven’t seen any footage of entire cities leveled like this."
    wongarsu · 1790682280 · focus · HN ↗
    "Russia is claiming it as theirs for the last four years and has largely rebuilt it" is not really counter-evidence to destruction during the fighting
    Mariupol probably did see less destruction. But for the actively contested regions, the biggest difference between Russian destruction and Israeli destruction is that the Russians use artillery, which leaves shells of buildings standing, while Israel uses bulldozers that are a lot more thorough in leaving no stone on the other
    someonebaggy · 1790716297 · focus · HN ↗
    Also the Palestinian buildings are practically made of cardboard because that's all the supplies they can get (because mysteriously supplies keep not arriving, oh well, no way to know why they don't)
    tgsovlerkhgsel · 1790707697 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mar'inka,+Donetsk+Oblast,+Ukraine/@47.9398557,37.5033743,1070m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x40e0a23e885a49c1:0x5db935ecafec4ca!8m2!3d47.9422861!4d37.5040301!16zL20vMGd0c19o" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mar'inka,+Donetsk+Oblast,+...
    virgilp · 1790667257 · focus · HN ↗
    Seriouslly?
    You can find lots of videos of Russia firing thermobaric weapons into populated areas - you will find none fired by Israel into Gaza. And I don't think that's because IL doesn't have them.
    virgilp · 1790675182 · focus · HN ↗
    (i can't edit apparently): why the downvotes? Serious question I don't understand, is there anything I said above false? The parent comment is questioning whether RU cruelty in Ukraine is anything close to what IL did - and the answer is yes, it's actually much worse, especially when you factor in that it's completely unprovoked.
    brabel · 1790680044 · focus · HN ↗
    There is no way it’s worse. To be comparable the Russians would have to have flattened Kyiv and most other cities which is extremely far from reality. The cities being flattened are all in the frontline as there is no way to take a city by force without basically destroying every building.
    virgilp · 1790682294 · focus · HN ↗
    > The cities being flattened are all in the frontline as there is no way to take a city by force without basically destroying every building.
    It's exactly the same in Gaza! You basically justified Israel's actions here... Check the distance between Gaza City & Israel border, vs distance beetween Bakhmut & Russia's border. Tell me which one is farther away - I'll wait
    someonebaggy · 1790716350 · focus · HN ↗
    I wonder why Israel put the border there.
    close04 · 1790681287 · focus · HN ↗
    The destruction in Ukraine is mostly focused on the front line. Gaza was treated as a front line almost in its entirety, with almost no place to hide.
    virgilp · 1790682997 · focus · HN ↗
    Entire Gaza is frontline. It's 365 square kilometers - a lot smaller that UKR frontline. It's barely the size of Mariupol (which according to UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights report [1] had 90% of high-rise buildings destroyed or heavily damaged; and 60% of private houses. But if you know anything about former communist countries - in cities like Mariupol, most people lived in high-rise buildings). Now, bear in mind that according to the discussion we have here, a lot of people seem to believe that Mariupol got off easily and the destruction it suffered doesn't even compare to destruction in Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Vuhledar etc
    [1]<a href="https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/countries/ua/2022-06-29/2022-06-UkraineArmedAttack-EN.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/countrie...
    close04 · 1790694592 · focus · HN ↗
    That's exactly why Gaza took it far worse than anything Russia can do in Ukraine. Gaza is shooting fish in a barrel and Israel fishes with dynamite and white phosphorus in that barrel. The Gaza war is about sterilizing that land of all its people, who I'm told aren't even considered people. Even Russia didn't go that far.
    virgilp · 1790700566 · focus · HN ↗
    > who I'm told aren't even considered people
    EXACTLY. You are told.
    If that was really the goal, I go back to my previous point - wouldn't thermobaric bombs be faster, more economic & more convenient? It just makes no logical sense. If you already declared them to be monsters, what exactly is holding them back?
    close04 · 1790751045 · focus · HN ↗
    It was a figure of speech. I'm told with evidence.
    virgilp · 1790864629 · focus · HN ↗
    Care to share the evidence?
    close04 · 1790949696 · focus · HN ↗
    You know how you don't convince a flat earther with evidence? You're not looking to be convinced, you just want to prove you're smarter than everyone else. You'll always have some silly vague argument that you can hang on to for dear life and pretend that invalidates the other person's case. I don't have time for pointless exercises you need as validation. :)
    virgilp · 1791112756 · focus · HN ↗
    All I see is that you're likely just ashamed to show out how weak your so-called "evidence" is, and instead chose to go on "you wouldn't believe it anyway" route. Yeah, if I won't believe it then it's probably due to the fact you yourself already know it's flimsy.
    westpfelia · 1790676206 · focus · HN ↗
    To busy using white phosphorous on kids.
    virgilp · 1790678993 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    cassepipe · 1790680399 · focus · HN ↗
    I think your distinction is a valid one, Israel has some war crimes going on whereas russian invasion of Ukraine was a war crime festival but you are fighting an uphill battle because trying to make distinctions in levels of evil is generally frowned upon because to many people it looks like justification. The reason is because most people can't imagine any other value to making distinctions in evil. I personally can but each time you are going to do it, you should be prepared to defend why, in fact, making those distinctions is useful while being clear that the purpose is not justification of evil acts. It's a thin line to walk on.
    virgilp · 1790683953 · focus · HN ↗
    There are a bunch of people here who _genuinely_ do not comprehend that Russia is on a completely different league of evilness compared to Israel (and may even consider Israel worse!). This, while Russia is literally the source/engine of a significant part of all the evil in this world - and I wish I was hyperbolic when saying that. FWIW, that's exactly their doctrine, that "everybody is bad, so why bother to make the distinction, it's not like the others are good". And that's exactly how you end up in other countries too with genuinely evil rulers like some of those we see today.
    Anyway. Rant over, otherwise I'll veer too much into politics :)
    westpfelia · 1790687019 · focus · HN ↗
    744 ukranian children killed.
    <a href="https://gwaramedia.com/en/russia-has-killed-744-injured-almost-3000-ukrainian-children-since-full-scale-invasion-began/" rel="nofollow">https://gwaramedia.com/en/russia-has-killed-744-injured-almo...
    20000 palestianian children killed
    <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-un-report-details-the-overwhelming-scale-of-children-killed-in-gaza-it-raises-grave-legal-questions-286327" rel="nofollow">https://theconversation.com/a-un-report-details-the-overwhel...
    more then 20 times the children killed in half time time.
    virgilp · 1790691723 · focus · HN ↗
    Only children matter? But, fine. How many were kidnapped? At least IDF can claim that they didn't intentionally target children - with kidnapping, that's harder. And the discrepancy in numbers can also be caused by how much Ukraine vs Hamas care about said children / how much they are put in harm's way.
    someonebaggy · 1790697371 · focus · HN ↗
    What do you call aiming a sniper rifle at a child, centering her in the scope, accounting for drop, and then pulling the trigger? Seems pretty intentional to me, but maybe the sniper's finger slipped and did all that by accident?
    virgilp · 1790700304 · focus · HN ↗
    you believe those were sniper kills? :o Where did you get that from, the Hamas "x-rays" where bullets conveniently lodged inside a child cranium instead of shattering the surrounding bones?
    janc_ · 1790736337 · focus · HN ↗
    There are enough Israeli videos, texts, interviews & testimonies about IDF soldiers intentionally targetting children & bragging about it. No need to depend on Hamas communications.
    cassepipe · 1790760669 · focus · HN ↗
    I call it a awful thing to do.
    I don't know what you are referring to. I suppose yet another war crime from the israeli army but this conflict generates a lot of dis/misinformation and it's hard enough to assess the trustworthiness of a source. If you don't even care to provide any source, you are just venting
    It's not because you are angry about the state of the world that it absolves you of the moral duty to engage usefully with others. I know I have changed my mind on some subjects but it was never with one lazy comment like this one.
    Now why is what you are talking about worse than aiming deliberately a supermarket full of civilians with a missile or hunting a grandpa with a fpv drone ? I don't really understand why you would choose to draw a line there. We already have a internationally recognized line in the sand that is somewhat actionable: War crime. It's hard to argue for genocide, it's easier to denounce and investigate suspected war crimes.
    I, for one, think all war crimes are bad and should be the line in the sand where international pressure should be at its maximum.
    Gaza invasion is a counterinsurgency type of war in an tighlty urbanized environment where the invader has apparently quite limited care about human life. It is not really surprising that more children would be killed there. Those are two different wars with war crimes happening in both.
    cassepipe · 1790680923 · focus · HN ↗
    Well, Russia's use of white phosphorous during the invasion and ensuing occupation of Ukraine is well documented
    MiroslavPokorny · 1790671471 · focus · HN ↗
    Many of the towns along the front with Russia are also wastelands. Nearly every single building from homes, to schools, to shops are rubble.
    newsclues · 1790680640 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/10/28/how-russias-invasion-flattened-a-ukrainian-border-city/" rel="nofollow">https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/10/28/how-russias-invas...
    megous · 1790667199 · focus · HN ↗
    It does not look the same, at all.
    chewchewchew · 1790680404 · focus · HN ↗
    Cities in the heat of the conflict (i.e boots on the ground) sure do look like that
    kergonath · 1790671561 · focus · HN ↗
    > Looks the same in Ukraine
    It does not.
    > and at least there it's most likely not primarily because Russians wanted flatten the city (I'm sure they'd have preferred taking it in one piece) but rather because fighting happens from buildings resulting in the buildings getting targeted.
    What happened on the Ukrainian frontlines is a war of position. Everything gets pounded, even forests and tree lines. It’s more like Verdun than anything that happened in Gaza.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790673200 · focus · HN ↗
    > It does not
    In absolutely does [1].
    > What happened on the Ukrainian frontlines is a war of position
    If Gaza is a genocide then Ukraine almost certainly is too. The same messaging about exterminating a culture that doesn't "actually" exist from senior leadership. The same attacks on children. The same destruction and systematic razing of civilian settlements.
    [1] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ySLyCjNnrI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ySLyCjNnrI
    cassepipe · 1790680031 · focus · HN ↗
    It can be (and is imho) true that both Russia and Israel have broadcasted genocidal intent with the consequences being war crimes and still not look identical
    It seems like the state of Ukraine frontline cities is due to intense artillery fire and air bombingn whereas gaza cities states seem to be more of systematic bulldozing of entire areas which would erase the marks of actual bombings and make the scale harder to assess
    cpursley · 1790680945 · focus · HN ↗
    So explain all these videos then, AI perhaps? Those aren't really locals who have returned, but actors?:
    <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@MariupolVideo/videos" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/@MariupolVideo/videos
    kergonath · 1790689402 · focus · HN ↗
    > If Gaza is a genocide then Ukraine almost certainly is too.
    Both are the results of aggressive madmen, but both situations are different. And the genocide aspect is not what is discussed here.
    Also, why do you think that “Russia is doing the same thing” is some kind of gotcha?
    jameshilliard · 1790717549 · focus · HN ↗
    > Both are the results of aggressive madmen, but both situations are different.
    Are the madmen you're referring to Putin and Sinwar?
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790676089 · focus · HN ↗
    Well, it happened in germany with the hitleryouth and volksturm.
    newsclues · 1790680572 · focus · HN ↗
    The same thing happens in Ukraine in the urban front lines. Villages get erased with artillery and bombs, as basements are the best place to survive drones and fires from artillery and bombs.
    Systematic destruction of urban areas is sadly what modern urban combat operations look like.
    When an enemy digs in and choose to fight and die in an urban area, this is how war plays out.
    <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/10/28/how-russias-invasion-flattened-a-ukrainian-border-city/" rel="nofollow">https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/10/28/how-russias-invas...
    WAR IS HELL
    potatototoo99 · 1790685343 · focus · HN ↗
    Rafah was no village, with 250,000 to 280,000 people.
    newsclues · 1790697488 · focus · HN ↗
    Similar size to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Mariupol" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Mariupol
    kergonath · 1790689351 · focus · HN ↗
    > The same thing happens in Ukraine in the urban front lines. Villages get erased with artillery and bombs, as basements are the best place to survive drones and fires from artillery and bombs.
