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Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.
This, after the reports of his aide being arrested for leaking information and sabotaguing negotiations really pissed the families of hostages off, because when you say something like this you are basically giving a free hand to Hamas to kill them, since they don't really mean much to IDF, according to their leader.
Hostages question is silly for anyone on Israeli side to use, they gave up on actually trying to free them a long time ago and they are just a sunken cost, that is both disgusting and despicable but it doesn't seem like Israeli public cares about that anymore, the almost 2 years of war footing and insane rhetoric seems to have worked wonders in radicalizing them.
I mean, first of all, there are protests in Israel all the time about getting the hostages back. So your statement that "it doesn't seem like the Israeli public cares anymore" is just flat out ignorant.
Second, you can't make the claim that Israel isn't interested in getting the hostages back when they are literally in the middle of negotiating a ceasefire that will include pausing the war and releasing Hamas terrorists in exchange for some of the hostages. This shows that they are willing to put their ultimate war goal (the destruction of Hamas) on hold to get hostages back.
There are protests but they are much smaller in 2025 then they were in 2024, from almost half a million according to Wikipedia in September 2024 to a few thousands at best sporadically through 2025.
I can and did make that claim because Nethyanahu has, as I noted before been actively sabotaging hostage negotiations, up to a point where Trump's guy went behind his back directly to Quatar / Hamas to get the last American hostage out.
The negotiations that are going on right now are, in my view, much more about Trump losing his patience with Nethyanahu and starting to put serious pressure on him to stop the war, the ultimate goal is to keep it's USA bodyguard on board much more then releasing the hostages, but of course, if you take the view that Israel is always truthful in it's intentions and statements you would believe that it's all about hostages, despite that not really mattering over the last 6 months.
On July 04 2025 04:38 Billyboy wrote: I think it was the US pol thread, or somewhere, but it was discussed long before this about whether some of the big bombing campaigns were genocide or not. I believe most people agreed they were atrocious but not genocide. Have peoples minds changed on that? I'm thinking Korean war, German Blitz of UK, Dresden, Vietnam, atomic bombs, firebombing of Japan.
Some people did actually call the Vietnam war a genocide. Bertrand Russel and the International War Crimes Tribunal among them. Their ruling was unanimous, unfortunately they didn't have the means to enforce it.
Tribunal members unanimously found the United States “guilty on all charges, including genocide, the use of forbidden weapons, maltreatment and killing of prisoners, violence and forceful movement of prisoners” in Vietnam and its neighbors Laos and Cambodia.
Interesting, I was talking about people here. Would you consider all the ones I listed genocide, none or which ones?
I don't know tbh. I'm not as well read on the Vietnam war and the Korean war and the other examples. But I do think if a group of high repute rules that genocide did occur, that accusation should be taken very seriously. It should certainly not be dismissed until other equally reputable groups or scholars have made their own call. So there may well have been instances of genocide in one or some of the examples.
What I'm seeing is that more and more scholars are coming to the conclusion that the Israel-Gaza war constitutes genocide. I'm not seeing any opposing trends.
It sounds fair to listen to the scholars. Is it safe to say that amount of civilians killed or even % is not really a factor, or at least no a major one. Obviously there is some floor number, but that it is more about trying to erase a group of people than raw numbers.
Yeah, I would definitely agree with that. The true scale of death doesn't appear to be a major factor (after a certain number).
For example, in my opinion October 7 constitutes genocide by Hamas. It is more than terrorism, more than mass murder. It was a very obvious instance of a genocide. The fact that it was stopped at a negligible percentage of Israelis is irrelevant, because the side that stopped the killing wasn't Hamas. It was Israel. Hamas would've just kept murdering innocent Israeli people if they had been given a free choice.
Likewise Israel's aggression in Gaza after October 7 constitutes genocide as well for those same reasons. If Hamas had been able to stop the counter-aggression, I would still consider it genocide by the IDF. In this instance the IDF isn't going to be stopped, which is why so many more Palestinians had to die and are still dying. The reason why more Palestinians are dying is not that the war has to be fought for any reasons other than for the sake of genocide. There is no other motive that would make sense, because Israel has complete power to stop the war and withdraw without any meaningful consequences to the Israeli population. They're able to protect themselves from all aggression in the future without continuing to kill Palestinians in such disproportionate numbers. This is the reason why I've so adamantly called it a "war of aggression". It is strictly not for the sake of defense.
Always with the both sides trying to put Hamas and the IDF on some kind of a similar moral plane. So sick and tired of this.
Genocide requires intent. We know that Hamas' actions on 10/7 were genocidal because they literally filmed themselves killing people indiscriminately. Not to mention the Hamas charter and the exultant phone calls their fighters were making back to Gaza talking about how many Jews they killed.
You talk about "Israel's aggression in Gaza." No, sorry, it is not aggression. It is self-defense after they were attacked. If you're framing it as an aggression you are already off to a bad start.
Second, there is, in fact, a reason why (unfortunately) more civilians are dying. It is because Israel's war goal is to destroy Hamas and they are not yet destroyed. Just recently several IDF soldiers were killed in northern Gaza by a Hamas ambush. Israel has decided that Hamas CANNOT be allowed to reconstitute itself in Gaza because they have said repeatedly that they want to do more October 7ths. Israel has a right to take action against a terrorist group that launches rockets at it and tries to butcher its civilians. They tried living with Hamas and relying on military superiority to prevent deaths for 18 years and look how it turned out. Don't tell me that they're able to "protect themselves from all aggression in the future."
