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Norway28598 Posts
On November 08 2023 05:53 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 05:45 Liquid`Drone wrote:
The 'numbers dead' is actually an, if not the essential component of the trolley problem. Then sometimes people make adjustments like 'but what if it's 5 85 year old nazis on one track and one saintly 20 year old woman poised to cure cancer on the other'. So phrasing this as a trolley problem basically necessitates one of two to justify 'pulling the lever': Either pulling the lever reduces the amount of people killed (and so far, reasonable people will agree that the retaliations has killed more than 5 times as many people than Hamas has killed in the past 15 years), or Israeli lives are worth more than Gazan lives. I can be on board with the notion that a) Israeli civilian lives are worth more than those of Hamas soldiers, and I can understand that Israel cares more about Israeli lives than they do about Palestinian lives, but myself, I don't think Isreali civilians are worth more than Palestinian civilians and no matter how you slice it and how you're going to calculate 'who is a combatant' and if you're gonna insist that Hamas is inflating the numbers, more Palestinian civilians have died than Israeli civilians.
Thus pulling the lever is not trolley-problem-justified. Morally, my answer is to sidestep the initial question of the Trolley problem. The person at the lever is faultless, whether they pull it or not. There could be 1 person on track A and 1 million people on track B, I still won't fault them if they pull that lever. The blame falls squarely on the people who tied a million people to the track and then sent a trolley. The people who did that are Hamas. Hamas is responsible for 4000 or 10000 or whatever the number of dead Palestinians right now. As soon as everyone accepts that Hamas is the one responsible, then there is a path forward.
So if Israel nuked Gaza, would that still be on Hamas?
To be clear, I don't think this is your position. But the way you are constructing/framing your argument seems to be giving Israel a free pass to kill 'as many civilians as necessary'. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with Israel retaliating with military action against Hamas, and I'm not necessarily faulting them for all civilian losses on the Gaza strip, but I am also by no means convinced that Israel does everything it can possibly do to minimize civilian losses and I do believe Israel at the very least shares responsibility for a bunch of the civilian casualties seen. I also believe a more patient response would yield better results (I also don't think there's any possibility of Hamas launching a new attack in the next say, 2 months, so there's no ticking bomb about to explode), which could also allow for fewer civilian deaths.
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On November 08 2023 05:47 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 05:37 Nebuchad wrote:On November 08 2023 05:33 Mohdoo wrote:On November 08 2023 05:26 Nebuchad wrote:On November 08 2023 05:23 Mohdoo wrote:On November 08 2023 05:11 Nebuchad wrote:On November 08 2023 05:04 Mohdoo wrote:On November 08 2023 04:45 Nebuchad wrote:On November 08 2023 04:00 Nebuchad wrote:On November 08 2023 03:55 RenSC2 wrote:
[quote]
Your read of the Trolley problem is that the person should never throw the switch? That's a new take. The whole point of the problem is that it is an unsolvable one. The situation is awful and the person at the switch is not at fault for bad circumstances no matter what he chooses.