    But that’s not what we see in Gaza. The parents specifically mentioned that only towns were leveled. The destroyed towns are not the only relevant aspect. The other one is that major damage happens only there. And of course it would, because the Israeli forces don’t want to sterilise the land; they want to take it. In contrast, Russia is happy to be king of the rubble as long as Ukrainians eat shells.
    newsclues · 1790697262 · focus · HN ↗
    If your enemy is dug in in an urban area, you bomb the hell out of it before you send in infantry to clean up. If you don’t use artillery and bombs the defenders will mow down the assault units.
    This is how urban war is played out between near peer armies.
    Think about this, I’m in a concrete bunker with a machine gun, do you want to charge the bunker and get shot, or do you want to call in an airstrike to destroy the bunker with the machine gun position? I know what I’d do
    mthoms · 1790702285 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    _DeadFred_ · 1790693020 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm sorry, Ukraine war discussion was labeled political on HN, not allowed, actively moderated and shutdown. Please don't post it here. Only Gaza/Israel get's a special carveout for these sorts of discussions on HN.
    YZF · 1790664511 · focus · HN ↗
    A lot of destruction is from bulldozers like: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDF_Caterpillar_D9" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDF_Caterpillar_D9
    The way the IDF fought in Rafah and other areas is leading with bulldozers that can take RPGs, IEDs, mines etc. to clear way for troops behind. That's how the tunnel and other guerrilla advantages are neutralized.
    So yes, the destruction is absolutely purposeful, its purpose is to take away the advantage of the tunnels and guerrilla tactics, and enable excavations for tunnel access and detection.
    The sequence was something like this (AI assisted):
    Early May 2024, the IDF issued extensive, phased evacuation orders. This prompted an estimated 1 million to 1.4 million civilians—many of whom had previously fled to Rafah from other parts of Gaza—to evacuate to designated zones like Al-Mawasi.
    Once ground troops secured these largely emptied areas, the IDF Combat Engineering Corps moved in. Objective satellite damage assessments show a massive spike in structural destruction in Rafah beginning in the summer of 2024, directly correlating with the ground invasion.
    Satellite imagery confirms that ground forces used controlled explosive demolitions and heavy earth-moving equipment, including armored D9 bulldozers, to systematically clear residential blocks, agricultural land, and infrastructure.
    This mechanical destruction was particularly concentrated along the Philadelphi Corridor (the Gaza-Egypt border) and in eastern Rafah. The military objective of these block-by-block clearing operations was to uncover and destroy cross-border smuggling tunnels and to establish a widened, flattened security perimeter where structures previously stood.
    In summary, while aerial bombardment occurred prior to and during the invasion, you are correct that the wholesale, block-by-block leveling of Rafah was heavily driven by engineering operations using bulldozers and controlled demolitions after the majority of the civilian population had evacuated the targeted areas.
    pjc50 · 1790674830 · focus · HN ↗
    > evacuation orders. This prompted an estimated 1 million to 1.4 million civilians
    "Evacuating" a million people who will not be allowed to return is "ethnic cleansing".
    SiempreViernes · 1790681861 · focus · HN ↗
    It's not even evacuation because the IDF does not provide facilities to go to, it's just forced displacement.
    someonebaggy · 1790697460 · focus · HN ↗
    And the one major time (and probably many more unreported) that they did provide an evacuation site, they waited for the evacuation, then bombed the shit out of the evacuation site claiming "Hamas is here lol"
    YZF · 1790713474 · focus · HN ↗
    Well. Hamas was there. Those attacks targeted specific people and we know they were killed. Israel did not bomb the shit out of the evacuation site, the number of civilians killed in Al-Muasi was extremely low. A lot less than e.g. the allies killed in Mosul where they did not evacuate the population.
    Mohammed Deif. The head of Hamas' military wing. Was killed in the humanitarian zone. Rafah Salameh. The head of the Khan Younis brigade. Was killed in the humanitarian zone.
    These claims are repeated a lot. They are baseless. A critical mind and a bit of research will prove that to you.
    It doesn't matter what Israel does. In Rafah Israel objectively and measurably did much better than western armies fighting against Mosul in terms of civilian casualties (and you can include those in the humanitarian zones, still better). But Israel is held to a higher standard.
    EDIT: And more: Yassin Rabia, Khaled Nagar, Osama Tabesh, Ayman Mabhouh, Samer Ismail Khadr Aby Daqqa. Fact check me. Also Israel has documented rocket launching from humanitarian zones. Israel has also retrieved bodies of hostages (including Hersh Goldberg) from tunnels under humanitarian zones.
    someonebaggy · 1790714536 · focus · HN ↗
    If you just kill everyone you do often kill the people you were looking for as well.
    YZF · 1790713080 · focus · HN ↗
    1) They will be allowed to return.
    2) It is a requirement by international law.
    3) If we compare this to the Battle of Mosul. Which is a pretty good comparison. They are very similar. That battle had a much larger civilian casualty count. The allies there decided to not evacuate the population and the result of that was a much larger number of civilian deaths. Are you proposing that Israel should have done the same? I.e. not evacuate the population and have a significantly higher number of civilian casualties? Do you feel that if Israel did that it would enjoy a similar support as the allies had when they went after ISIS in Mosul?
    Basically Israel did the right thing here. Provably better (judging by the number of civilian casualties) than the western armies that allied against ISIS did in Mosul. The ethnic cleansing allegation is not supported by evidence and really can't be proven until the war is over.
    erkt · 1790688902 · focus · HN ↗
    I’m not sure your point? They are not civilians when they are covering up tunnels in their homes for Hamas to use.
    maeln · 1790689345 · focus · HN ↗
    Look at Google map of Gaza city, Rafah, Khan-Younes, Al Qarara, ... pretty much all building have been destroyed. You want to try to argue that every one of them was somehow hiding a tunnel ?
    tengbretson · 1790692799 · focus · HN ↗
    Is having tunnels in their own territory a problem?
    t3po · 1790708130 · focus · HN ↗
    how much funding and aid did Gaza receive prior to October 7th? they had plenty of opps to build a healthy community. They chose terrorism. Ammunitions were hidden in hostpitals and childrens schools. Israeli gave ample warning to leave building before they were demolished.
    jameshilliard · 1790717418 · focus · HN ↗
    > It can't be argued to be an accident because in farmland you see no bombs which hit the farmland by mistake. In other-words, this is entirely purposeful.
    It's obviously intentional that Hamas built their military infrastructure underneath and within civilian infrastructure(which is a war crime) and not in open farmland. So it's quite obvious why the civilian infrastructure gets destroyed when the military infrastructure is targeted.
  2. skissane · 1790641897 · focus · HN ↗
    You can also see a lot of buildings demolished on the Egyptian side too.
    In 2015, the Egyptian government announced a plan to demolish the entire Egyptian city of Rafah, in order to deter smuggling with the Gaza Strip. More than a decade on, most of it is gone. The residents were forcibly relocated to elsewhere in Egypt.
    elcritch · 1790648158 · focus · HN ↗
    It also looks similar to Mosul in Iraq before and after the ISIS and Iraq and coalition forces fought:
    <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/15/world/middleeast/mosul-before-after.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/15/world/middlee...
    Urban warfare is brutal, especially when one side systematically digs in and uses IEDs and booby traps in civilian buildings.
    megous · 1790667099 · focus · HN ↗
    Yeah, this is not what happened here. You can look up Israeli articles from the time that described that nothing was going on for weeks on end other than demolitions. Basically no fighting. You get Israeli politicians repeating beforehand that Rafah will get leveled.
    They wanted to level the city, they did. That's all. There was some fighting eventually with a few fighters holed in in Rafah, but nothing that would justify this. And Israelis continue leveling entire areas the whole year after so called "ceasefire" during which there were almost no attacks on them, yet they managed to murder more than a thousand of people.
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790676033 · focus · HN ↗
    So, you are directly saying no genocide? Just empty house- and then demolishing the possible booby trapped tunnel endpoint?
    LorenPechtel · 1790696451 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    mobelkh · 1790697384 · focus · HN ↗
    flattens the entire city? absolutely not, this is not a standard anyone should consider normal
    stickfigure · 1790700793 · focus · HN ↗
    Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Warsaw, Grozny, Aleppo, Mariupol, Carthage... war is hell.
    Sadly it does seem pretty normal.
    gravisultra · 1790703946 · focus · HN ↗
    Even if you take Israel at its word, Hamas only killed 1200 people. How many people did the Nazis or Imperial Japan kill before their cities were destroyed?
    t3po · 1790707875 · focus · HN ↗
    only 1,200 people? are you nuts? every Israeli felt the loss. they are a small country. How can you just say 1,200 people as if its nothing.
    gravisultra · 1790708285 · focus · HN ↗
    Palestinian lives > zionist feelings. If you think 1,200 people is devastating, what do you think about the 75k+ Palestinians murdered by Israel? Again, 1,200 is far, far less than the number of Palestinians murdered by Israel prior to Oct 7th. History can no longer be denied.
    LorenPechtel · 1790798608 · focus · HN ↗
    The 75k deaths in Gaza should be blamed on the side that chose the conflict: Hamas. Human shield deaths are ugly, but the blame must go to the side that caused them to be human shields. The alternative is to create a situation where evil can prevail by hiding behind enough human shields.
    gravisultra · 1790798937 · focus · HN ↗
    The Zionists chose this conflict when they invaded Palestine and ethnically cleansed the indigenous Palestinians. That you call Palestinians murdered by Israel "human shields" is evil.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
    Daishiman · 1790742922 · focus · HN ↗
    This is not the argument in favor of Israel you think it is
    kyboren · 1790798789 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    erxam · 1790694881 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
3. cavisne · 1790653859 · focus · HN ↗
  Oh 100%, you can see specific buildings (mostly marked as schools) that are still standing.
4. YZF · 1790663982 · focus · HN ↗
  The buildings were levelled with bulldozers for the most part after the civilians left during combat operations against the tunnel infrastructure and any remaining combatants. Not sure what the "surgical strikes" comment is about. Are you asking why weren't open spaces destroyed or attacked?
  1. a_paddy · 1790665596 · focus · HN ↗
    How does bulldozing a family home have any affect on a tunnel?
    vkou · 1790666102 · focus · HN ↗
    It encourages the former occupants leave the country. Once they all leave or die, there will be no more tunnels or insurgents.
    fesoliveira · 1790666664 · focus · HN ↗
    That is a definition of a genocide[1].
    [1] <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocide-prevention/definition" rel="nofollow">https://www.un.org/en/genocide-prevention/definition
    mb2100 · 1790667986 · focus · HN ↗
    Not quite. Perhaps you were thinking of "ethnic cleansing" ?
    latexr · 1790670709 · focus · HN ↗
    It seems bonkers to me that we’re nitpicking what to call a given mass extermination of human lives, like some kind of deranged Clippy. Talk about loss of perspective.
    The link provided in your parent post explicitly says there is no precise definition of “ethnic cleansing”, so I don’t even understand why you’d think the distinction matters.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790672642 · focus · HN ↗
    > seems bonkers to me that we’re nitpicking what to call a given mass extermination of human lives
    The OG genocides involved deaths in the millions [1]. That requires killing with industrial efficiency, something that made it categorically unique from the "wipe out the village" warfare that goes back to, probably, before civilisation. (Chimpanzees do it. To my knowledge, they're the only other species that annihilates versus merely fighting off enemies.)
    At lower kill volumes, even in the tens and possibly even hundreds of thousands, the line between conventional warfare done conservatively, conventional warfare done brutally and a process that, if left unhindered, will reach a million-man death toll.
    (Then you have the ambiguity, one which does not apply in Gaza, introduced by displacement also being included in genocide and it starts to intersect pretty much perfectly with war.)
    If we want these words to keep having meaning, we have to nitpick around their use. Otherwise, overinclusivity will consume them.