Third, there is no genocidal intent in Israeli war policy. The existing case law establishes that genocidal intent must be the only reasonable inference based on the facts or circumstances. If you're going to try to climb that mountain here you're going to have to contend with:
1. The fact that the civilian to militant death toll is actually quite low despite the conflict taking place in a densely populated urban environment against an enemy that doesn't wear uniforms, takes absolutely no precautions to shelter its civilians, doesn't allow civilians into its tunnel network, and routinely sets up military posts in civilian places like hospitals, mosques etc. 2. The fact that Israel literally in the middle of the war facilitated a vaccination campaign for children within the Gaza Strip 3. The fact that Israel issued evacuation warnings throughout the conflict and has tried to set up humanitarian zones 4. The fact that Israel has facilitated millions of tons of aid into the Gaza Strip throughout the war
So... is this all window dressing for Israel's genocidal intent? Good luck trying to make that argument. The fact that certain organizations and some scholars have incorrectly deemed this a genocide does not make it so. It is telling that some countries are literally trying to change the definition of genocide to try to apply it to Israel.
Can you please elaborate on the bad things, in your opinion, that Israel has done in the conflict. I agree that Hamas and the Israeli government are not equivalent, but that doesn't mean I praise Israel for their constraint either. You know who is also not doing that? The governments that you claimed were proof no genocide was happening. I think your argument why the IDF is allowed to (unfortunately) kill tens of thousands civilians, but before I engage on that I would like to have your opinion on the broader conflict so I understand where you come from. It's a lot to ask, sorry.
This, after the reports of his aide being arrested for leaking information and sabotaguing negotiations really pissed the families of hostages off, because when you say something like this you are basically giving a free hand to Hamas to kill them, since they don't really mean much to IDF, according to their leader.
This is what you wrote:
Hostages question is silly for anyone on Israeli side to use, they gave up on actually trying to free them a long time ago and they are just a sunken cost, that is both disgusting and despicable but it doesn't seem like Israeli public cares about that anymore, the almost 2 years of war footing and insane rhetoric seems to have worked wonders in radicalizing them.
I mean, first of all, there are protests in Israel all the time about getting the hostages back. So your statement that "it doesn't seem like the Israeli public cares anymore" is just flat out ignorant.
Second, you can't make the claim that Israel isn't interested in getting the hostages back when they are literally in the middle of negotiating a ceasefire that will include pausing the war and releasing Hamas terrorists in exchange for some of the hostages. This shows that they are willing to put their ultimate war goal (the destruction of Hamas) on hold to get hostages back.
There are protests but they are much smaller in 2025 then they were in 2024, from almost half a million according to Wikipedia in September 2024 to a few thousands at best sporadically through 2025.
I can and did make that claim because Nethyanahu has, as I noted before been actively sabotaging hostage negotiations, up to a point where Trump's guy went behind his back directly to Quatar / Hamas to get the last American hostage out.
The negotiations that are going on right now are, in my view, much more about Trump losing his patience with Nethyanahu and starting to put serious pressure on him to stop the war, the ultimate goal is to keep it's USA bodyguard on board much more then releasing the hostages, but of course, if you take the view that Israel is always truthful in it's intentions and statements you would believe that it's all about hostages, despite that not really mattering over the last 6 months.
I'd guess there was some deal where the US uses there big bomb to get the Iran nuclear facility and Israel stops there offensive on Iran.
I'm not so sure that on Gaza, I think there it is a case of Netanyahu making his top priority and red line being Hamas being completely removed. That is probably more possible now then it was previously. It was a massive shift in foreign policy/terrorist negotiations to not have hostages being the top priority. Hugely divisive in Israel the government would not have survived without it being war time. There was a swell of people in Israel thinking that "paying" so much for hostages was encouraging terrorists to take them, but I think it was still the minority position over doing everything it would take to bring back survivors.
On July 10 2025 23:46 KwarK wrote: Gaza is not a viable home for the Gazans.
The United States can take all of them then.
Until that's the plan Gaza is their only home because no one else should have to step up and deal with Israels and USAs mess. If it's not a viable home it's Israels fault and responsibility.
Fault doesn’t make a difference to the truth of it at this point. Let’s say Israel disappears overnight, Palestine is restored, the Palestinians all go back to the farmland owned by their great great grandfathers. How do you divide it up between the 30 3rd cousins who have to live on land that supported a single family?
The population growth has been exponential, fueled by zero Malthusian constraints in a mixed sex refugee camp. Obviously Gazans have terrible lives but none of that stops them from fucking. The question of how to feed their growing family is different there because they don’t have jobs or income and their own food is equally insecure and dependent upon aid. Food insecurity is the default, either the aid shipments get through and feed all your children or they don’t and you all starve together but there’s nothing you can do to change that.
Decades of refusal to take difficult steps in resolving the refugee crisis have brought it to a point where it is now beyond resolution. That’s one of the most depressing things about the crisis. Let’s say there’s a ceasefire and things go back to how they were a few years ago. What then?
There isn’t a home for them to go back to at this point.
You know who also can't go back to his forefathers farm to feed his family? You. And me. And the population of every city in the western world. I live in food aid, I am just not dependant on Israeli goodwill for it to show up at a humanitarian center. Gaza can 100% become a home to the population of Gaza again, the world and Israel simply need to feed it. And you know, build a harbor and water treatment and and and. What's the upside of them all going to some other place in the desert? Will they have their own food there?
I think we should allow anyone that wants to leave as part of a structured plan for the whole west, mainly the us, to build communities for them and slowly allow them to rebuild their trust in society. Gaza should stay though and get 50 billion in rebuilding effort.