In real life, if you know who keeps sending trolleys at occupied tracks, you can put the blame squarely on them. That's Hamas. Hamas needs to stop sending trolleys down the track and Israel is finally going after the source of the trolleys, but Hamas won't go out without sending some last trolleys at innocent Palestinians. I'm sorry I'm a little hazy on trolley problems I guess what happens if you don't throw the switch? Sorry I'm used to Twitter where it's faster to ask than to look for myself, so I went and looked. In a trolley problem, someone launches a trolley and you have an option A and an option B, where the option A is worse than option B. You have the option to divert the trolley from A to B, but then the outcome B is your responsibility because you had direct impact on where the trolley went. The question is then, do you get to choose that outcome B is better than outcome A. Here are some differences between what Israel is doing and a trolley problem: - Outcome B is worse than outcome A. Way more people are dying when we pull the lever. The difference is that those people aren't humans. - There is nobody on track A. This isn't "Some people are going to die as a direct consequence of my inaction". If you didn't do this act, nobody would die as a consequence. The Israeli people were on the track earlier, they are already dead, we can't save them by diverting the trolley into Gaza. Your only option is to decide if the trolley kills other people or if it doesn't. - Diverting the trolley doesn't stop Hamas from launching other trolleys in the future. We've pulled the trolley numerous times in the past and that hasn't stopped people from dying on the next track A. - We have a seething hatred of the people on track B, and we want to steal their land from them. It would be beneficial to our goals if the trolley went on track B. In fact, before Hamas launched its trolley we were already mistreating and killing people on track B recreationally. People will die if nothing is done. Hamas said they will repeat attacks like October 7 in the future, and we have every reason to assume that is true. So if Israel simply ignored the attack entirely, the attacks would continue until all Israelis are dead. This is what Hamas themselves directly said. They have clearly stated that the only condition Hamas will accept for stopping their attacks is for the entirety of Israel to no longer exist. All Israelis dead is their condition for stopping their attacks. We have every reason to assume they are being truthful. So yes, people are going to die even if Israel ignores the attack entirely. That is the big thing that everyone loves to ignore. Israeli civilians will die if nothing is done. So there is not a solution which does not lead to anyone dying. Is there another option I am not aware of? "There will be another trolley in the future" is not morally the same as "you didn't pull the lever". It's not a direct consequence. There is nothing about putting the trolley on track B that changes any of what you said regarding Hamas. All of that is still true. The only difference is that a bunch more people are dead. You are advocating for people assuming Hamas attacks won't happen in the future. That is not reasonable. You can't just toss an unsubstantiated "yeah but maybe not" to the situation when they've already done it before and they have expressed intent to do it again. They have the intentions, the history, and the tools to do it again. It is clearly reasonable to assume leaving Hamas alone will lead to Israelis dying. Hamas will definitely attack again in the future. You're, in my opinion intentionally, misreading what I said. So if Hamas will definitely attack again, is it fair to say Israelis will definitely die? What are you saying isn't a guarantee? So long as it is guaranteed, there is no break down of the trolley problem. The trolley problem points out that so long as death is guaranteed, the only choice is who dies. If you agree the attacks are guaranteed, and you agree Israeli deaths are guaranteed, that means it is accurate to point out someone dies regardless of what Israel decides to do. The fact that Israel's decision making is irrelevant when determining whether or not people will die should make people wonder if maybe there is a better solution somewhere out there. It should make people wonder if someone else's decision making could have more of an impact as to whether or not people die. Maybe Hamas has that choice. And maybe nations supporting Hamas have a choice whether or not they facilitate Hamas's goals. In the trolley problem, when you divert the trolley, the people on track A don't die. Your choice to not do an action has a direct consequence. In the real world, there is no connection between your decision of pulling the lever or not pulling the lever and the death of the next people who are going to die on track A. As you said yourself, they are going to die regardless. So therefore, the only thing that pulling the lever does is kill people on track B also. Kind of. You are correct that the real world switch is not binary. It's not "A or B" in reality. However, the dismantling of Hamas's power base will greatly reduce the numbers of deaths on track A which is why Israel is throwing the switch to track B.
I think there's ample reason to believe that this is not why Israel is throwing the switch to track B. It is not fitting with their attitude up to this point, with the constant declarations of numerous people in the government, with the leaked plans that we have seen (one of which literally says that it is preferable to end up with a status quo where Hamas still rules Gaza than to have a situation where the PA rules Gaza, if those are the only two options left), or more generally with the ideology of fascist governments.
On November 08 2023 05:53 RenSC2 wrote:
Morally, my answer is to sidestep the initial question of the Trolley problem. The person at the lever is faultless, whether they pull it or not. There could be 1 person on track A and 1 million people on track B, I still won't fault them if they pull that lever. The blame falls squarely on the people who tied a million people to the track and then sent a trolley. The people who did that are Hamas.
I think it's difficult to assign all of the blame to the person launching the trolley if the person who switches the lever is like "SWEET! Now I get to kill a bunch of people!"