    [1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides
    claykkari · 1790673854 · focus · HN ↗
    Nitpick all you want, but at some point you should also ask why this is being debated so widely in the first place, and whether it's time for the international community to step in. Those approaches aren't mutually exclusive.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790674348 · focus · HN ↗
    > you should also ask why this is being debated so widely in the first place
    Because there are lots of wars burning all over the planet. We tried to carve an exception into international law, after WWII, about it being permissible to intervene in the internal affairs of another sovereign state if they're doing genocide. So this is a real debate that should be had. The problem is by practically every definition, there are at least a handful of active genocides happening in multiple theaters around the world.
    The abhorrence of genocide is one that needs to be refreshed with action if we're to restore the norm that it's not okay. But to do that, you have to set the new threshold.
    kyboren · 1790793368 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    dudefeliciano · 1790673944 · focus · HN ↗
    > The OG genocides involved deaths in the millions
    So if less than a million people are killed it's not a genocide? Seems like a very obtuse understanding of the word, which is also defined in the wiki you linked.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790674435 · focus · HN ↗
    > if less than a million people are killed it's not a genocide?
    Nobody said that. OP asked why this is being debated. That's why. It's not clear what generally constitutes a genocide in a way that is separate from warfare in general. (Gaza and Ukraine are simpler, to me, because Russia and Israel explicitly message genocidal intent in a way New Delhi, Beijing and Washington do not.)
    hiddencost · 1790675649 · focus · HN ↗
    There is a technical definition of genocide. There's no ambiguity as to what Israel is doing, only people like you who are probably concern trolling.
    [deleted] · 1790677147 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    JumpCrisscross · 1790677217 · focus · HN ↗
    > There is a technical definition of genocide
    It's incredibly ambiguous. There are very few sets of people who agree on the list of ongoing genocides, much less historic ones. The only places where there is even a semblance of agreement is in Europe and urban America, and that's largely due to deferral to our institutions.
    > There's no ambiguity as to what Israel is doing
    I agree. That doesn't mean it's beyond discussion or debate. I think it's a genocide. I also think that term has been mangled, particularly online, to the point that it's virtually meaningless. (One of the problems with the term is it's grammatically odd. A homicide is a completed murder. Attempted murder is different. A genocide, completed, is an extermination or annihilation. But we give the ongoing project the same grammar as, in other cases, an act.)
    well_ackshually · 1790688215 · focus · HN ↗
    >A genocide, completed, is an extermination or annihilation.
    Which is why zero armenians remain after the armenian genocide
    oh wait no nevermind, your definition is just bullshit. Only one set of people define what is or isn't a genocide: historians. The ICC only covers crimes against humanity. Historians are also in wide agreement (except for the Israel aligned ones) that it is a genocide in Gaza.
    campers · 1790683800 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/rwanda/assets/pdf/GuidanceNote-When%20to%20refer%20to%20a%20situation%20as%20genocide.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/rwanda/assets/pdf/Guid...
    The legal definition of genocide is precise and includes an element that is often hard to prove: "intent." Determining whether a situation constitutes genocide is factually and legally complex. It should only be made following a careful and detailed examination of the facts against relevant legislation. This examination is carried out to establish State responsibility or individual criminal responsibility for the crime of genocide. It must be done by a competent international or national court with jurisdiction to try such cases, after an investigation that meets appropriate due process standards.
    Correct. If no such court case has delivered a verdict, then by definition no one can rightly claim genocide has occurred.
    As for whats happening, the over represented proportion of male combatant age deaths, the well below average ratio of civilian to combatant deaths in complex urban warfare, the war being in response to an atrocious attack on civilians etc put a big question on the "Only Reasonable Inference" standard.
    well_ackshually · 1790688921 · focus · HN ↗
    You know what, it's been a while since I took the piss out of the hasbara, let's have fun.
    > the well below average ratio of civilian to combatant deaths in complex urban warfare
    Ah, yes, the very urban warfare art of bombing hospitals and refugee camps. Very urban. Much warfare. And you also get to claim that the civilians didn't die from the fighting, merely from the starvation!
    >the war being in response to an atrocious attack on civilians
    Yep. Nothing happened before October 7. 1947 ? Doesn't exist. Nakba? Probably some arab term that means nothing. Close to a century of warfare, torture, humiliation and putting Gazawis into concentration camps ? Naaaah. Hamas is responsible. Bad Hamas.
    > population numbers remaining stable
    There has been no accurate population counts for three years. But thank you for being so generous and letting palestinians reproduce while you park them in camps. Very kosher <3
    >Hamas's initial charter
    No shit, the armed resistance group that was formed to resist with arms against an attacker wants the attacker gone ? Silly Hamas. They should have done like Bibi and kept the actual plan quiet in cabinet meetings.
    Hint: armed resistance against an occupier is legal and encouraged under international law.
    >the rockets fired over the years
    Yep. Israel did nothing. Didn't shoot children in the head, didn't regularly murder palestinians in prisons, didn't conduct raids on Palestinian territories or encourage settlers to colonize more. Poor little Israel.
    >the IRCG commanders statements about a co-ordinated attack from Gaza, southern Lebanon and the West Bank
    You regularly bomb another country, and you think that the other country is in the wrong for finding literally any way to make you eat shit ?
    > the abhorrent attack of October 7th
    A regrettable event and a needless loss of life. I'm not fully sure it justifies a retaliation that causes fifty times more death, destruction and horror, nor will the tribunal that will judge you for your crimes against humanity.
    latexr · 1790675748 · focus · HN ↗
    > OP asked why this is being debated.
    I did not. I lamented (it was not a question) that we’re nitpicking (it’s not a debate) the definition, especially when the person in question suggested an alternative which is not defined.
    I do wonder if you’d care about this conversation if you and your family were the ones being killed. If one of those people were in front of you crying for their home and life and asked for your compassion and help in fleeing the genocide, would you turn to them and say “ackchyually, someone on Hacker News said this is merely an ethnic cleansing, you’re on your own”?
    JumpCrisscross · 1790677098 · focus · HN ↗
    > do wonder if you’d care about this conversation if you and your family were the ones being killed
    No. At that point, whether it's a genocide or not is kind of irrelevant. They're being killed. War doesn't need extra bits attached to it to be horrible.
    > would you turn to them and say “ackchyually
    What is this.
    latexr · 1790679599 · focus · HN ↗
    > No. At that point, whether it's a genocide or not is kind of irrelevant. They're being killed. War doesn't need extra bits attached to it to be horrible.
    Right. So what I’m saying is let’s have some empathy and compassion for other people. Let’s focus on how horrible it is and what we can do, the same way we would hope others would do for us if we were the ones in that situation.
    WarmWash · 1790689666 · focus · HN ↗
    At what point does Israel go
    "Ya know what, everybody already has us marked as commiting genocide, so why don't we just actually do it?"
    The civilian population of Palestinians has shrunk ~1% since the war started, despite Israel have the weapons to actually just kill everyone.
    someonebaggy · 1790678526 · focus · HN ↗
    One of the items on this list has only 3000 deaths. Genocide isn't about how many people you succeed in killing.
    customguy · 1790678529 · focus · HN ↗
    Oddly, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnian_genocide" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnian_genocide is not listed?
    I'm not a genocide scholar, so may be way off the mark here, but imagine a language that only has a few 100 native speakers left. There's one person who really hates them, writes in his diary about how he longs for that culture to cease, and then he murders the only remaining historian or language teacher of that group. Is that attempted genocide? A little bit?
    My point isn't "yeah it is" because I don't know, but I'm very certain that I'm still closer to whatever the heart of it is, than sheer "kill volume". We already have a word for massacres and mass murder, and genocide usually comes hand in hand with those and many other crimes, but it's not those crimes.
    well_ackshually · 1790688069 · focus · HN ↗
    .. any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
    (a) Killing members of the group; (check) (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (check) (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (check) (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (check) (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.[8] (check)
    Israel is a genocidal, apartheid state and the biggest threat to the stability of the middle east. Whataboutism will not change facts.
    kyboren · 1790794977 · focus · HN ↗
    Well, Israel certainly doesn't intend to destroy Arabs, Muslims, or brown-skinned people more broadly, and you can't honestly claim "Palestine" is a nation:
    - no defined territory--and certainly none broadly recognized
    - no unique language or ethnicity
    - a culture only distinguished from Egypt and the Levant by their penchant for terrorism
    - a history that only meaningfully diverged from their neighbors within the last half-century, and which divergence springs entirely from their consistent unwillingness to pursue peace with Israel
    So even if Israel had the intent to commit genocide--which, unfortunately[1], they don't--the Arabs in Gaza don't qualify as a distinct group that can be subjected to genocide.
    If Colombia had decided to annihilate the FARC, just kill them all--would that have qualified as a genocide, too? It seems to me they meet at least as many tests for nationhood.
    [1]: See also: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49912637">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49912637
    latexr · 1790680063 · focus · HN ↗
    I will add as a comment—because I can no longer edit the post—that it’s also bonkers how much the upvotes and downvotes are fluctuating on this. I couldn’t care less about the points, but the threshold for a downvote is higher than an upvote so it does show a certain tendency, and it’s disgusting that such a large part of this community values nitpicking of words over empathy and human lives.
    Not that that was in question. HN is, after all, in too large a part a reflection of the greedy US tech industry. It has shown time and again that it’s selfishly OK with human exploitation and supremely susceptible to being manipulated by the right amount of technicality while simultaneously arrogantly believing it is immune to being influenced.
    Some days I’m truly ashamed of this community and find myself incapable of defending it against the mockery and contempt it receives from the rest of the internet.
    hiddencost · 1790675554 · focus · HN ↗
    Bruh it's literally text book.
    skybrian · 1790678185 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    MiroslavPokorny · 1790671385 · focus · HN ↗
    Its called something like collective punishment, something that many cultures practiced around the world.
    engine_y · 1790674384 · focus · HN ↗
    have you seen the extent of tunnels that were there?
    pjc50 · 1790674676 · focus · HN ↗
    No, have you? Is there any independent confirmation of their existence?
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790675571 · focus · HN ↗
    Yes, hamas posted about it?
    hdgvhicv · 1790678322 · focus · HN ↗
    Personally I haven’t. I know my office is gone. I know the hotel I used to stay in (always fun to wake up seeing a gunboat a couple of miles off shore pointing at you out the window) has gone.
    My colleagues have seen these tunnels. At least ore 2023. Israel has denied them entry since then.
    engine_y · 1790687596 · focus · HN ↗
    Tons of pictures and videos were published by both sides.
    ragazzina · 1790677052 · focus · HN ↗
    What do you think of the cultures that practiced it?
    MiroslavPokorny · 1790720212 · focus · HN ↗
    Dont harm the messenger, im just telling you the fact of past humanity.
    newsclues · 1790680958 · focus · HN ↗
    Collective punishment like launching rockets at civilian cities indiscriminately? Collective punishment like kidnapping civilians from music festivals?
    estearum · 1790681181 · focus · HN ↗
    Yes exactly like that.
    "We're no worse than Hamas!" is an interesting argument.
    newsclues · 1790681356 · focus · HN ↗
    So if two sides are doing the same things in an existential struggle, how can you say one sides tactics are deplorable and wrong?
    estearum · 1790681838 · focus · HN ↗
    Because I can say that both sides are deplorable and wrong? In fact, I can even say they're both deplorable and wrong in uneven amounts, but that both meet the bar of "deplorable and wrong."
    You think you have to choose a side between the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel? You think you need to send one of them money?
    tt24 · 1790684317 · focus · HN ↗
    So if we stopped sending money to Israel you’d stop talking about Israel and Gaza forever?
    This idea that people only care about Israel because we support them with our tax dollars is such a joke
    estearum · 1790686688 · focus · HN ↗
    Well I care about it principally because of the degree to which it distorts our politics. The funding is one cause and effect of that distortion but there are others. For example the theological allegiance between US evangelicals and Zionists is a shockingly powerful force.