This is the same poll that shows that 'A majority of 56 percent of Jews supported the "transfer (forced expulsion) of Arab citizens of Israel to other countries', and - indeed - explicitly genocidal and not just ethnic cleansy - 'when asked directly whether they agreed with the position that the IDF, "when conquering an enemy city, should act in a manner similar to the way the Israelites acted when they conquered Jericho under the leadership of Joshua, namely, to kill all its inhabitants?" nearly half, 47 percent, agreed.'
If Afghanistan bordered on the USA what do you think a poll would have looked like after 9/11?
Numbers have changed somewhat since october 7th, but 48% agreed and 46% disagreed that Arabs should be expelled or transferred from Israel even back in 2016. This question got support from 56% of the respondends in Sorek's poll -indicating that yes, there's a change, and regarding Gaza in particular I'm guessing the change is bigger, but the idea that Israel should be for Jews and all of Palestine should ideally be Israel isn't like, a new sentiment within the Israeli population.
So if it is not new then what is your point? Again you are stuck in the, they are so evil and powerful they are not influenced by the rule of law of the world and they are only not being more awful because they do not want to lose support of the west.
A bunch of the people in Gaza leaving, if it is actually voluntary and to somewhere better would be a huge win for those who want to. It is so incredibly fucked there that when you get past the things that sound nice and try to think about how they would actually work in practice you come quickly to a bunch of choices that are bad, worse and worse than that. It is a problem way bigger than Israel could ever solve, and being as though they have been in nonstop conflict with various factions and Gazans themselves since their existence it is illogical and quite frankly stupid to think that they should be the ones to sort it out.
It is also quite frankly stupid to think that Gazans should be the ones to sort this out. In fact that's more stupid than literally anything else. They have zero negotiative power with or without Hamas.
Totally agree, the Gazans have almost no agency and are the victims of the whole mess.
The Gazans outnumber Hamas.
While they may technically outnumber them. it seems very western to set distinct groups and say people belong to one or the other. Of course, this isn't the case. Many Gazans will rejoice when Hamas kill some Israeli. Many won't ever partake in direct aggression, but will support it. Some might build destructive gear or tunnels but won't fire anything. Some will only do supportive tasks. Or turn a blind eye to it. There are many levels of involvement. So it's impossible to draw the line between those who are in or out (or are legit targets for the Israeli). Of course that is no justification for Israel to just kill anyone. And it's also very understandable from a Gazan point of view, they grew up in this mess (Dutch saying: hate was poured into them using the porridge spoon). But it also means it's convenient to say hardly anyone, or for that matter almost everyone in Gaza is a terrorist and skew any number in your favour.
There are protests but they are much smaller in 2025 then they were in 2024, from almost half a million according to Wikipedia in September 2024 to a few thousands at best sporadically through 2025.
The hostage rallies have been going on for more than a year and a half and just in the last two weeks there have been tens of thousands of people in the streets. Most of the people in Israel want the hostages back. You are simply wrong on this.
I can and did make that claim because Nethyanahu has, as I noted before been actively sabotaging hostage negotiations, up to a point where Trump's guy went behind his back directly to Quatar / Hamas to get the last American hostage out.
In what way has he been sabotaging this round of negotiations? By having certain demands that he is bringing to the table? Nothing that has been reported about the negotiation so far indicates that Netanyahu is "sabotaging" the negotiations.
It's also quite odd that you keep putting the blame on Israel for everything when Hamas (who started the war and took hostages in the first place) could stop all of this by simply agreeing to disarm themselves which they continue to refuse to do. But I guess they're not "sabotaging" the negotiations right?
The negotiations that are going on right now are, in my view, much more about Trump losing his patience with Nethyanahu and starting to put serious pressure on him to stop the war, the ultimate goal is to keep it's USA bodyguard on board much more then releasing the hostages, but of course, if you take the view that Israel is always truthful in it's intentions and statements you would believe that it's all about hostages, despite that not really mattering over the last 6 months.
Netanyahu made a hostage deal that included the release of 1000+ Palestinians many of whom were terrorists. It's frankly a weird fantasy world that you seem to live in where even when the Israelis take actions they must have some kind of weird ulterior grand plan that is driving it and they're not just doing what they say they want to do.
On July 04 2025 04:38 Billyboy wrote: I think it was the US pol thread, or somewhere, but it was discussed long before this about whether some of the big bombing campaigns were genocide or not. I believe most people agreed they were atrocious but not genocide. Have peoples minds changed on that? I'm thinking Korean war, German Blitz of UK, Dresden, Vietnam, atomic bombs, firebombing of Japan.
Some people did actually call the Vietnam war a genocide. Bertrand Russel and the International War Crimes Tribunal among them. Their ruling was unanimous, unfortunately they didn't have the means to enforce it.
Tribunal members unanimously found the United States “guilty on all charges, including genocide, the use of forbidden weapons, maltreatment and killing of prisoners, violence and forceful movement of prisoners” in Vietnam and its neighbors Laos and Cambodia.
Interesting, I was talking about people here. Would you consider all the ones I listed genocide, none or which ones?
I don't know tbh. I'm not as well read on the Vietnam war and the Korean war and the other examples. But I do think if a group of high repute rules that genocide did occur, that accusation should be taken very seriously. It should certainly not be dismissed until other equally reputable groups or scholars have made their own call. So there may well have been instances of genocide in one or some of the examples.
What I'm seeing is that more and more scholars are coming to the conclusion that the Israel-Gaza war constitutes genocide. I'm not seeing any opposing trends.