Similarly I wouldn't find it very persuasive if you told me that Israel's occupation of Palestine is the launching of the trolley, and Hamas fighting back is just them pushing a lever so there's nothing wrong with Hamas. It's a bit silly.
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On November 08 2023 06:01 Liquid`Drone wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 05:53 RenSC2 wrote:On November 08 2023 05:45 Liquid`Drone wrote:
The 'numbers dead' is actually an, if not the essential component of the trolley problem. Then sometimes people make adjustments like 'but what if it's 5 85 year old nazis on one track and one saintly 20 year old woman poised to cure cancer on the other'. So phrasing this as a trolley problem basically necessitates one of two to justify 'pulling the lever': Either pulling the lever reduces the amount of people killed (and so far, reasonable people will agree that the retaliations has killed more than 5 times as many people than Hamas has killed in the past 15 years), or Israeli lives are worth more than Gazan lives. I can be on board with the notion that a) Israeli civilian lives are worth more than those of Hamas soldiers, and I can understand that Israel cares more about Israeli lives than they do about Palestinian lives, but myself, I don't think Isreali civilians are worth more than Palestinian civilians and no matter how you slice it and how you're going to calculate 'who is a combatant' and if you're gonna insist that Hamas is inflating the numbers, more Palestinian civilians have died than Israeli civilians.
Thus pulling the lever is not trolley-problem-justified. Morally, my answer is to sidestep the initial question of the Trolley problem. The person at the lever is faultless, whether they pull it or not. There could be 1 person on track A and 1 million people on track B, I still won't fault them if they pull that lever. The blame falls squarely on the people who tied a million people to the track and then sent a trolley. The people who did that are Hamas. Hamas is responsible for 4000 or 10000 or whatever the number of dead Palestinians right now. As soon as everyone accepts that Hamas is the one responsible, then there is a path forward. So if Israel nuked Gaza, would that still be on Hamas? To be clear, I don't think this is your position. But the way you are constructing/framing your argument seems to be giving Israel a free pass to kill 'as many civilians as necessary'. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with Israel retaliating with military action against Hamas, and I'm not necessarily faulting them for all civilian losses on the Gaza strip, but I am also by no means convinced that Israel does everything it can possibly do to minimize civilian losses and I do believe Israel at the very least shares responsibility for a bunch of the civilian casualties seen. I also believe a more patient response would yield better results (I also don't think there's any possibility of Hamas launching a new attack in the next say, 2 months, so there's no ticking bomb about to explode), which could also allow for fewer civilian deaths.
It would still be Hamas's fault, yes. That doesn't mean Israel should do it. Israel should do what it takes to eliminate Hamas as an immediate threat while minimizing their own losses, but not do more than is necessary. Prevent Hamas from putting any more people on the tracks, not kill everyone they could potentially put on those tracks.
I suggested very early in this thread that the best option would be a long term (50+ years) occupation of Gaza by Israel. Up to this point, Israel has treated Gaza like a prison, except they've merely kept the prisoners inside to rule themselves while Israel has stayed on the outside. As expected, the prison ended up being run by the biggest assholes in it. That's not how any good prison is run. Israel needs to get in there and actually administer the prison and work towards reform.
It's a huge undertaking and I understand why they haven't done it before, but now is the time. If they can enlist an international coalition to help, that would be better. A good start would be simple things like creating schools that are used for educating kids, not for launching rockets. Hospitals for treating the sick, not for storing ammunition. Apartment complexes for giving people safe places to live, not as secret entrances to tunnel systems full of weapons.
After the initial resistance, I think a lot of Palestinians would realize that life is a lot better under Israeli rule than Hamas rule.
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@RenSC2
I think the way people are reading your position is that you're in favor of Israel killing Gazan citizens disproportionately in the pursuit of destroying Hamas.
Is that actually your position?