    But yes the component that morally implicates me personally is the funding.
    expedition32 · 1790682635 · focus · HN ↗
    What if... wait for it... They are both wrong?
    Israel is the great betrayal. In 1948 it was supposed to become a secular country based on European values not a Jewish theocracy. It is dragging us down and for what?
    conception · 1790685580 · focus · HN ↗
    The power imbalance allows one side to exhibit restraint and use more civilized options. These aren’t actors on the same footing. It’s a nuclear power with a multi billion dollar military against some of the poorest people on the planet.
    enaaem · 1790684214 · focus · HN ↗
    Those cultures sound like savages to me
    ascorbic · 1790687560 · focus · HN ↗
    Which is a war crime
    MiroslavPokorny · 1790901366 · focus · HN ↗
    Agreed, im simply telling you why its done.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790673037 · focus · HN ↗
    > How does bulldozing a family home have any affect on a tunnel?
    The tunnel entrances and exits are tremendously hard to find. Some of them were located in private residences.
    But Israel has an oil & gas industry. They have equipment that can look underneath a quiet city. If tunnel elimination were truly the goal, temporarily displacing the population while clearing operations took place should have been sufficient. As it stands, simply bulldozing over the entrances probably doesn't actually destroy the tunnels. It just hides their entrances.
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790675542 · focus · HN ↗
    The problem is that the homes are booby trapped. US would not send soldiers into iraq towns too- one trap - one ambush, and its artillery o clock.
    JumpCrisscross · 1790677030 · focus · HN ↗
    > the homes are booby trapped
    Robots. These things can be cleared. Particularly if the population isn't there.
    mschuster91 · 1790681657 · focus · HN ↗
    > These things can be cleared. Particularly if the population isn't there.
    Not if the trigger is based on detecting body heat. And you can't really clear more than the ground floor either, we don't have bipedal robots yet.
    throwaway173738 · 1790683157 · focus · HN ↗
    There are wheelchairs that can climb stairs. This is a solved problem if you want it to be.
    mschuster91 · 1790695051 · focus · HN ↗
    These things are gimmicks. They work in stairs constructed by code, but are not usable in warzones both in terms of resiliency and speed.
    [deleted] · 1790683490 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    a_paddy · 1790705770 · focus · HN ↗
    How advanced do you think Hamas are? One of their main weapons is the Qassam rocket, a dug up sewer pipe filled with sugar.
    mschuster91 · 1790748503 · focus · HN ↗
    Heat trigger sensors can be had for a few dollars in China these days. As long as you got a decent electrical engineer and a supply chain... you can probably whip up a working prototype in a day or two.
    a_paddy · 1790769960 · focus · HN ↗
    You're right, that's totally doable. However supply chains to that Gaza aren't exactly robust, they can barely get enough food to survive. It's unlikely an AliExpress package full of PIR sensors is going to make it's way through the blockade.
    mschuster91 · 1790786846 · focus · HN ↗
    > However supply chains to that Gaza aren't exactly robust, they can barely get enough food to survive.
    Yeah, but guns absolutely can. Iran is pretty good at supplying Hamas with everything they need to maintain control over the population - you might expect that after three years of absolutely brutal warfare Hamas would be beaten into submission, but clearly they are not.
    wongarsu · 1790681714 · focus · HN ↗
    That's kind of what they did. Just in the most heavy-handed indiscriminate way imaginable. But the booby-traps are cleared, and they did use teleoperated robots to do that
    datsci_est_2015 · 1790686440 · focus · HN ↗
    Furthermore, in a way that’s conveniently equivalent to ethnically cleansing the land.
    YZF · 1790714160 · focus · HN ↗
    Ethnic cleansing and property damage are not the same thing. The claim of ethnic cleansing can't be determined now. I would say with almost complete certainty that Gazans will eventually be allowed to return to a rebuilt Rafah. There is no evidence right now the displacement is permanent. Israel says it will not withdraw until Hamas disarms is where things stand now. So it is saying it will withdraw when Hamas disarms.
    To be clear. There are cases where civilian property damage is a war crime. And we do need to evaluate that. But ethnic cleansing is something else. If there are good military reasons to destroy said property then it's also not a war crime.
    Daishiman · 1790742412 · focus · HN ↗
    > The claim of ethnic cleansing can't be determined now.
    When the members of the biggest coalition in the Knesset say openly and proudly that they are doing ethnic cleansing what exactly are you pretending to defend?
    > There is no evidence right now the displacement is permanent.
    All of the allies of Likud and the settler movement wants Palestinians expelled.
    > Israel says it will not withdraw until Hamas disarms is where things stand now.
    They used to say they would withdraw when the hostages were returned. The goalposts were moved, as is typical.
    > But ethnic cleansing is something else. If there are good military reasons to destroy said property then it's also not a war crime.
    At this point there are literally hundreds of accounts of IDF members who were given told quite explicitly that it was an open field for killing with no consequences.
    kyboren · 1790797255 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    Daishiman · 1790822113 · focus · HN ↗
    > So they're all dead now? Ethnic cleansing complete?
    That's not an argument.
    > Wait, I thought they wanted them murdered in "an open field for killing with no consequences"?
    Who made that argument? They want to take the land and if means killing anyone in it so be it, although some sure do have murderous beliefs but that's besides the point.
    > Then why is it taking so long?
    Ben Gvir is on record as saying that it has to be such that the diplomatic consequences don't affect them. When they go too fast Western governments get public pressure, when it's slow nothing of importance happens.
    Do you really think about these responses when you asked or do you just make knee-jerk questions of the lowest caliber?
    kyboren · 1790824579 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    Daishiman · 1790829015 · focus · HN ↗
    > They've had the capability for decades. So why hasn't it happened?
    The same can be said for any conflict in which one side has overwhelming capacity and does not choose to engage on it for various reasons. But yes, diplomacy and public pressure actually matter a lot, as evidenced by the fact that Israel spends billions of dollars in state propaganda and funding political campaigns in the West to continue to receive military aid and avoiding sanctions.
    You are saying that Israel has shown itself to not be susceptible to international pressure on existential questions yet it engaged for decades in political and diplomatic action to be where it is today; it was not looked at that favorably by Western powers even a few decades backs. And it understands that apartheid South Africa was not on anyone's radar for decades until it was. AIPAC and other lobbying agencies fund hundreds of political campaigns in the US in order for this to happen.
    So yeah, if in five years' time the Democratic Socialists end up overtaking establishment DNC Zionists and get their share of power such that they allow BDS to work and stop military aid then Israel is going to have a much more difficult time, as evidenced by their desire to have the US engage Iran without them participating directly because they are not actually as powerful militarily as they project themselves to be.
    > Sure there might be sanctions, etc. but there will always be someone willing to work with them. And their foreign military sales make sanctions not exactly straightforward for e.g. Germany.
    That works until it doesn't, much like how China did not dominate on renewable energies until it did, or how proprietary Unix dominated the server market until Linux appeared. It takes remarkably little time to turn a country into a pariah state. For the past two decades Germany theorized that economic connections to Russia would prevent them from doing anything stupid regarding Ukraine.
    And Israel does not just have to care about external issues. Economic sanctions hit economies hard, and even a recession is enough to turn the tables against candidates during election years, so given that certain political parties are the ones who hold the cards at any time, they are not keen to lose elections.
    Also Israel depends very much on its network of high-tech companies, companies that are extremely sensitive to any sort of sanctions regime or any loss of trust such that no amount of lobby money suffices to get profitable military or high-tech companies.
    And once Israel is politically and militarily isolated it becomes a much easier target against rivals in the Middle East, so being politically associated with the West is very much a matter of survival. In this sense they have all the time in the world to perform their campaign of ethnic cleansing to restore Eretz Israel.
    None of what I'm saying is speculation, this is very much what political analysts in Israel say and have been saying for decades. The only difference is that now that liberal Zionism is dead and has been dead since the death of Itzak Rabin and the demographic explosion of the settler movement there's really no one to stop them from proceeding with these plans.
    manyaoman · 1790840916 · focus · HN ↗
    > The only difference is that now that liberal Zionism is dead and has been dead since the death of Itzak Rabin and the demographic explosion of the settler movement there's really no one to stop them from proceeding with these plans.
    Also it's a self-reinforcing cycle. The far right keeps testing what they can get away with, becoming increasingly emboldened. The leftists are packing up. Those in the middle see global backlash grow and realize there's no going back to pre-2023 world, so they might as well go all-in with the right. Israel is like a heroin addict using the very thing that's destroying them, in order to cope with the damage it already caused. Without intervention it generally doesn't end well.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790887411 · focus · HN ↗
    > Ethnic cleansing complete?
    Are you seeing the same images we are in the article? Yes, the city has been ethnically cleaned.
    vigilantpuma · 1790747656 · focus · HN ↗
    Sorry, nearly the entire population of these cities has been displaced, their homes all destroyed (not “damaged” but basically completely razed) and you’re saying it’s not ethnic cleansing because Israel says they will withdraw when Hamas disarms (e.g. when pigs fly)?
    Come on.
    estearum · 1790681135 · focus · HN ↗
    Can you link to any documented cases of the US leveling a city after encountering a trap or ambush?
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790683437 · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Basra_(2003)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Basra_(2003)
    themgt · 1790686013 · focus · HN ↗
    I was more opposed to the Iraq war than 99.9% of Americans, and this is just ahistorical bullshit.
    You can go look at Basra right here:
    <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Basrah,+Basra+Governorate,+Iraq/@30.5132736,47.7806886,14224m/" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/maps/place/Basrah,+Basra+Governorate,...
    Over a million people live here. The estimate was that "448 to 593 civilians were killed due to coalition military operations", orders of magnitude less than Israel has killed. Basra was not wiped off the map or seized and annexed by coalition forces while the population was herded into a concentration camp.
    It is simply slander against the US military to suggest they have in the 21st century done anything like what the IDF has done in this genocide.
    myth_drannon · 1790685681 · focus · HN ↗
    Battle of Mosul
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mosul_(2016%E2%80%932017)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mosul_(2016%E2%80%93...
    estearum · 1790694615 · focus · HN ↗
    Huh? The Battle of Mosul was notable for its extremely intense infantry combat.
    myth_drannon · 1790695085 · focus · HN ↗
    There were weeks of airstrikes by the coalition and then artillery barage("Down Barage"). Basically Mosul was leveled before a single soldier entered it.
    estearum · 1790696145 · focus · HN ↗
    Uhh... no.
    Here's historical satellite imagery. Go to 2017-08. You can see Mosul airport and surrounding facilities leveled, immediately adjacent to a city that is obviously a city and not 1) flattened Mosul airport or 2) similar in any way to the Rafah imagery above.
    <a href="https://livingatlas.arcgis.com/wayback/#mapCenter=43.12003%2C36.32159%2C16&mode=explore&active=15084" rel="nofollow">https://livingatlas.arcgis.com/wayback/#mapCenter=43.12003%2...
    myth_drannon · 1790696620 · focus · HN ↗
    here are better ones, with clear complete devastation of large parts of the city:
    NYT - <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/15/world/middleeast/mosul-before-after.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/15/world/middlee...
    and AP drone imagry <a href="https://apimagesblog.com/blog/2017/7/14/mosul-drone-footage-destruction" rel="nofollow">https://apimagesblog.com/blog/2017/7/14/mosul-drone-footage-...
    estearum · 1790697909 · focus · HN ↗
    This is a good rebuttal to the claim that no part of Mosul was struck hard or leveled. But nobody claimed that.
    From your linked AP article:
    "Nearly a third of the Old City [a specific neighborhood] was damaged or destroyed in the final three weeks of bombardment up to July 8, according to a survey by U.N. Habitat using satellite imagery"
    From MSF re Rafah:
    "Over 15 months of all-out war on Gaza have left 92 percent of housing units and about 70 percent of all structures destroyed or damaged."
    So we have 1/3rd of a particularly hard-hit neighborhood destroyed in Mosul versus 70% of the entire city of Rafah.
    <a href="https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/destruction-homes-leaves-palestinians-unable-safely-return-rafah" rel="nofollow">https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/destruction-hom...