It sounds fair to listen to the scholars. Is it safe to say that amount of civilians killed or even % is not really a factor, or at least no a major one. Obviously there is some floor number, but that it is more about trying to erase a group of people than raw numbers.
Yeah, I would definitely agree with that. The true scale of death doesn't appear to be a major factor (after a certain number).
For example, in my opinion October 7 constitutes genocide by Hamas. It is more than terrorism, more than mass murder. It was a very obvious instance of a genocide. The fact that it was stopped at a negligible percentage of Israelis is irrelevant, because the side that stopped the killing wasn't Hamas. It was Israel. Hamas would've just kept murdering innocent Israeli people if they had been given a free choice.
Likewise Israel's aggression in Gaza after October 7 constitutes genocide as well for those same reasons. If Hamas had been able to stop the counter-aggression, I would still consider it genocide by the IDF. In this instance the IDF isn't going to be stopped, which is why so many more Palestinians had to die and are still dying. The reason why more Palestinians are dying is not that the war has to be fought for any reasons other than for the sake of genocide. There is no other motive that would make sense, because Israel has complete power to stop the war and withdraw without any meaningful consequences to the Israeli population. They're able to protect themselves from all aggression in the future without continuing to kill Palestinians in such disproportionate numbers. This is the reason why I've so adamantly called it a "war of aggression". It is strictly not for the sake of defense.
Always with the both sides trying to put Hamas and the IDF on some kind of a similar moral plane. So sick and tired of this.
Genocide requires intent. We know that Hamas' actions on 10/7 were genocidal because they literally filmed themselves killing people indiscriminately. Not to mention the Hamas charter and the exultant phone calls their fighters were making back to Gaza talking about how many Jews they killed.
You talk about "Israel's aggression in Gaza." No, sorry, it is not aggression. It is self-defense after they were attacked. If you're framing it as an aggression you are already off to a bad start.
Second, there is, in fact, a reason why (unfortunately) more civilians are dying. It is because Israel's war goal is to destroy Hamas and they are not yet destroyed. Just recently several IDF soldiers were killed in northern Gaza by a Hamas ambush. Israel has decided that Hamas CANNOT be allowed to reconstitute itself in Gaza because they have said repeatedly that they want to do more October 7ths. Israel has a right to take action against a terrorist group that launches rockets at it and tries to butcher its civilians. They tried living with Hamas and relying on military superiority to prevent deaths for 18 years and look how it turned out. Don't tell me that they're able to "protect themselves from all aggression in the future."
Third, there is no genocidal intent in Israeli war policy. The existing case law establishes that genocidal intent must be the only reasonable inference based on the facts or circumstances. If you're going to try to climb that mountain here you're going to have to contend with:
1. The fact that the civilian to militant death toll is actually quite low despite the conflict taking place in a densely populated urban environment against an enemy that doesn't wear uniforms, takes absolutely no precautions to shelter its civilians, doesn't allow civilians into its tunnel network, and routinely sets up military posts in civilian places like hospitals, mosques etc. 2. The fact that Israel literally in the middle of the war facilitated a vaccination campaign for children within the Gaza Strip 3. The fact that Israel issued evacuation warnings throughout the conflict and has tried to set up humanitarian zones 4. The fact that Israel has facilitated millions of tons of aid into the Gaza Strip throughout the war
So... is this all window dressing for Israel's genocidal intent? Good luck trying to make that argument. The fact that certain organizations and some scholars have incorrectly deemed this a genocide does not make it so. It is telling that some countries are literally trying to change the definition of genocide to try to apply it to Israel.
Can you please elaborate on the bad things, in your opinion, that Israel has done in the conflict. I agree that Hamas and the Israeli government are not equivalent, but that doesn't mean I praise Israel for their constraint either. You know who is also not doing that? The governments that you claimed were proof no genocide was happening. I think your argument why the IDF is allowed to (unfortunately) kill tens of thousands civilians, but before I engage on that I would like to have your opinion on the broader conflict so I understand where you come from. It's a lot to ask, sorry.
Sure, let me try to list a few in no particular order. Just preface by saying that some of these have the benefit of hindsight, some are tangentially related to the conflict.
1. To say off the start, there is no doubt that soldiers in the IDF have committed war crimes. There have undoubtedly been instances where soldiers have needlessly killed innocent civilians. It is not the policy of the IDF to target civilians but any instance where soldiers have done so deliberately is a war crime that should be prosecuted and this has definitely happened several times over the course of this conflict.
2. There does not seem to any kind of day-one plan for what Gaza looks like after the conflict is over. It has been almost two years and I have not seen any kind of thinking on what the political settlement looks like in Gaza. This is a disgrace and it's a disservice to the Gazans who deserve a chance to live peacefully under competent leadership as well as the IDF soldiers who are dying in Gaza. Israel will not lose this war militarily but they can still lose it strategically if they don't get this right.
3. The GHF - while I understand the rationale behind it - has been extremely poorly executed. It's undeniable that innocent civilians trying to access aid have been killed by IDF soldiers, which shows that there was an astounding lack of planning, lack of signage, lack of crowd control, and lack of trained personnel to be able to run this effectively. That is on the IDF and the GHF leadership.
4. I wish the humanitarian zone policy was executed differently throughout the war. In hindsight, I think it would have been better had the Israelis decided to host refugee camps on Israeli soil. That way they could have properly vetted the people, they could have managed security better, and they could have provided aid much easier. I know this would have been extremely unpopular politically in Israel but sometimes leaders have to take tough decisions.