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On November 08 2023 05:45 Liquid`Drone wrote:
The 'numbers dead' is actually an, if not the essential component of the trolley problem. Then sometimes people make adjustments like 'but what if it's 5 85 year old nazis on one track and one saintly 20 year old woman poised to cure cancer on the other'. So phrasing this as a trolley problem basically necessitates one of two to justify 'pulling the lever': Either pulling the lever reduces the amount of people killed (and so far, reasonable people will agree that the retaliations has killed more than 5 times as many people than Hamas has killed in the past 15 years), or Israeli lives are worth more than Gazan lives. I can be on board with the notion that a) Israeli civilian lives are worth more than those of Hamas soldiers, and I can understand that Israel cares more about Israeli lives than they do about Palestinian lives, but myself, I don't think Isreali civilians are worth more than Palestinian civilians and no matter how you slice it and how you're going to calculate 'who is a combatant' and if you're gonna insist that Hamas is inflating the numbers, more Palestinian civilians have died than Israeli civilians.
Thus pulling the lever is not trolley-problem-justified.
It is dishonest for you to pretend its just that people don't think Gaza civilians have equal worth to Israeli civilians. No one is saying that. I won't speak for others, but what I have said from the beginning is that it is ridiculous to pretend Israel should be willing to have civilians culled every so often for the sake of preventing Palestinian civilians from dying.
The goal is to take away Hamas's control of land because Hamas controlling land greatly enhanced their ability to conduct their October 7 attack. Since Hamas has indicated they plan to repeat October 7, Israel is reasonable in trying to take measures to prevent that from happening.
Israel's neighbors have said they will not take steps to take land away from Hamas.
Iran and Qatar have indicated they will not take steps to take land away from Hamas.
The nations with the power to take land away from Hamas without killing Palestinian civilians are declining to do so. So literally no one is recommending any form of action be taken to take land away from Hamas. No nation in Israel's position would choose to allow Hamas to continue controlling land. Is this where the disconnect is? You think there are nations with moral philosophies that would respond to October 7 happening them with pacifism? They would allow everyone else to collectively decide not to take land away from Hamas, accept the idea that October 7 will happen again, and just kinda leave things like that?
If the Swedish government coordinated an exact duplicate of the October 7 attack on Norway, committed all the same violence, then posted videos of it on social media and congratulated their soldiers for all the great work, would Norway take steps to remove Sweden's government from power? Would they want Swedish leadership to answer for those crimes?
What if Norway said "We demand the Swedish government who coordinated the October 7 attack against Norway resign. We demand Sweden take steps to prevent that political party from ever coordinating attacks like that in the future"
And then Sweden replied with "No, we hate you. Your grandparents illegally formed Norway 75 years ago by stealing what you call "Norway" from Sweden. Your grandparents stole the land from Sweden, but you are deciding to keep living there. All current inhabitants of Norway are morally deserving of death for declining to move away from "Norway" once they learned Norwegians took that land from Sweden 75 years ago. Once we finish killing all of the Norwegians in "Norway", we will take that land and then focus our attention on killing Norwegians living overseas. "
It would not be reasonable to ask Norway to just chill out and accept the Swedish government as-is. Norway would demand that political party be entirely removed from power. People are asking Israel to tolerate Hamas continuing to rule Gaza. No one is providing a method for removing Hamas from power. It is not reasonable to ask Israel to just say "ok no problem. You guys are definitely right that my grandparents were assholes. I should probably just move away, as recommended by Sweden"
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Norway28598 Posts
I'm not actually saying that people are claiming Palestinian civilians are worth less than Israeli civilians. I'm saying the support of attacking Gaza to oust Hamas on the grounds of saving civilian lives is inconsistent with the belief that both are worth equally much, because even accepting the inevitability of Hamas kililng Israeli civilians, there's nothing indicating that they would kill more Israeli civilians than what is being killed as consequence of the current retaliatory attack on Gaza. (Whether this is because Hamas uses civilians as human shields or because Israel is too careless with their attacks is irrelevant to this particular discussion - the civilians would not die if Israel did not attack).