    YZF · 1790713947 · focus · HN ↗
    You are comparing different things. You should be comparing the intensive part of the battle in both cases. Mosul vs. Rafah is a great comparison. The total number of civilians were similar. The number of combatants were similar. Rafah is a lot denser. Israel's war results in significantly less civilian casualties. The allies pounded Mosul with its civilian population with heavy bombardments. The criticism of Israel on this is orders of magnitude higher than any criticism levelled at the allies (well basically none). If you look at why did the allies go to war on ISIS there is nothing even borderline comparable to the Oct 7th attack on Israel from Gaza. Something to ponder.
    That Israel kept looking for tunnels and destroying empty buildings for strategic reasons after the battle was over and Rafah was mostly abandoned is not relevant to evaluating the main battle.
    That MSF statement is not specifically about Rafah in your link either. It's about the entire Gaza strip. And just like Rafah a lot of the destruction happened in evacuated areas for tactical reasons, searching for tunnels, preventing guerrilla attacks, dealing with booby traps etc. We can argue about the necessity and legality of those but they are a different kind of discussion vs. the main battle portion.
    estearum · 1790715357 · focus · HN ↗
    Gaza in total had a population of about 2 million people and about 70,000 casualties. Israel's own estimate in 2025 claimed 8,900 of those were combatants.
    Mosul had 1.5 million people at the time of the battle and ~10-20k civilian casualties + ~10-20k combatants.
    Hard to do direct comparisons and all the numbers are obviously squishy, but your claim that Israel's war results in significantly fewer casualties seems... dubious at best.
    And in any case, we actually know for a fact that Israel's non-combatant casualty cut-off value (NCV) -- i.e. their accepted rate in decision-making -- is several multiples higher than the coalition forces were.
    > Peter Gersten, former deputy commander of operations and intelligence for Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve, states that “[w]ith Osama Bin Laden, you’d have an NCV value of 30, but if you had a low-level commander, his NCV was typically zero. We ran zero for the longest time.” U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, when he was head of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) during the war against ISIS, would personally be called to authorize an operation with a “high” NCV of 14 or 15.
    Re the Jabalia Camp attack:
    > Satellite visual analysis of the attack site shows at least five large craters, including two approximately 40 feet wide, consistent with the impact of 2,000-pound Joint Direct Attack Munitions. The attack destroyed not just one residential apartment building, but a whole block.
    > Even without specific further intelligence, on the basis of this information Israel’s CDE must have resulted in a very high estimate for civilian casualties. Given the location, population spread, and choice of weapons, the actual toll of hundreds of civilians killed or wounded would have been a reasonable expectation.
    jibalt · 1790685455 · focus · HN ↗
    The problem is that it's genocide.
    Georgelemental · 1790685974 · focus · HN ↗
    Every single house in the entire city of Rafah was booby-trapped?
    TalkingCodeMonk · 1790687920 · focus · HN ↗
    "It's not a lie, if you believe it" — George Costanza
    WarmWash · 1790688394 · focus · HN ↗
    No, but how do you tell which ones are and which ones aren't?
    Like when packaged food gets potentially contaminated, you don't test each package for bacteria. You throw away the whole lot.
    Georgelemental · 1790689301 · focus · HN ↗
    You kidnap a civilian at gunpoint and force them to trigger the trap. It's called the "Mosquito Protocol", an IDF classic: <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2025-03-30/ty-article-opinion/.premium/in-gaza-almost-every-idf-platoon-keeps-a-human-shield-a-sub-army-of-palestinian-slaves/00000195-e627-deaf-a397-f6674e390000" rel="nofollow">https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2025-03-30/ty-article-opinio...
    Or, if you are not a genocidal terror group, you actually go house-to-house and check. Difficult, dangerous, but not a war crime. That's why Mosul isn't a pile of rubble, even though ISIS was more than willing to use booby traps!
    ---
    "We are demolishing more and more homes, they have nowhere to return. The only obvious result will be the desire of the Gazans to emigrate outside the Strip. Our main problem is in the receiving countries."
    —Benjamin Netanyahu, 2025
    <a href="https://www.maariv.co.il/news/military/article-1195594" rel="nofollow">https://www.maariv.co.il/news/military/article-1195594
    WarmWash · 1790700682 · focus · HN ↗
    Mosul doesn't have a massive network of underground tunnels that use civilian homes as entrances and exits.
    If Hamas cared about Palestinians, they could just use military buildings for that.
    janc_ · 1790733347 · focus · HN ↗
    Hamas doesn't care much about civilians, nobody says otherwise. But that's no legitimation for also murdering civilians.
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790846570 · focus · HN ↗
    Eh, that is exactly what ISIS did in Mosul
    manyaoman · 1790850285 · focus · HN ↗
    Did exactly what?
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790861867 · focus · HN ↗
    Dig tunnels and taking civilians hostage and used them as human shields. Nobody gave a fuck.
    manyaoman · 1790866079 · focus · HN ↗
    True. Hopefully one day brown people will be considered people too.
    hdhjsjja · 1790784420 · focus · HN ↗
    What other option was left for Israel. Muslims all over the world chanting "river to sea" Israel just trying to self preserve. It's better for the world to Jews to win rather than Muslims for obvious reasons
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790689580 · focus · HN ↗
    The problem with Ghaza is, that its the living proof that the peace process never could work. Charon returned it, des-ettlered it, the hippies moved near the border to help, they integrated them into the economy- only to get murdered on the 7th of october.
    Not even egypt allows ghazans in- 10.000 euros for one passport is insane. And all those walls and checkpoints. And egypt is pretty islamist itself, so natural ally to hamas and the like.. but they know had that brush with the mb
    Georgelemental · 1790689820 · focus · HN ↗
    You neglected to mention the decades-long blockade, or Netanyahu doing everything in his power to keep Hamas in charge. A true "peace process" has never been tried. (Well, except by Rabin, so of course they murdered him)
    <a href="https://original.antiwar.com/scott/2023/10/27/netanyahus-support-for-hamas-backfired-2/" rel="nofollow">https://original.antiwar.com/scott/2023/10/27/netanyahus-sup...
    janc_ · 1790732979 · focus · HN ↗
    Part of Hamas' militias fought alongside the Egyptian army against IS & AQ in Egypt, so that's not entirely true.
    What is true is that Egypt doesn't want to take in 2 million poor, underfed, sick, homeless Gazans & have to care for them.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790689806 · focus · HN ↗
    > Like when packaged food gets potentially contaminated, you don't test each package for bacteria.
    You're comparing wiping out tens or hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian people's lives... to disinfection.
    Like yeah, there's plenty of examples of israel's current leaders calling the Palestinian race sub-human, vermin, animal, saying it should be wiped off the earth, etc, but I didn't expect it on HN, JFC.
    WarmWash · 1790698638 · focus · HN ↗
    These homes being bulldozed are empty.
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790709752 · focus · HN ↗
    my dude, you just compared the ethnic cleansing of Palestine to getting rid of contaminating pathogens, and were called out on it, and you're gonna try to change the subject like you aren't walking around with freshly-crapped pants?
    why should anyone continue to discuss this topic with you, when you're basically just channeling german dictators at this point?
    WarmWash · 1790716928 · focus · HN ↗
    If you check the parent for this thread, the conversation is about Israel use of bulldozers to flatten Rafah, and the reason they do it is the same reason you toss any possible contaminated food. It's impractical to check a bunch of empty buildings for booby traps. Rafah was evacuated about a year and a half ago.
    Here is a link to the conversation topic to help clear your confusion:
    <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49890287#49898968">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49890287#49898968
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790725606 · focus · HN ↗
    Again, you're comparing the ethnic cleansing of an entire city to "tossing possibly contaminated food".
    Take a step back and see the echoes of your words in history.
    > It's impractical to check a bunch of empty buildings for booby traps
    That's life. That you might find it hard to achieve your military conquest without engaging in ethnic cleansing isn't a legal or moral excuse for perpetrating ethnic cleansing. Find a way that doesn't require ethnic cleansing or pick more realistic military objectives.
    > Rafah was evacuated about a year and a half ago.
    A forced expulsion of all existing inhabitants of a city without any right of return is commonly called "ethnic cleansing". So is razing the city. It's called that because it is cleansing the city of all people and/or traces of an ethnicity, like israel did here. Both constitute crimes against humanity, regardless of the excuse (the nazis had excuses for their similar crimes too, look how that went for them).
    21asdffdsa12 · 1790776239 · focus · HN ↗
    Man, i cant wait for qatar to run out of money and send these bots back to McDonalds.
    flyinglizard · 1790688408 · focus · HN ↗
    How do you know which ones are booby trapped?
    ImPostingOnHN · 1790693312 · focus · HN ↗
    They didn't claim to. They are responding to a claim that all the houses were demolished because they all contained booby traps, because "might contain booby traps" is obviously a legally and morally insufficient justification for demolishing every home in the city and cleansing it of the previous inhabitant race. Your home might contain booby traps, too.
    Gibbon1 · 1790677376 · focus · HN ↗
    There isn't any requirement at all to preserve civilian infrastructure being used to military purposes by the other side. If you are using it to hide a tunnel and booby trap it, the enemy can and in every case destroy it rather than risk their own troops.
    Take a look see of what's happening to peoples houses in Ukraine.
    abirch · 1790678182 · focus · HN ↗
    It’s frustrating when people use civilians as pawns.
    jibalt · 1790685555 · focus · HN ↗
    It's frustrating when people rationalize genocide.
    Gibbon1 · 1790705771 · focus · HN ↗
    It's demoralizing when people idolize Hamas committing crimes against humanity and starting wars.
    jibalt · 1790754038 · focus · HN ↗
    > It's demoralizing when people idolize Hamas committing crimes against humanity and starting wars.
    It's sickening when people blatantly lie like that ... especially in the service of rationalizing genocide.
    Gibbon1 · 1790974862 · focus · HN ↗
    What sicking is people like you throwing the word genocide around not because you have any argument that supports that but because it justifies what you've already decided you want to do to Jews.
    jibalt · 1790977014 · focus · HN ↗
    Every expert on genocide says it's a genocide, so claiming that I'm throwing it around with no argument is a lie ... in the service of genocide. And I'm Jewish ... there's nothing that I want to "do to Jews", but I would like the state of Israel to stop committing genocide. The fact is that the people who respond the way Gibbon responded hate Palestinians ... it's about what they want to do to them.
    IX-103 · 1790681216 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
    erkt · 1790688774 · focus · HN ↗
    The words you are looking for are combatants. How does bulldozing a combatants home have any affect on a tunnel? Because it destroys the entrance to the tunnel. There are no innocents in Gaza.
    erxam · 1790695369 · focus · HN ↗
    > There are no innocents in Gaza.
    This is true. Their crime is not having been born a Jew. According to the Torah, the Talmud and the Talakha, shkotzim and shiksim like us must be slaughtered as is the right and the duty of the Chosen Ones to honor G-d.
    vigilantpuma · 1790747875 · focus · HN ↗
    “ There are no innocents in Gaza.” funny, this is exactly what people said to defend what Hamas did on October 7th.
    The babies and young children in Gaza are as innocent as they are everywhere else in the world. If you can’t see that, you should reexamine the lens you use to look at the world, it’s distorting things massively.
  2. 4gotunameagain · 1790668528 · focus · HN ↗
    An alternative to levelling entire cities to the ground to find tunnels, would be to stop the expanding of the settlers, stop the apartheid within Israel, stop the blockade and starving on Gaza, and try to actually foster peace instead of constant conflict, pain and misery in order to retain power.
    This is despicable, inhumane. It is generational trauma that started with the Nazis, now propagated to the poor souls around the new western colony of Israel.
    cess11 · 1790671185 · focus · HN ↗
    No, it predates the nazis. Zionist terrorism and genocidal actions in Palestine started earlier.