5. What has been happening in the West Bank over the course of the last year or two. The settlement policy pursued by this Israeli government is indefensible, both from a moral and strategic perspective. It's not directly related to the war in Gaza but Netanyahu is the one who is empowering religious zealots like Ben-Gvir and Smotrich to drive these policies. It needs to stop immediately. This is where I wish my own government would step in and put pressure. Not going to happen in this administration though I'm afraid.
There are other things but this is kind of off the top of my head for now. Hope that kind of gives you a flavor?
Just a quick note on your other points - you're right that those governments I cited are not necessarily in favor of Israeli war policy. The reason I cited them was to show that there are credible actors (not just Israel) who are pushing back against the genocide accusation. I want to stress also that just because the UK, US, Germany etc. say it's not genocide doesn't mean that it isn't genocide. The reason I don't believe it is genocide is because of what I see based on the facts on the ground and the actual law of genocide.
Final point: this is what kind of kills me about this whole debate. There are SO many ways to reasonably criticize the Israeli government for its conduct over the last two years and before. What people have done instead is throw out words like "genocide" "ethnic cleansing" "apartheid" that really do not apply here. That kind of rhetoric is not intended to try to get Israel to improve the way it conducts war and foreign relations - it is a rhetoric of demonization and delegitimization that only really serves to harden people's attitudes.
This, after the reports of his aide being arrested for leaking information and sabotaguing negotiations really pissed the families of hostages off, because when you say something like this you are basically giving a free hand to Hamas to kill them, since they don't really mean much to IDF, according to their leader.
As far as BillyBoy's incredibly obtuse statement where he knows how Gazans should be happy to be ethnically cleansed to somewhere else, I wonder how he'd react if I kept throwing bombs at his house for almost 2 years and then offered him a tent somewhere in a desert to relocate since "his house is clearly not safe", I'm sure he'd be supper happy and would consider that a big win!
That is not at all what I said, why go full asshole on me? It is so tiring. Do you really think everyone in Gaza wants to stay there? How many times do we here it is a large open air prison and you think no one wants to leave? Tons of them want what every human wants. What does sicken me is that people, who consider themselves the righteous ones, won't take the refugees because the Syrian ones cause the rise of the right and made it more difficult on them. Selfish self righteous cunts in my opinion.
This is their home. This is the only place they have known. They have an absolute right to stay there. The reason why they might want to leave is because Israel through their policy of ethnic cleansing and genocide made it impossible for them to stay.
In a just world they would be provided reparations and their city would be rebuilt, what Israel is offering is to put them in a concentration camp.
What happened in Gaza is not the fault of Egypt or Jordan, or any of the other countries around them that are "supposed to take them because they are also brown".
The country that is the most complicit in the destruction of Gaza after Israel is the US, are you down with a plan for Israel and US to pay to relocate 2 million people to Texas?
As someone who's family was driven from their home which was subsequently looted and they were never able to return there I can tell you that the people who are selfish cunts in this hypothetical are people like you who both don't care about these people enough to be on board a humane solution which lets them stay in their home as well as calling for countries that had nothing to do with this whole fucking mess to take 2 million refugees because Israel decided that their security means flattening a city.
What is tiring is that you can't see that you went full asshole the moment that you decided that Israel is unimpeachable and everyone else is responsible for fixing their mess.
Germany didn't fuck up Syria, neither did Turkey. It wasn't Lebanon or Jordan either. They most certainly didn't occupy Gaza in 1967 and they for sure didn't decide that a normal reaction to a terrorist attack that was only this successful because Israel's security forces were focused on taking more land in the West bank instead of protecting their citizens was to destroy or render uninhabitable 80 % + of buildings in a city of 2+ million while killing 60 + K people.
This is what you are defending and this is who you are explaining should shoulder the burden of fixing it, otherwise they are selfish cunts, gotcha, how very righteous of you.
I did not decide the bolded part, and for the 1000 time go try to find me saying it. I get that you have to say it because otherwise you would have to deal with what I'm actually saying and that is way harder, but it does not make it any less frustrating.
I'm also not suggesting that people should be forced to go, I'm just not some self righteous asshole that is forcing them to stay in a hell hole.
Everyone who decided it was a good idea to send all the Jews to Israel shares some of the responsibility along with all the assholes along the way that decided the best policy was to try to kill each other instead of getting along. But here we are and someone needs to start thinking about what is an actual go forward plan for the 6 million people living in various levels of hell.
One thing that can be done is to protest the governments of the US and Germany for militarily supporting Israel. These two countries alone make up nearly 100% of the arms exports to Israel.
Campaign groups and some politicians from Israel's Western allies argue that arms exports should be suspended because Israel is allegedly failing to adequately protect civilian lives and ensure sufficient humanitarian aid reaches Gaza. On Friday, the UN Human Rights Council supported a weapons ban, with 28 countries voting in favor, six against, and 13 abstentions. The US and Germany, which account for the majority of Israel's arms imports, voted against the ban. Germany's opposition was based on the resolution's failure to explicitly condemn Hamas.
A ban on arms sales (including parts) to the US is also necessary, since their weapons inevitably end up in Israel.
CAAT says the UK has granted arms export licences to Israel worth £576m in total since 2008. Much of those have been for components used in US-made warplanes that end up in Israel.
People need to keep protesting and they need to get louder and louder. Anti-war protests have the desired effect. But people have to join now while there's still hope.
Sure, but I'm more talking next steps. It looks like (fingers crossed) Israel will stop the offensive in Gaza shortly and we will have a ceasefire that could (and for the sake of this discussion does) end the war. Now what? A real plan needs to be made for the area.