I think it's entirely reasonable for Israel to value Israeli civilians more than they value Palestinian civilians (although I might disagree with the ratio), but I don't. I mean, I actually genuinely do not think Norwegians are inherently more valuable than people from Yemen, but I still got way more emotionally affected by July 22nd than I get by reading about the war in Yemen, even though the death toll is like 2000 times higher. So again, while I actually think a position of pacifism could have been a fantastic response to this, it wasn't one I expected, I understand that it wouldn't have been politically feasible, and I think you can argue that a military response was justified. But even accepting that, this doesn't mean 'all palestinian civilian deaths are inevitable and nothing Israel does can be subject to critique because ultimately their hand is forced by Hamas', I think that's genuinely an insane position to take. There's a reason why they were seemingly strong armed into at least allowing some food and water to flow into the Gaza strip, and why they didn't actually invade 24 hours after issuing the command to leave within 24 hours.
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On November 08 2023 07:02 Liquid`Drone wrote:
I'm not actually saying that people are claiming Palestinian civilians are worth less than Israeli civilians. I'm saying the support of attacking Gaza to oust Hamas on the grounds of saving civilian lives is inconsistent with the belief that both are worth equally much, because even accepting the inevitability of Hamas kililng Israeli civilians, there's nothing indicating that they would kill more Israeli civilians than what is being killed as consequence of the current retaliatory attack on Gaza. (Whether this is because Hamas uses civilians as human shields or because Israel is too careless with their attacks is irrelevant to this particular discussion - the civilians would not die if Israel did not attack).
I think it's entirely reasonable for Israel to value Israeli civilians more than they value Palestinian civilians (although I might disagree with the ratio), but I don't. I mean, I actually genuinely do not think Norwegians are inherently more valuable than people from Yemen, but I still got way more emotionally affected by July 22nd than I get by reading about the war in Yemen, even though the death toll is like 2000 times higher. So again, while I actually think a position of pacifism could have been a fantastic response to this, it wasn't one I expected, I understand that it wouldn't have been politically feasible, and I think you can argue that a military response was justified. But even accepting that, this doesn't mean 'all palestinian civilian deaths are inevitable and nothing Israel does can be subject to critique because ultimately their hand is forced by Hamas', I think that's genuinely an insane position to take. There's a reason why they were seemingly strong armed into at least allowing some food and water to flow into the Gaza strip, and why they didn't actually invade 24 hours after issuing the command to leave within 24 hours.
It sounds like we're just misunderstanding each other then. My impression is that we have concrete proof Israel is taking a non-zero amount of steps to prevent Palestinian civilian deaths. The information you and I have is of course extremely incomplete, but I think both of us have read plenty of information indicating they are taking steps to protect civilians but also deciding to allow civilian deaths "when necessary" to kill members of Hamas.
Any conclusions we try to reach beyond that is foolish. We don't have specific info as to which decisions Israel is making based on which info. We don't have a good answer for how many Palestinian lives should be prioritized over the wider goal of eliminating Hamas and thus saving a non-zero amount of Israeli lives. If we can't define the metrics and we can't quantify the inputs, all we can really do is agree Israel is doing more than zero but clearly still deciding to let civilians die.
And sure, it is of course reasonable for you personally to view Israeli and Palestinian lives as equal. But that is unrelated to the discussion of "how should the Israeli military handle Hamas".
Just to be clear, my only point is: In the absence of anyone else providing any solution whatsoever, Israel is within their right to prioritize their own lives over those of Palestinians by prioritizing elimination of Hamas above protecting Palestinian lives.