    [deleted] · 1790678592 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    usumgallu · 1790682626 · focus · HN ↗
    Indeed. I'll never forget setting out to find out the origins of terrorism thinking it was Iranian, and finding out it was mostly British and Zionist... and I worked in anti-terrorism and hadn't been taught much of that history...
    fangspire · 1790674177 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    jameshilliard · 1790724575 · focus · HN ↗
    > An alternative to levelling entire cities to the ground to find tunnels, would be to stop the expanding of the settlers, stop the apartheid within Israel, stop the blockade and starving on Gaza, and try to actually foster peace instead of constant conflict, pain and misery in order to retain power.
    Israel left Gaza back in 2005 after forcibly expelling all Jews and only later on only blockaded Gaza due to weapons being smuggled in, so they tried that and it clearly didn't work. It seems unilateral disengagement is simply not a strategy that can be succesful here.
    4gotunameagain · 1790748497 · focus · HN ↗
    This is such a spin. A 20 year blockade (and allowing Qatar to fund Hamas) leading to the Oct. 7 attack - the justification - for the ongoing atrocities, framed as "unilateral disengagement" that was not successful. Therefore it is the Palestinian's at fault.
    It is clear that Israel is the source of violence. Which makes sense, as it is a new Western colony occupying (and constantly expanding) land where people lived for thousands of years, under the justification THAT IT'S IN THE BIBLE.
    A religious fundamentalist colony, funded and armed by the west.
    It is unjustifiable. It is vile.
    rantoniol · 1790751808 · focus · HN ↗
    > A 20 year blockade (and allowing Qatar to fund Hamas)
    The blockade only started after Hamas was elected into power, to reduce their access to more missiles and weapons. The money from Qatar was still allowed in for humanitarian reasons. But no matter what Israel does it is accused of being evil - both allowing the money through and blocking it would be considered wrong by the haters.
    > a new Western colony occupying (and constantly expanding) land
    The total land under control by Israel has shrunk by more than 50% over the past 50 years (with the return of Sinai to Egypt in exchange for peace).
    Millions of Arabs have migrated to the West, but only when Jews migrate East are they “vile colonizers”.
    4gotunameagain · 1790761819 · focus · HN ↗
    > The blockade only started after Hamas was elected into power
    Israel has been restricting Gaza's economic viability since the 90s, much before the official blockade.
    > The money from Qatar was still allowed in for humanitarian reasons
    Is this a joke ? The humanitarian Israel that does not let international flotillas with aid reach Gaza ? Or the humanitarian Israel that kills children ?
    > The total land under control by Israel has shrunk by more than 50% over the past 50 years
    The spin of the century. They gave back uninhabitable desert, while continuing expansion all over Palestine.
    > Millions of Arabs have migrated to the West, but only when Jews migrate East are they “vile colonizers”.
    Firstly, it has nothing to do with religion. Secondly, migration is quite different than a formation of a military state that constantly occupies land and expands, attacking its neighbours that has been there for millennia.
    You are spewing propaganda.
    rantoniol · 1790764278 · focus · HN ↗
    > Is this a joke ?
    Israel is currently allowing in thousands of truckloads carrying 35,000 metric tons of aid per month, according to the UN: <a href="https://www.un.org/unispal/document/ocha-newsitem-7aug26/" rel="nofollow">https://www.un.org/unispal/document/ocha-newsitem-7aug26/
    What they blocked was a sailboat carrying a bag of oranges and anti-Israel activists trying to carry out a media stunt for attention and virtue-signalling.
    You obviously have an agenda here and are being disingenuous. I will disengage and leave you spewing your lies.
    [deleted] · 1790766746 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    4gotunameagain · 1790766920 · focus · HN ↗
    35000 tons of aid, 60% percent of it food. So.. 10kg of food per person, per month.
    How noble and humanitarian of the state of Israel.
    Please do disengage, you refuted none of my statements while continuing to spread propaganda from your 3 hour old account.
    jameshilliard · 1790799200 · focus · HN ↗
    > 35000 tons of aid, 60% percent of it food. So.. 10kg of food per person, per month.
    That's for UN 2720 Mechanism aid AFAIU, for totals I think you need to look at COGAT data which shows much higher numbers for total food aid.
    4gotunameagain · 1790857852 · focus · HN ↗
    COGAT is an Israeli military unit.
    Trusting their statements is like trusting the statements of the Nazis during the previous genocide.
    jameshilliard · 1790874649 · focus · HN ↗
    > COGAT is an Israeli military unit.
    That doesn't mean the data is unreliable.
    > Trusting their statements is like trusting the statements of the Nazis during the previous genocide.
    Comparing Israeli's to Nazi's is a common antisemitic trope.
    manyaoman · 1790880704 · focus · HN ↗
    > Comparing Israeli's to Nazi's is a common antisemitic trope.
    That doesn't mean the comparison is inaccurate.
    dang · 1790900525 · focus · HN ↗
    We've banned this account because it has been using HN exclusively for political/national/etc. battle for many months. That's not allowed here, regardless of what you're for or against.
    If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html">https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
    4gotunameagain · 1790956762 · focus · HN ↗
    What about that jameshilliard guy that has tens of flagged dead comments about Israel ?
    jameshilliard · 1790967590 · focus · HN ↗
    > What about that jameshilliard guy that has tens of flagged dead comments about Israel ?
    I think overall most of my comments are positive. Some people seem to flag comments as a way of disagreeing I guess.
    > Since 2024, 99% of his comments are political and about Israel.
    I don't think that's really an accurate characterization, it's certainly not 99%, are comments correcting factual inaccuracies/misinformation in threads related to Israel considered political just because the surrounding topic is politically contentious?
    Most of my comments on threads involving Israel are me just correcting some of the more obvious misinformation/conspiracy theories and/or trying to provide more factual background context/nuance to the discussions. I try not to push a specific political agenda/ideology for the most part. It's not like I'm trying to start political/ideological discussions either, there just seems to be more factual misinformation around topics involving Israel and that happens to be something where I know a lot of the history.
    dang · 1790977414 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't feel comfortable with "what about that X guy" responses to moderation comments, but in fairness the GP has a point: your account has overwhelmingly been posting in political flamewars for quite some time, and that's not allowed here.
    I had to go back 79 days and what felt like hundreds of posts to find any exception (something about heat pumps I think!), but then scrolling further back just led through reams more of the same. That means your account is definitely on the wrong side of the "primarily" test (<a href="https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0&query=primarily%20test%20by:dang" rel="nofollow">https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...)
    To say that you're simply correcting inaccuracies and misinformation doesn't really work because the question of what counts as accurate vs. misinformation is hotly disputed. It is basically the entirety of the battle.
    On the other hand, your comments have mostly (though not entirely) been avoiding the more degraded forms of guidelines breakage that people resort to in these threads - things like snark, name-calling, and from there into personal attacks, slurs, and so on. That's good, but it's not enough—if you want to keep posting on HN we need you not to use the site primarily for political battle (broadly construed).
    [editing - bear with me...]
    jameshilliard · 1790987490 · focus · HN ↗
    > I had to go back 79 days and what felt like hundreds of posts to find any exception (something about heat pumps I think!), but then scrolling further back just led through reams more of the same.
    I went and checked myself and it's not exactly quite that bad, I quite regularly comment on posts unrelated to Israel/politics, these are comments of mine newer than 79 days that seem entirely unrelated for example: 7 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49846584">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49846584 19 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49687187">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49687187 28 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49569325">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49569325 52 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49252558">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49252558 59 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49163184">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49163184 59 days ago: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49163014">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49163014 79 days ago(the supposedly non-political one you found about heat pumps is quite ironically titled "The politics of air conditioning in Switzerland"): <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48915330">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48915330
    > To say that you're simply correcting inaccuracies and misinformation doesn't really work because the question of what counts as accurate vs. misinformation is hotly disputed. It is basically the entirety of the battle.
    I think it's more complex than that, for example in this thread I was pointing out that one shouldn't use UN aid delivery data to justify that sufficient aid is reaching Gaza, because UN aid data doesn't support that conclusion by itself, I then pointed out what data does support the conclusion that sufficient aid is being delivered. So I think there are cases where it's entirely possible to correct misinformation without even challenging the conclusion.:
    <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49879645#49906915">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49879645#49906915
    > On the other hand, your comments have mostly (though not entirely) been avoiding the more degraded forms of guidelines breakage that people resort to in these threads - things like snark, name-calling, and from there into personal attacks, slurs, and so on.
    Yeah, I try and avoid that in general.
    > That's good, but it's not enough—if you want to keep posting on HN we need you not to use the site primarily for political battle (broadly construed).
    I guess the main issue is that I tend to get more replies to my comments in Israel related threads and I get drawn in responding back if I think there's more to be said on the topic, most of my Israel related comments(in terms of absolute numbers) seem be from these super deep back and forth threads and not top level comments.
    4gotunameagain · 1791010142 · focus · HN ↗
    This is definitely a double standard.
    If you looked at the comments of the banned account that were older than a year ago, they were not political.
    While jameshilliard has hundreds of comments almost entirely on the topic for the past two years, with a huge number of them flagged/dead.
    It is clear to see what is going on.
    dang · 1791051547 · focus · HN ↗
    Ok, if I look back far enough then indeed there are comments like <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43934794">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43934794 which match your description, so I take your point and have unbanned that account.
    manyaoman · 1791063745 · focus · HN ↗
    Thank you for the unban! I'll behave.
    @4gotunameagain Really appreciate standing up for me, thanks.
    4gotunameagain · 1790956710 · focus · HN ↗
    > That doesn't mean the data is unreliable.
    No but it is like taking Russia's word for how many troops they lost.
    > Comparing Israeli's to Nazi's is a common antisemitic trope.
    How is comparing a state that is conducting a genocide to another group that did so too against the Jewish people ?
    jameshilliard · 1790963517 · focus · HN ↗
    > No but it is like taking Russia's word for how many troops they lost.
    Russia mostly just doesn't publish those figures at all last I checked. OSINT researchers however following the Russia/Ukraine war will typically use data from Russian, Ukrainian and independent sources where available however so it also wouldn't be advisable to completely ignore the Russian data either. Even extremely biased/limited data can sometimes be used to identify trends, at least for cases where the bias factor tends to be consistent.
    Israel also isn't a dictatorship and has what most would consider to be a relatively free press that is not afraid to criticize the government(i.e. Haaretz) so it would be rather difficult for Israel to deliberately publish outright fabricated data on a large scale without getting caught doing so.
    I'm also not saying you should blindly trust any specific sources, however much of the COGAT data can also be corroborated via independent sources such as satellite imagery.
    Keep in mind it's also not the case that the UN data meaningfully contradicts the COGAT data either, it's entirely possible for both to be reasonably accurate. In general I would say both COGAT and UN data are both likely reasonably accurate once factoring in the published limitations on that data.
    The reason the numbers are different is simply because they are measuring different things. In the case of COGAT they generally measure total aid going through border crossings while the UN measures aid reaching only a subset of distributions points within Gaza.
    So if you want to estimate per capita food aid going into Gaza you would want to use the COGAT figures since that data is collected at all border crossings and can be used to get a rough per capita figure on aid entering Gaza. On the other hand if you want to measure something like aid reaching UN system aid distribution points within Gaza then you would want to use the UN data.
    Attempting to use UN data to calculate per capita food aid going into Gaza would clearly be wrong as the UN's own published data collection methodology clearly shows they are not measuring total aid entering Gaza.
    The UN often seems to publish reports analyzing their own data while clearly failing factor in their own published data limitations into their calculations which results in inaccurate conclusions in their analysis. Usually these sort of analysis mistakes are very obvious as the UN generally publishes the math behind their calculations.
    You shouldn't blindly discard data simply because you think the source might be biased in one direction, rather you should try to understand the limitations of the data and corroborate it against secondary sources where possibly while also trying to factor in bias where feasible.
    Essentially it's not the raw data where there is disagreement, it's the various interpretations of what the data actually means.
    > How is comparing a state that is conducting a genocide to another group that did so too against the Jewish people ?