I'm an optimist at heart so I always wanna believe in a ceasefire. But I don't think there will be a lasting one anytime soon. Just judging from patterns.
Regarding a real post-war plan? There's only Netanyahu's settler ideology. It's inevitable. Israel can't handle a ceasefire while Netanyahu is in power. And he knows that perfectly well.
The only hope for Palestinians is to wait things out until Netanyahu keels over from natural causes. Then there may be a glimmer of hope.
There is mounting pressure in Israel for elections, so that part is hopeful. But my bigger questions are about the go forward no matter who is leading Israel, and at this point almost no matter what they do.
Like imagine Israel says, deal 2 state solution with a land bridge for easy passage between the Westbank and Gaza. Now what? You have way to many people (and most are skillless with no education) in such a small area, no money, no industry, no infrastructure, no food and so on. Like thy need to transform into a Singapore economy to survive but that is like decades away if even ever possible. On top of that you have this radicalization that is not going to be easy to unwind.
It is going to take a global effort and there seems to be no will. And even with a global effort there is no blueprint for making it work. We have multple examples of how to not make it work, and even make it worse.
There is indeed no will. Even a Democrat leadership wouldn't apply much pressure, mainly out of fear of losing voters. Even Mamdani is constantly being questioned about his intent regarding Israel - even though he as a mayor has no say in foreign affairs. That's the absurdity of the political landscape in the US.
On July 11 2025 07:26 Nebuchad wrote: Any hindsight on why, when I type "scholars of genocide on Gaza" into Google, none of the results are about how RJgooner is right?
Because your search term is biased and of course people studying genocide in Gaza believe it is a genocide. Otherwise they wouldn’t be scholars of genocide in Gaza.
On July 11 2025 07:26 Nebuchad wrote: Any hindsight on why, when I type "scholars of genocide on Gaza" into Google, none of the results are about how RJgooner is right?
Because your search term is biased and of course people studying genocide in Gaza believe it is a genocide. Otherwise they wouldn’t be scholars of genocide in Gaza.
"Scholars of genocide in Gaza" is not a thing, obviously. It's scholars of genocide, talking about Gaza.
This is the same poll that shows that 'A majority of 56 percent of Jews supported the "transfer (forced expulsion) of Arab citizens of Israel to other countries', and - indeed - explicitly genocidal and not just ethnic cleansy - 'when asked directly whether they agreed with the position that the IDF, "when conquering an enemy city, should act in a manner similar to the way the Israelites acted when they conquered Jericho under the leadership of Joshua, namely, to kill all its inhabitants?" nearly half, 47 percent, agreed.'
If Afghanistan bordered on the USA what do you think a poll would have looked like after 9/11?
Numbers have changed somewhat since october 7th, but 48% agreed and 46% disagreed that Arabs should be expelled or transferred from Israel even back in 2016. This question got support from 56% of the respondends in Sorek's poll -indicating that yes, there's a change, and regarding Gaza in particular I'm guessing the change is bigger, but the idea that Israel should be for Jews and all of Palestine should ideally be Israel isn't like, a new sentiment within the Israeli population.
That poll was an outlier at that time. Basically every other poll with a similar question polled much lower. From your own source;
The University of Haifa’s Index of Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel has asked, “Do you agree, tend to agree, tend to disagree, or disagree with the following statement: Arab citizens should leave the country and receive proper compensation.” (Emphasis added.) This question has been asked 11 times since 2003, with only modest fluctuations in opinion. The most recent survey, conducted in 2015, finds that 32% of Israeli Jews agree or tend to agree with the statement, while 64% disagree or tend to disagree. Index of Arab-Jewish relations over time
In addition, an October 2015 poll conducted by the Maariv newspaper asked Israeli Jews whether they “support the idea of a voluntary transfer of Palestinians from Judea and Samaria,” also known as the Israeli-occupied West Bank. (Emphasis added.) It finds that a majority (58%) of Jews favor this idea, while 26% oppose it.
Substantial differences in question wording may explain the variation in responses to these questions. Pew Research Center’s question asks about the transfer of “Arabs” and does not specify whether these are Arab citizens or not. By contrast, the Index of Arab-Jewish Relations question specifically refers to Arab “citizens.”
Additionally, Pew Research Center’s question asks if Arabs “should be expelled or transferred from Israel.” The Index of Arab-Jewish Relations does not include the words “transfer” or “expel” but rather asks if Arab citizens “should leave the country and receive proper compensation.” The Maariv poll specifies that the transfer of Arabs from “Judea and Samaria” (i.e., the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and not Israel proper) would be “voluntary.”
That Haifa poll also found that six in 10 Israeli Jews felt “it would be good for Arabs and Jews to always live together in Israel.”
Then there's another poll from the Israel Democracy institute with 37.5% support for encouraging Arab migration.
I'm very skeptical of any poll result with more than 80% support on a controversial issue. That's approaching Putin presidential election results.
This is the same poll that shows that 'A majority of 56 percent of Jews supported the "transfer (forced expulsion) of Arab citizens of Israel to other countries', and - indeed - explicitly genocidal and not just ethnic cleansy - 'when asked directly whether they agreed with the position that the IDF, "when conquering an enemy city, should act in a manner similar to the way the Israelites acted when they conquered Jericho under the leadership of Joshua, namely, to kill all its inhabitants?" nearly half, 47 percent, agreed.'
If Afghanistan bordered on the USA what do you think a poll would have looked like after 9/11?