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On November 08 2023 06:41 RenSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 06:01 Liquid`Drone wrote:On November 08 2023 05:53 RenSC2 wrote:On November 08 2023 05:45 Liquid`Drone wrote:
The 'numbers dead' is actually an, if not the essential component of the trolley problem. Then sometimes people make adjustments like 'but what if it's 5 85 year old nazis on one track and one saintly 20 year old woman poised to cure cancer on the other'. So phrasing this as a trolley problem basically necessitates one of two to justify 'pulling the lever': Either pulling the lever reduces the amount of people killed (and so far, reasonable people will agree that the retaliations has killed more than 5 times as many people than Hamas has killed in the past 15 years), or Israeli lives are worth more than Gazan lives. I can be on board with the notion that a) Israeli civilian lives are worth more than those of Hamas soldiers, and I can understand that Israel cares more about Israeli lives than they do about Palestinian lives, but myself, I don't think Isreali civilians are worth more than Palestinian civilians and no matter how you slice it and how you're going to calculate 'who is a combatant' and if you're gonna insist that Hamas is inflating the numbers, more Palestinian civilians have died than Israeli civilians.
Thus pulling the lever is not trolley-problem-justified. Morally, my answer is to sidestep the initial question of the Trolley problem. The person at the lever is faultless, whether they pull it or not. There could be 1 person on track A and 1 million people on track B, I still won't fault them if they pull that lever. The blame falls squarely on the people who tied a million people to the track and then sent a trolley. The people who did that are Hamas. Hamas is responsible for 4000 or 10000 or whatever the number of dead Palestinians right now. As soon as everyone accepts that Hamas is the one responsible, then there is a path forward. So if Israel nuked Gaza, would that still be on Hamas? To be clear, I don't think this is your position. But the way you are constructing/framing your argument seems to be giving Israel a free pass to kill 'as many civilians as necessary'. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with Israel retaliating with military action against Hamas, and I'm not necessarily faulting them for all civilian losses on the Gaza strip, but I am also by no means convinced that Israel does everything it can possibly do to minimize civilian losses and I do believe Israel at the very least shares responsibility for a bunch of the civilian casualties seen. I also believe a more patient response would yield better results (I also don't think there's any possibility of Hamas launching a new attack in the next say, 2 months, so there's no ticking bomb about to explode), which could also allow for fewer civilian deaths. I suggested very early in this thread that the best option would be a long term (50+ years) occupation of Gaza by Israel. Up to this point, Israel has treated Gaza like a prison, except they've merely kept the prisoners inside to rule themselves while Israel has stayed on the outside. As expected, the prison ended up being run by the biggest assholes in it. That's not how any good prison is run. Israel needs to get in there and actually administer the prison and work towards reform. It's a huge undertaking and I understand why they haven't done it before, but now is the time. If they can enlist an international coalition to help, that would be better. A good start would be simple things like creating schools that are used for educating kids, not for launching rockets. Hospitals for treating the sick, not for storing ammunition. Apartment complexes for giving people safe places to live, not as secret entrances to tunnel systems full of weapons. After the initial resistance, I think a lot of Palestinians would realize that life is a lot better under Israeli rule than Hamas rule.
Doesn't it scare you when you look at what's happening in the land that Israel has been occupying for 50 years, where both the attitude of Israel and the realizations that Palestinians have made are very different from what you hope for?
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On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
The idea that innocent people of one tribe have to be killed to ensure another tribe's continued existence is the foundation of ideologies like the one of the Nazis. It's also an idea that has been rejected by many democratic countries after WW2 revealed the actual truth: killing innocent people never leads to anything good.
It doesn't matter whether it is Hamas or the Israeli administration that uses this foundation. It's wrong either way.
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On November 08 2023 07:32 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
The idea that innocent people of one tribe have to be killed to ensure another tribe's continued existence is the foundation of ideologies like the one of the Nazis. It's also an idea that has been rejected by many democratic countries after WW2 revealed the actual truth: killing innocent people never leads to anything good. It doesn't matter whether it is Hamas or the Israeli administration that uses this foundation. It's wrong either way.
This feels a bit too broad. This would mean the armies that fought the Nazis were also morally failing when they killed Nazis. Absolute pacifism is not reasonable or realistic. Are you saying Israel should adopt an entirely pacifist approach here?