    A war is not the same thing as a genocide. The Jews did not start a war with the Nazi's. Hamas started a war with Israel with openly genocidal goals, Hamas simply did not have the military capability to accomplish their genocidal goals.
    manyaoman · 1790768430 · focus · HN ↗
    It's okay to have an agenda, just be honest about it please. Anti-Zionists tend to be pretty open about their agenda: opposing colonialism, ethno-states, genocide etc. It's telling that modern Zionists often seem less willing to express theirs.
    grewady · 1790773816 · focus · HN ↗
    You don’t call it colonialism when it’s Muslims migrating en masse to Europe, you don’t oppose ethno-states when they are Arab states that have cleansed all their Jews, and you don’t give a shit about actual genocides.
    4gotunameagain · 1790775486 · focus · HN ↗
    We don't call migration colonialism indeed, that's because they are fundamentally different concepts.
    And guess what ? Someone can be both against unconstrained migration, colonialism, zionism and apartheid states.
    Weak hasbara, try with a new throwaway account
    manyaoman · 1790776464 · focus · HN ↗
    > You don’t call it colonialism when it’s Muslims migrating en masse to Europe
    Mass migration generally does more harm than good and should be reserved for very exceptional cases like natural disasters.
    > you don’t oppose ethno-states when they are Arab states that have cleansed all their Jews
    Such as Saudi Arabia? Seeing it fall apart is my favorite thing about 2026 lmao.
    > and you don’t give a shit about actual genocides.
    I do but it makes sense to focus especially on the one being carried out with my tax money.
    jameshilliard · 1790799135 · focus · HN ↗
    > Israel is currently allowing in thousands of truckloads carrying 35,000 metric tons of aid per month, according to the UN: <a href="https://www.un.org/unispal/document/ocha-newsitem-7aug26/" rel="nofollow">https://www.un.org/unispal/document/ocha-newsitem-7aug26/
    You have to be very careful when looking at this sort of data, from my understanding UN data only tracks UN 2720 Mechanism aid deliveries. I think you need to look at COGAT data to see total aid deliveries as there are non-UN aid deliveries as well that won't show up in the UN data.
    4gotunameagain · 1790857741 · focus · HN ↗
    An Israeli military unit (COGAT) is not a trustworthy source of data for the aid they provide to an area they are actively blockading and starving.
    This is a genocide, and you are complicit through your online hasbara.
    jameshilliard · 1790874527 · focus · HN ↗
    > An Israeli military unit (COGAT) is not a trustworthy source of data for the aid they provide to an area they are actively blockading and starving.
    From my understanding no organization other than COGAT even has the ability to track the total aid deliveries, there is no evidence of mass starvation or that COGAT data is unreliable from what I've seen.
  3. myth_drannon · 1790686610 · focus · HN ↗
    Not only tunnels. Almost every house was rigged with explosives, like what happened in Gaza city, entire neighborhoods would explode once the troops arrive. If not rigged then it would be a stash of weapons somewhere in the house or under, you are not going to spend days on each house that is potentially rigged looking for a needle in a haystack. Unfortunately the worst for Gaza will come after the Israeli elections. Israel has 2 years of politically favorable US president to clear out Gaza City once and for all to correct the mistake of 2005 withdrawal.
    Ar-Curunir · 1790688576 · focus · HN ↗
    Begone foul genocide apologist.
5. pietervdvn · 1790679880 · focus · HN ↗
  This wasn't done with strikes, but with (remote controlled) bulldozers. <a href="https://idfclub.org/remote-controlled-warfare-how-israels-robotic-bulldozers-are-shaping-the-future-of-combat/" rel="nofollow">https://idfclub.org/remote-controlled-warfare-how-israels-ro...
  1. tyromaniac · 1790685407 · focus · HN ↗
    Wow. So the next Rachel Corinne will be killed by a robot.
6. mda · 1790684906 · focus · HN ↗
  Prolonged "surgical" strikes continued so long that there is almost nothing left to operate on I guess. And your justification is that some farms are not completely destroyed? What a disingenuous remark.
7. skinkestek · 1790686190 · focus · HN ↗
  Look to Ukraine.
  Every structure is eventually flattened.
  The only difference is that Gaza, unlike Ukraine
  - first had the option not to attack
  - secondly had an option to accept a ceasefire and not immediately violate it 15 minutes later by firing barrages of unguided rockets into civilian neighborhoods
  - had the option to actually respect the ceasefires and exchange hostages as scheduled
  Gaza is being flattened because that is the only way Israel has to make sure this won't happen again. This is not unusual. Same situation as when the allies flattened nazi Germany.
  But this time we are absolutely somewhat responsible because we reward hamas every time they do insane things that makes sure civilians get hurt.
  If the understanding in media and among thought leaders back in 1945 were at todays levels we would have had people crying about the "genocide against the Germans"[1] and how the allies were the actual bad guys and we would still have a small nazi country in the middle of what is Germany today.
  [1]: I mean seriously, at least 350 000 civilian ethnic Germans died in the war compared to well under 10 000 civilian Americans - and well under 2000 if we exclude sailors, so the numbers are very comparable
  1. Traster · 1790686536 · focus · HN ↗
    What is your expectation of how the civilian population of Gaza are meant to live after this? You can repeat your propaganda all you like, but what is the actual outcome you expect from this? In five years time, is this land occupied? By the same population that was displaced, or by Israelis? Or by no one?
    skinkestek · 1790935520 · focus · HN ↗
    The ideal situation would be something like after WW2:
    - large international combined army occupies the entirety of Gaza
    - every hamas official gets arrested
    - trials in Hague (or somewhere else) where we separate between who was just party members, who tried to reduce the evil and who were the masterminds behind the worst parts of it. Some go free, some get a few years and some get life without parole
    - international military administration until they are ready for normal elections. In Germany that took 9 years
    - lots and lots and lots of campaigns to make them understand that they are not the victims (Germans also thought they were the victims until 1945 and beyond and it took effort to fix that)
    - keep a close eye on them for the next 50 - 60 years
    Will it happen?
    Of course not. But it would be the absolute best outcome for civilians on Gaza.
    Why won't it happen? Because half of the world think that the Gazans are the victims because more Gazans have died than Israelis lately. Imagine if we taught WW2 that way: "Germans were mostly innocent victims, over 350 000 absolutely innocent Germans died vs under 10 000 US civilians, wHiCh mEaNs WW2 wAs a aCsHuAlLy a gEn0cIdE aGa1nSt tHe GeRmAn pEoPlE".
  2. Georgelemental · 1790687344 · focus · HN ↗
    Ukraine looks nothing like this
    skinkestek · 1790935827 · focus · HN ↗
    Tell me you know nothing about the war in Ukraine without telling me?
    Please look up Mariupol, Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Soledar, Toretsk, Vugledar and Volnovakha. Those are just from Donetsk oblast.
    And if you go beyond just the buildings it gets a lot uglier.
  3. estearum · 1790694439 · focus · HN ↗
    After the Allies flattened Nazi Germany (and Japan), civilized peoples looked at what they had done and said "wow we need to agree that this never happens again."
    It's always funny hearing these defenses of Israel or Hamas which resolve to "hey what can you expect, they have the moral intuitions of cavepeople!"
    skinkestek · 1790935991 · focus · HN ↗
    Well, now we have let it happen again, the facists of Gaza has attacked israel for 20 years while we looked the other way and finally, after their old provocations (or should I just write terrorist attacks?) stopped working (after Iron Dome and better border controls) they did the the unspeakable things in 2023.
    So the question is now: will we let it continue?
    estearum · 1790942385 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't think equating the Jews of 1920s/30s Europe to the modern state of Israel is making the argument you want to make.
    estearum · 1790943004 · focus · HN ↗
    When was the "looking the other way" happening?
    The region has been locked in tit-for-tat since (at least) Israel broke the initial colonial independence process.
    There was never any intention whatsoever from the Israeli side to live in peace with its neighbors. I'm not sure it's incumbent upon the existing residents of an area to welcome someone who quite clearly intends to take all of your land.
    Ben-Gurion wrote this to his son a year before Israel was created:
    > A Jewish state in part of Palestine is not an end, but a beginning... We shall bring into the state all the Jews it is possible to bring... then we shall expand to the whole country... We will break through the borders imposed on us...
    Note that he refers to this being a state created in Palestine. He refers to bringing people from elsewhere into this state.
    No symapthy from me. Both sides are sufficiently horrible and indefensible to be simply horrible and indefensible.
    skinkestek · 1791020239 · focus · HN ↗
    > When was the "looking the other way" happening?
    Maybe you didn't.
    Just point me to a few points in the past where you have been trying to get attention to how hamas has been shelling civilian areas in Israel, or where you have tried bring attention to Gazans abusing the ambulances (that had free pass through the border) to smuggle in explosives to bomb buses or cafes.
    Or maybe you were one of the very few who were outraged when Palestinian Arabs celebrated in March 2011, when Hakim Awad and Amjad Awad infiltrated the West Bank settlement of Itamar and murdered five members of the Fogel family in their home, including a mother, father, and three children (aged 11, 4, and an infant)?
    Or any of many other times they slit the throat of an elderly unarmed person, bashed in the head of a toddler, stabbed a mother in front of her kids?
    Or maybe you have expressed your outrage to the 9 major bomb attacks between 2006 (when Israel left Gaza) and 2022? Or the hundreds of smaller attacks using "only" pipe bombs?
    But most of the worlds was busily looking the other way.
    And I have a sneaking suspicion you absolutely were not aware of this.
    > There was never any intention whatsoever from the Israeli side to live in peace with its neighbors. I'm not sure it's incumbent upon the existing residents of an area to welcome someone who quite clearly intends to take all of your land.
    Israel has traded land for peace every time they got a chance. Just ask Egypt.
    You can also check with Syria who got offered the Golan heights back but refused because there was one clause: Syria would have to agree to a peace deal.
    > A Jewish state in part of Palestine is not an end, but a beginning... We shall bring into the state all the Jews it is possible to bring... then we shall expand to the whole country... We will break through the borders imposed on us...
    That was his opinion. Reading that quote and not checking what actually happened and also reading that quote without reading all the much worse quotes by Palestinian Arab (and other Arab) leaders is almost disingenious.
    > Note that he refers to this being a state created in Palestine.
    I don't dispute Palestine existing.
    That would be as stupid as denying Scandinavia.
    What I would like to point out though is that calling Palestinian Arabs "Palestinians" while calling Israelis "Jews" would be equally stupid to calling Swedes Scandinavians and Norwegians just Norwegians and argue that since Norway was once ruled by Sweden we don't really exist and must be expelled because "Scandinavia for Scandinavians".
    If you look you will find that until 1948 Palestinians meant everyone living in Palestine and until the 60ies and 70ies Palestinian Arabs often refused being called Palestinians as they saw themselves as south Syrians, Jordanians or just Arabs.
    Look closer at anything people present as proof of Palestine existing as a country and you find contradictions:
    Palestinian stamps have Hebrew (~ Israeli) text. Same goes for Palestinian coins.
    Palestinian passports has a field telling if it is a Druze, a Jew, a Muslim etc.
    Palestinian Airlines? Owned and operated by Jews.
    List goes on.
    > Both sides are sufficiently horrible and indefensible to be simply horrible and indefensible.
    One side celebrates murder and death, has death penalty, throws gays from rooftops, no womens rights.
    The other is a modern democracy where everyone has the same rights (ok, Israeli Arabs ("Israeli Palestinians") and Ultra Orthodox Jews both have the same extra right to only serve in the IDF if they want.)
    One side has systematically ethnically cleansed the other sides (no known Jews in Gaza, Christian population in Bethlehem down by 66%) while the other side has a large Arab minority well represented at every level of the legal system and in the parliament.
    But sure, both sides are equally bad, right?
    estearum · 1791031422 · focus · HN ↗
    You should consider reading the words in front of you instead of responding to imaginary points.
    I’m not sure which part of Ben-Gurion’s strategy and the Zionist mission overall you think is disproven by “they’ve exchanged land for peace.” Obviously the Arabs have also conceded land for peace many many times, and that doesn’t disprove their desire for Israel’s eventual dissolution.