Numbers have changed somewhat since october 7th, but 48% agreed and 46% disagreed that Arabs should be expelled or transferred from Israel even back in 2016. This question got support from 56% of the respondends in Sorek's poll -indicating that yes, there's a change, and regarding Gaza in particular I'm guessing the change is bigger, but the idea that Israel should be for Jews and all of Palestine should ideally be Israel isn't like, a new sentiment within the Israeli population.
That poll was an outlier at that time. Basically every other poll with a similar question polled much lower. From your own source;
The University of Haifa’s Index of Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel has asked, “Do you agree, tend to agree, tend to disagree, or disagree with the following statement: Arab citizens should leave the country and receive proper compensation.” (Emphasis added.) This question has been asked 11 times since 2003, with only modest fluctuations in opinion. The most recent survey, conducted in 2015, finds that 32% of Israeli Jews agree or tend to agree with the statement, while 64% disagree or tend to disagree. Index of Arab-Jewish relations over time
In addition, an October 2015 poll conducted by the Maariv newspaper asked Israeli Jews whether they “support the idea of a voluntary transfer of Palestinians from Judea and Samaria,” also known as the Israeli-occupied West Bank. (Emphasis added.) It finds that a majority (58%) of Jews favor this idea, while 26% oppose it.
Substantial differences in question wording may explain the variation in responses to these questions. Pew Research Center’s question asks about the transfer of “Arabs” and does not specify whether these are Arab citizens or not. By contrast, the Index of Arab-Jewish Relations question specifically refers to Arab “citizens.”
Additionally, Pew Research Center’s question asks if Arabs “should be expelled or transferred from Israel.” The Index of Arab-Jewish Relations does not include the words “transfer” or “expel” but rather asks if Arab citizens “should leave the country and receive proper compensation.” The Maariv poll specifies that the transfer of Arabs from “Judea and Samaria” (i.e., the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and not Israel proper) would be “voluntary.”
That Haifa poll also found that six in 10 Israeli Jews felt “it would be good for Arabs and Jews to always live together in Israel.”
Then there's another poll from the Israel Democracy institute with 37.5% support for encouraging Arab migration.
I'm very skeptical of any poll result with more than 80% support on a controversial issue. That's approaching Putin presidential election results.
Is this not saying that the lower numbers (still 30%ish) is about Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, living in Israel, while the larger numbers are for people in the West Bank? If so, that seems like consistent numbers rather than an outlier. I may be reading this wrong idk.
Today is a 30 year anniversary of the last European recognized genocide, the one in Srebrenica.
I, personally, given the proximity and my own country's exposure to the ICJ have somewhat of a complicated view of ICJ and their judgements, however, over the years, I adjusted my views and I firmly believe that my country committed acts of Ethnic cleansing in expelling large numbers of Serbs from our territories.
My country has also, in my view and according to rulings of the ICJ committed war crimes and there were massacres of civilians in both Croatian and territories that are today Bosnia and Hercegovina, done by Croatian military and paramilitary members.
These were prosecuted by ICJ and I don't think that would have ever happened and initiated by our courts, we were "forced" to do it by EU in order to be able to join, which I was (even tho I was pretty young at the time) on board because I can't stand any sort of ethno-nationalism.
Given that these were less then 10 of these war crime incidents over the war, and there was never a semblance of proof of Croatian military and political leaders ordering them I don't think what Croats did constituted a genocide, but I do believe there was ethnic cleansing.
What Serbian paramilitaries did in Srebrenica was an obvious genocide and it did come with blessing from their political and military leadership.
Why I think Gaza fits the same criteria:
1. Safe area - Srebrenica was designated a safe area by the Serbs who then proceeded to surround it, ethnically cleanse some and massacre others 2. Staging area - ARBiH (armed forces of Bosniak Muslims) used Srebrenica area as a staging area for mounting attacks on neighboring Serb held territory, Srebrenica was already basically surrounded and this was used as a justification 3. Starvation/Siege tactics - Serbs blocked delivery of aid to the area and tried to slowly starve the population
These things took place over 2 years, then, in July of 1995 the Serbs took over and started to forcibly remove tens of thousands of women and children to Bosniak controlled territories while indiscriminately killing men and boys.
What I guess my point is, is that even before the actual mass executions started thousands of people died in Srebrenica, and even after the Serbs came in and took over, there were many small massacres and mass graves, there weren't a huge, systematic killings of thousands at the time, which from reading around here is something people imagine when they hear genocide.
The other thing is intent and motivations, the Serb's stated motivations were revenge for the incursions coming from this surrounded area into their territory and their motivation was to remove these people form there and send a message to them never to come back.
That all seems very, very familiar to me and this is why I firmly believe that Gaza is a genocide.
I strongly encourage everyone to read up on this, it's a horrid but fascinating read, especially the role of UN and their forces, Dutch forces under it (Dutch government resigned over this) and the complete abandonment form US and French forces of these people, they ignored requests for air support from the Dutch and basically condemned these people:
Lets put a real face on this conflict. It's actually a nice video and I'm glad to see someone able to survive with, well, a lot less than the bare minimum.
Just kidding, it's sad as fuck to see that. Fingers crossed he survives.
Israel just bombed Syria again. There are very clear videos of them hitting the main army HQ several times.
Why is Israel doing this?
The official reason is attacks on druze in Syria. It's theoretically true (in no small part because of Israel's involvement) but it's mainly bullshit.