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On November 08 2023 07:38 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 07:32 Magic Powers wrote:On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
The idea that innocent people of one tribe have to be killed to ensure another tribe's continued existence is the foundation of ideologies like the one of the Nazis. It's also an idea that has been rejected by many democratic countries after WW2 revealed the actual truth: killing innocent people never leads to anything good. It doesn't matter whether it is Hamas or the Israeli administration that uses this foundation. It's wrong either way. This feels a bit too broad. This would mean the armies that fought the Nazis were also morally failing when they killed Nazis. Absolute pacifism is not reasonable or realistic. Are you saying Israel should adopt an entirely pacifist approach here?
The allied nations were morally failing indeed. They killed an unbelievable amount of innocent civilians with the explicit purpose of weakening the Axis powers. The bombing campaigns were designed not only to destroy civilian infrastructure, but also to kill civilians. They didn't even hide their intent. With hindsight it turned out that this was neither pragmatically nor morally the correct decision.
The allied nations weren't "the good guys". It can be argued that they were significantly less evil. But good they were demonstrably not.
Israel is following that same doctrine at this moment.
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On November 08 2023 07:51 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 07:38 Mohdoo wrote:On November 08 2023 07:32 Magic Powers wrote:On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
The idea that innocent people of one tribe have to be killed to ensure another tribe's continued existence is the foundation of ideologies like the one of the Nazis. It's also an idea that has been rejected by many democratic countries after WW2 revealed the actual truth: killing innocent people never leads to anything good. It doesn't matter whether it is Hamas or the Israeli administration that uses this foundation. It's wrong either way. This feels a bit too broad. This would mean the armies that fought the Nazis were also morally failing when they killed Nazis. Absolute pacifism is not reasonable or realistic. Are you saying Israel should adopt an entirely pacifist approach here? The allied nations were morally failing indeed. They killed an unbelievable amount of innocent civilians with the explicit purpose of weakening the Axis powers. The bombing campaigns were designed not only to destroy civilian infrastructure, but also to kill civilians. They didn't even hide their intent. With hindsight it turned out that this was neither pragmatically nor morally the correct decision. The allied nations weren't "the good guys". It can be argued that they were significantly less evil. But good they were demonstrably not. Israel is following that same doctrine at this moment.
Also pointing out that you talked about killing innocent civilians and he answered "but then you can't kill nazis", which is a bit weird.
But yes Dresden Hiroshima or Nagasaki were atrocities as well, this is not very difficult. I believe we had this conversation in the thread a few years back.
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Norway28598 Posts
On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
There are two things I imagine would change my values.
1: If Hamas' capabilities matched their intentions. If I actually believed they were in a position of possibly eradicating Israel, I'd be much more supportive of a much harsher response. I think in WW2 the case for ignoring German and Japanese civilian casualties if it improved the chance of ultimately winning the war was a very strong one because these were genocidal regimes with the power to back it up. Hamas on the other hand generally kills a small double digit number of Israelis every year. I understand that October 7th changes the equation, but I reject the idea that new October 7th are inevitably going to happen every year if Hamas isn't killed.
2: If I believed that Muslim opposition to Israel was entirely static and independent of Israel's actions. I don't. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly muslims who are fundamentally opposed to Israel existing where it does, but my experience from talking to muslims is that most are pragmatically opposed to Israel: Their opposition is grounded in Israel oppressing other muslims. My experience talking to Norwegians who have visited the west bank (my mother being one of them), or reading interviews with South Africans who experienced apartheid, is that apartheid is an appropriate term to use when describing the Palestinian experience - that is, the West Bank experience. The one in Gaza is significantly worse. So, I also believe it would be possible for Israel, through altering its policies, especially regarding settlers/settlements, to receive less opposition in the muslim world than they do, and that it is possible to eventually find some degree of lasting peace.
What I do not believe, is that the 16 million jews of the world are in a position where they want an increasingly antagonistic relationship with the 1.8 billion muslims. Even if Israel itself is so militarily powerful that it can hold its own, that's not a promising long term prospect. And I think the actions currently taken to weaken/oust Hamas are building resentment that will ultimately be more harmful to Israel than what Hamas itself is capable of being.