    The question is whether they intend and continue to work toward taking over the entire region. Ben-Gurion’s own letter discusses that there will be setbacks and periods of reverse progress and so on. I’m sure Arab leaders have their followers similar assurances any time they gave up land for peace.
    It’s strange to dismiss the literal founder of Israel’s opinion and declared strategy as “just an opinion” as if it’s some guy on Reddit.
    Can you link me to any quotes from Arab leaders where they discuss putting a country on top of another person’s country and gradually expanding it? I am genuinely curious, though I can tell you upfront my reaction will be the same: that person is a piece of shit and their project is morally flawed.
    Can you say the same of Ben-Gurion and his project? I suspect you are the one with the double standard here. But find me some analogous quotes first and we can test the theory.
    Not sure what the relevance of your entire Scandinavia/Palestine/Jew sidebar is. Feel free to clarify if you’d like a direct response to it. It seems like you’re providing evidence that Palestine was in fact a state (with passports) that included Jews, Arabs, and more. Which obviously emphasizes the evil in Ben-Gurion’s desire to make the entire area a wholly Jewish state, doesn’t it?
    And finally back to the point of actually reading the words in front of you: can you tell me where I said they are equally bad? You cannot, because I didn’t say that. I said they are both sufficiently bad to be unworthy of my respect and support.
    You don’t need to support the Sinaloa Cartel in their rivalry with Jalisco New Generation Cartel just because Sinaloa is less bad than CJNG. I don’t need to support Israel just because Hamas is a bunch of murderous cavemen.
    Since you believe that it’s some moral failure not to pick a side in the Hamas/Israel situation, I implore you to pick a side and begin sending checks (since taxes won’t get directed there) to your preferred cartel. If you’re unwilling to do that, you are probably racist and you clearly have been brainwashed by the racist conspiracy against [Sinaloans or Jaliscoans].
    Let me know which side you’ve issued your check to.
8. KKKKkkkk1 · 1790690234 · focus · HN ↗
  > If the destruction of civilian dwellings was purely an accident
  Why would it be accidental? Are you lobotomized? That's where the fighting was happening.
9. jameshilliard · 1790719132 · focus · HN ↗
  > Its really telling to see the destruction limited to where the structures used to be rather than to all of the surrounding green spaces. If the destruction of civilian dwellings was purely an accident you'd expect to see the destruction spread evenly over the area. Instead it looks much more like a prolonged set of surgical strikes to destroy the buildings while preserving as much of the surrounding areas as possible.
  The targets(Hamas infrastructure) are located underneath and within civilian structures(which is a war crime). So it's quite obvious why these structures get destroyed when the military infrastructure of Hamas is targeted. This tactic is part of the Hamas strategy.
10. kyboren · 1790791947 · focus · HN ↗
  [delayed]
Leonard_of_Q · 1790616838 · focus · HN ↗
[dead]
1. lotadicarus · 1790616970 · focus · HN ↗
  this is not war, it is genocide
  1. bjork · 1790617242 · focus · HN ↗
    It’s not genocide in any way, shape or form. Please use other sources than TikTok.
    lotadicarus · 1790617561 · focus · HN ↗
    try using a source other than the Israeli government: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_humanitarian_and_human_rights_groups_accusing_Israel_of_genocide_in_Gaza" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_humanitarian_and_human...
    Leonard_of_Q · 1790617964 · focus · HN ↗
    Try using another source than Wikipedia which is edited by "interested groups" and as such not a reliable source for contentious issues like this one.
    lotadicarus · 1790618376 · focus · HN ↗
    good thing there's 100+ cited sources in that article
    Leonard_of_Q · 1790618878 · focus · HN ↗
    I'll take your 100+ sources and raise you 200+ sources:
    <a href="https://wikiislam.net/wiki/List_of_Genocides,_Cultural_Genocides_and_Ethnic_Cleansings_under_Islam" rel="nofollow">https://wikiislam.net/wiki/List_of_Genocides,_Cultural_Genoc...
    Does that make this link twice as truthful as the one you sent?
    iaaan · 1790619672 · focus · HN ↗
    What, succinctly, is your point? You first claimed that this was not a genocide, then posted a link to a list of other genocides. Are you saying that none of the genocides in your list happened? Or that they are miscategorized?
    Leonard_of_Q · 1790621482 · focus · HN ↗
    My point is that wikis are not reliable sources no matter how many sources they link to. You'd have to check all the other sources to verify their veracity and that only gets harder the more sources are linked.
    constantius · 1790627516 · focus · HN ↗
    Lazy dismissal ,but then again, you don't really have a leg to stand on to defend your point.
    You don't have to check all the links mate, just check a few for the organisations or institutionsnyou know. Unless you think they're all Hamas, of course.
    Leonard_of_Q · 1790710669 · focus · HN ↗
    Which of these organizations should I trust on their word? Give me 5 of them and I'll see if I feel like I can trust them. As to them "all being Hamas", well, who knows. The Swedish television special reporter from that region is so it isn't unheard of. It is not as if it is possible for anyone to just barge in there and report anything he sees, interview anyone he wants and visit any place he cares.
    sjoedev · 1790619557 · focus · HN ↗
    I don’t use TikTok, but I’ll chip in and cite the United Nations [1], the International Association of Genocide Scholars [2], Physicians for Human Rights-Israel [3], Amnesty International [4], Human Rights Watch [5], and Doctors Without Borders [6] to get started.
    While the genocide case brought against Israel hasn't concluded as of now, to say there's no reason to believe this is genocide is incorrect.
    If you’d like to share some sources (rather than only telling others to), maybe we can compare.
    [1] <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/09/israel-has-committed-genocide-gaza-strip-un-commission-finds" rel="nofollow">https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/09/israel-has-c...
    [2] <a href="https://genocidescholars.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/IAGS-Resolution-on-Gaza-FINAL.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://genocidescholars.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/IAGS...
    [3] <a href="https://www.phr.org.il/en/genocide-in-gaza-eng/" rel="nofollow">https://www.phr.org.il/en/genocide-in-gaza-eng/
    [4] <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/12/amnesty-international-concludes-israel-is-committing-genocide-against-palestinians-in-gaza/" rel="nofollow">https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/12/amnesty-inter...
    [5] <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/12/19/israels-crime-extermination-acts-genocide-gaza" rel="nofollow">https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/12/19/israels-crime-exterminat...
    [6] <a href="https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/our-response-israel-gaza-war" rel="nofollow">https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/our-response-is...
    mittensc · 1790619797 · focus · HN ↗
    Imagine this was Jerusalem
    would you say the same?
  2. Leonard_of_Q · 1790618693 · focus · HN ↗
    It is war and why did you feel the need to create an account just to repeat this false claim? The term "genocide" can now be added to the list of terms which have lost they meaning like racist, nazi, fascist, white supremacist and all those other labels which are bandied around willy-nilly. Just use your real account, what are you afraid of?
    lotadicarus · 1790618967 · focus · HN ↗
    was always a lurker so never had an account. I just think it's important to counter Israel's misinformation campaign :) very telling you think those words have lost their meaning though. I don't think we need further discussion
    Leonard_of_Q · 1790621174 · focus · HN ↗
    Well yes we do need more discussion because each of these words used to indicate serious wrongdoings on the part of the accused while nowadays they are used to indicate "strong disagreement" at most. What, now, if a real nazi were to appear? You've been calling so many people nazi for nothing more than ideological disagreements that people just treat it as a hooting car alarm: "yeah sure, shut up already, we've heard you before and it never meant anything so stop bothering us". Good for the nazi but had for the rest of us.
    mittensc · 1790621748 · focus · HN ↗
    > What, now, if a real nazi were to appear?
    Way to miss the point entirely
2. dumberquestions · 1790617507 · focus · HN ↗
  History didn't start on October 7th.
3. biimugan · 1790618890 · focus · HN ↗
  What belief is being expressed in your comments? That if someone wins a military conflict, any action they took is justified? That seems like either moral relativism or ahistorical, blind patriotism. The Soviets also won that war -- does that mean they were justified in their constellations of gulags?
  If anything, the more apt historical comparison is to the Czechoslovakian and Polish partisans who wanted nothing less than to harry the Germans on (or within) their borders before the war. The British and French ambassadors (i.e. Qatar, etc) took great pains to try and convince the Polish and Czechoslovakian governments to restrain their partisans from attacking German people or positions, since they suspected Germany would use any and all provocation, no matter how small, as a casus belli. Anyone who's read a bit of WW2 history also knows how often the German government attempted to engineer exactly these kinds of events to justify their aggression.
  It sounds straight out of the Likud playbook, doesn't it? But in what universe does an attack that kills 1000 people, a good number of them active duty soldiers, justify killing and maiming over 100,000 civilians and leveling hundreds of thousands of buildings? If the shoe were on the other foot, this implies Hamas also has the moral imperative to do just the same to Israel. That's moral relativism for you.
  Perhaps Europe had a better understanding of this topic when they instituted the Geneva Conventions and other international humanitarian law after the war than we do today, 100 years out, trying to now claim none of it actually matters and the means justify the ends.
  1. catlikesshrimp · 1790655414 · focus · HN ↗
    "The end justifiesthe means" <a href="https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_end_justifies_the_means" rel="nofollow">https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_end_justifies_the_mean...
    I glad you are not AI!
    biimugan · 1790711676 · focus · HN ↗
    Haha, yes, that's what I meant. Written in haste :)
ChrisArchitect · 1790617539 · focus · HN ↗
non-X Google Maps link to ~location of screenshot: <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/@31.2857778,34.2533333,1010m" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/maps/@31.2857778,34.2533333,1010m
AuthAuth · 1790617684 · focus · HN ↗
They kept hostages to intentionally get this result.
the_origami_fox · 1790618968 · focus · HN ↗
It's so great to see that this thread is not filled with the usual violent, racist, hateful antizionist speech that accompanies anything to do with Israel on HackerNews. And people are pushing back against the genocide claim.
aerodog · 1790636850 · focus · HN ↗
Sergey Brin, who founded and owns most of Google with Larry Page, said recently (during the genocide) that he visited Ben Shapiro (genocide advocate) and had fun. They show these things in Google Maps, but don't forget that Google is not a 'neutral' company in this conflict.
1. thehappypm · 1790643271 · focus · HN ↗
  This is not factually accurate to say they own most of Google, the most I’ve seen of the two of them combined owning presently is 12%
  1. azornathogron · 1790644927 · focus · HN ↗
    Page and Brin together hold over 50% of voting shares, even though their economic share is lower as you suggest. Different share classes.
    <a href="https://aifundingtracker.com/who-owns-alphabet/" rel="nofollow">https://aifundingtracker.com/who-owns-alphabet/
2. monideas · 1790649120 · focus · HN ↗
  aerodog (internet forum frivolity engager during the genocide)
lwansbrough · 1790639134 · focus · HN ↗
[dead]
1. FridayoLeary · 1790639254 · focus · HN ↗
  [dead]
  1. newspaper1 · 1790639760 · focus · HN ↗
    The only terrorists are the Zionists. They've been slow rolling genocide ever since they invaded Palestine.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakba
  2. lwansbrough · 1790639762 · focus · HN ↗
    Ethnic cleansing, then. But this is exactly the sort of thing I'm talking about - very typical of Israel supporters: they debate you on the letter instead of acknowledging that what we see here is horrendous.
    Then they suggest that this is justified because Israel is a jewish ethnostate.
    FridayoLeary · 1790640368 · focus · HN ↗
    Also not. Almost everyone who was in Gaza on Oct6 is still there, minus 20-30,000 genocidal terrorists, and an admittedly unfortunately large number of civilians as casualties of war.
    I'm not debating you on letters, I am dismissing your entire claim as factually groundless.
    lwansbrough · 1790640943 · focus · HN ↗
    In what sense is the forced, systematic removal of people from this area based on religious grounds "factually groundless"?
    They don't live there anymore, they're displaced.

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