The druze in Syria is not one single faction but several. Most of them support the new Syrian government but there has been a long standing problem with the druze in Suweyda led by al-Hiri. Fairly recently there was a deal between the government and them to integrate with the rest of the country but they really wanted to be their own little province. This may have been accentuated by very persistent rumors (I have seen people talking about it for as long as I've watched post-civil war Syria) that al-Hiri was/is involved in organized crime with arms smuggling and prostitution/trafficking). A major problem is long standing grudges between the local Bedouin tribes and the druze in Suweyda which is what kicked off this current round of troubles.
Israel has been very open with that they prefer a federalized (failed) state in Syria similar to Iraq. They tried pushing for this with SDF but the US was not interested and Turkey were ready to annihilate the kurds if they called for their own state. So that didn't happen.
So Israel have turned to the southern parts of Syria and have repeatedly warned the Syrian government about "attacking" the druze. What happened now was that violence kicked off between bedouin tribes and the druze (as far as I understood it the bedouin have "controlled" the highway and kidnapped a local druze businessman. The army stepped in to try to quell the situation and a lot of the security forces were killed. As they scaled up the operation (I think they have Suweyda right now) Israel is now bombing the army.
There are many reasons for this. First and foremost of course the desire for a weak federalized Syria that remains broken and powerless. So it's a good tactic to support local minor factions and promise them that they can attack with impunity because Israel will retaliate with airstrikes on their behalf. Of course it's also good for Israel to build up a narrative about druze persecution because that's the reason they occupied additional territory in the south which they of course have no intention of ever giving back. Even if it's only a tiny minority of druze that wants this and the rest support the government. A stable Syria would also allow for the long planned gas pipeline from Qatar to Turkey (and further into Europe) which would be of immense value to Turkey, Syria, the gulf states and Europe. It would seriously sideline Israeli geopolitical power in the region. And of course Bibbi has his legal troubles that just got postponed again.
Israel is more than happy for Syrian civil war 2.0 to break out and is actively working towards it. Having already crippled the Syrian military they are now working to embolden minor factions as much as they can, hoping for mass instability, possibly renewed civil war. The chance of more massacres of course increases dramatically with increased unrest since the new government only has a small core of loyal/organized troops that can be relied on to step in when minorities are involved. It doesn't help that there was an amnesty of druze officers from Assad's army and there have been confirmation of that some of them have been killed fighting security forces.
Israel has now also hit goverment forces in Daara and Suwayda. There was an agreement to stop the fighting after security forces took control but the fighting started again after they had to retreat after air strikes.
Israel providing CAS for rebels in a non hostile country. Nice... Assad killed 500k of his own people and Isrsel didn't care, now they do.
And before you ask, the druze in Suwayda were on Assads side (compared to many other communities that joined the revolution).
So, how are we feeling about this, latest escalation?
I'll start, I fucking hate it, but that's not new, I have been firmly on the de-escalation train since about November 2023.
I guess, for me, the thing that bothers me the most is that Israel has absolute disregard for the well being of their neighbors, specifically their civilian populations. Why can't Syrian people, who now have a flawed government, but one that compared to Assad's seems like heaven have a respite from war and tragedy?
So Israel can have their "buffer"? Where is the line? Is there a line?
How fucked and feckless is EU to, despite it's best interests being stopping all of this wanton aggression from Israel they keep offering incredibly tepid criticism while they sell arms to them, and all that after the Syrian refugee crisis created incredible political turmoil all over the continent that is still ongoing.
The Israeli justifications are thinner and thinner, less believable by the day, in all cases, from Iranian nuclear program that only they deem as an emergency to now protecting a minority by bombing a sovereign capital and the presidential palace in it. For Gaza they aren't even trying to make up excuses and justifications, just "Hamas must be destroyed" on repeat and move on.
And then, when all of this shit blows up in their faces 2-5-10 years later it's another excuse for another round of escalations and aggression, jesus fuckign christ, I hope people of Israel (because obviously no one else is willing to stop them) can finally get out on the streets and get this mad fucking dog Nethanahu and his merry band of radicals out so some chance for peace exists.
Netanyahu wants to keep fighting going. He did it with Iran and with that cooled off he is going back to attacking Syria. So long as he is in power these sort of actions will continue for as long as he is able.
I'll start, I fucking hate it, but that's not new, I have been firmly on the de-escalation train since about November 2023.
I guess, for me, the thing that bothers me the most is that Israel has absolute disregard for the well being of their neighbors, specifically their civilian populations. Why can't Syrian people, who now have a flawed government, but one that compared to Assad's seems like heaven have a respite from war and tragedy?
So Israel can have their "buffer"? Where is the line? Is there a line?
How fucked and feckless is EU to, despite it's best interests being stopping all of this wanton aggression from Israel they keep offering incredibly tepid criticism while they sell arms to them, and all that after the Syrian refugee crisis created incredible political turmoil all over the continent that is still ongoing.
The Israeli justifications are thinner and thinner, less believable by the day, in all cases, from Iranian nuclear program that only they deem as an emergency to now protecting a minority by bombing a sovereign capital and the presidential palace in it. For Gaza they aren't even trying to make up excuses and justifications, just "Hamas must be destroyed" on repeat and move on.
And then, when all of this shit blows up in their faces 2-5-10 years later it's another excuse for another round of escalations and aggression, jesus fuckign christ, I hope people of Israel (because obviously no one else is willing to stop them) can finally get out on the streets and get this mad fucking dog Nethanahu and his merry band of radicals out so some chance for peace exists.
That Israel was intended to basically Manifest Destiny the Middle East into "civilization, democracy, and freedom" used to basically be open US policy, it seems it pretty much is again.
I'd prefer to see some sort of "AmeriMaidan" at this point, but it's unclear what (if anything) will actually flip that switch for enough people in the US.
EPT