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United States42255 Posts
There aren’t innocent civilians in a total war. That’s what makes a total war horrific. The entire population is mobilized and seconded to the war effort. No non participants.
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On November 08 2023 07:51 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On November 08 2023 07:38 Mohdoo wrote:On November 08 2023 07:32 Magic Powers wrote:On November 08 2023 07:23 JimmiC wrote:
Would your values change if they were Nazi sympathizers? Because this is how Israel and Jews around the world view the Palestinians choosing to stay in the high danger areas. You have Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis and so on who have all openly stated their goals of killing every Jew in the world and have already effectively done so in areas where they hold the power. They also have no proved that it is not just rhetoric to after Israel but that they have the will and means to carry out effective horrific attacks.
I understand that some people think that Israel will be able to successfully defend themselves against future attacks. But is it realistic for them to be expected to do that forever? Will they be able too or eventually will they be overrun? These are the questions Israeli's are asking themselves and I do not know the answers, I'm not sure why some of you are so certain.
The idea that innocent people of one tribe have to be killed to ensure another tribe's continued existence is the foundation of ideologies like the one of the Nazis. It's also an idea that has been rejected by many democratic countries after WW2 revealed the actual truth: killing innocent people never leads to anything good. It doesn't matter whether it is Hamas or the Israeli administration that uses this foundation. It's wrong either way. This feels a bit too broad. This would mean the armies that fought the Nazis were also morally failing when they killed Nazis. Absolute pacifism is not reasonable or realistic. Are you saying Israel should adopt an entirely pacifist approach here? The allied nations were morally failing indeed. They killed an unbelievable amount of innocent civilians with the explicit purpose of weakening the Axis powers. The bombing campaigns were designed not only to destroy civilian infrastructure, but also to kill civilians. They didn't even hide their intent. With hindsight it turned out that this was neither pragmatically nor morally the correct decision. The allied nations weren't "the good guys". It can be argued that they were significantly less evil. But good they were demonstrably not. Israel is following that same doctrine at this moment.
So wait, just to be clear: Are you saying Israel should adopt a zero-violence protocol here? Are you saying all violence, regardless of the situational factors, is unethical?
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On May 19 2021 16:50 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On May 19 2021 16:43 Magic Powers wrote:On May 19 2021 16:13 Broetchenholer wrote:
Dear Magic Powers, did you just say that that the deliberate bombing of a non military target, maximised to kill the population and destroy the civilian infrastructure with no military value except for terror, like the bombing run on Dresden and others, is the fault of the Germans? Are you sure? Not the fault of "the Germans", but the fault of "Germany", i.e. the German leadership, which is the Nazis, Hitler being the head of it. So, your position is, if Israel would start blasting Gaza with speakers saying "As long as you keep firing rockets, this will continue!" and then proceeds to drop explosive bombs followed by incendiary bombs into one sector of Gaza. And then the next sector. And the next. And the next. Until there is either no Gaza left, or there are no rockets flying into Israel anymore. There's context missing from your question. Depending on whether or not Hamas has sent rocket strikes prior to Israel "blasting Gaza" as you put it, and depending on what targets Israel would choose in retaliation to those strikes, the answer that I'd give would change depending on that information. This would be the responsibility of Hamas for firing rockets into israel and no blame would go to the IDF? And if that is not okay, why do you think Dresden was okay? Would you allow for Dresden again? Germany (not Germans, see my response to the first paragraph) had been waging an aggressive war against Britain and other countries, including the heavy bombardment of innocent and defenseless British towns that were not militarily relevant locations in order to kill and frustrate the population. Britain had no choice other than to retaliate with full force. What should else should Britain have done? Germany was committing war crime after war crime and conquering land after land, showing no regard for the lives of innocent people. Tell me what better options Britain had. The better option to firebombing the civilian population of Dresden would be not firebombing the civilian population of Dresden. Not only would it save on fuel and reduce carbon emissions, it would also avoid a hundred thousand people dying in a firestorm.
I liked this guy more, what happened to him
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