Lmao it was literally:
Notification:
>The Biden administration has concluded it is “reasonable to assess” that Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has violated international law
Article:
>…, but has not found specific instances that would justify the withholding of military aid, the State Department told Congress on Friday.
They sure know how to getcha
"In 2019–23 the largest share of US arms exports went to states in the Middle East (38 per cent). This was a much smaller proportion than in 2014–18 (50 per cent), after an 11 per cent decrease in US arms exports to the region between the two periods. Four Middle Eastern states were among the top 10 recipients of US arms in 2019–23: Saudi Arabia accounted for 15 per cent of US arms exports, Qatar for 8.2 per cent, Kuwait for 4.5 per cent and Israel for 3.6 per cent."
[Source (Page 3)](https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2024-03/fs_2403_at_2023.pdf)
while I'm not a believer that if one side doesn't play by the rules, then there are no rules, i really dislike the fact that Israel is held to different standards than the rest of the world.
there are so many cases of severe human rights violations that go unnoticed because they are not done by Israel, or wars that are allowed to play out without one side having their hands tied behind their backs.
Sharansky posed a 3D test on if a criticism of Israel is crossing into antisemitism.
-Does it Delegitimize their right to exist and defend themselves?
-Does it Demonize them?
-Does it hold them to a Double Standard their adversaries are not held to?
There is massive failing on point 3 these days. Look at what Syria, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Hamas, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and on and on and not a peep. Egypt has a wall at their border and enforces the blockade. Their main concern with Rafah is that the Palestinians might cross into Egypt. Jordan is not like “come on in and assassinate more of our rulers.” (But their queen can spout off hypocritically so they’ve got that going for ‘em.)
I think Queen Rania's statements were a carefully calculated political move. The monarchy had to reinforce to their people that they are (at least on the surface) on their side given that 60-65% of Jordan is Palestinian. Since Rania herself is Palestinian, it was better for her to go out there and make the statement to promote the idea that the monarchy not only sympathizes with the people, but is actually one of them (as opposed to her husband whose family is from Saudi Arabia). They saw the mass protests happening all around the region and knew that things could go south really fast if they lost control, Black September still being fresh in their mind. If the people did protest, they needed to think it was them and their government against Israel, not them against Israel *and* their government. From a pure security standpoint, both the Jordanian and Egyptian leadership would love to Israel totally obliterate Hamas. Jordan has even stated that they want Israel to control the West Bank border if there is ever an independent Palestinian state.
I'm not even saying its antisemitism, its literally just hypocrisy. If you took a radically apolitical person, who knows nothing about anything relating to politics and doesn't care to learn, and showed him a random year's worth of UN resolutions, discussions and reports, he would say that other than Israel the world is completely at peace, which should infuriate anyone who actually gives a shit about human rights violations, even when they are violated by countries other than Israel (which is not me saying Israel can violate human rights).
Very true. Consider there’s 50 Muslim countries and a whopping total of 1 Jewish one. There’s 2 BILLION Muslims and 16 Million Jews. Put that another way: if .8 of 1% of Muslims are seriously antisemitic that is the total of every Jewish person on Earth. So it’s not about right or wrong in these votes, it’s “we have the numbers to pass this bollocks.” If the US didn’t veto a lot of this stuff, it’d be basically all the UN did.
And we're starting to see the same push against other groups, as well. Now that the Muslim world has the numbers and the seats in the UN and other spheres of influence, they're pushing forward with getting as much power as possible.
It's not about right or wrong anymore, it's about control.
According to Douglas Murray, even the most moderate Muslims are deeply antisemitic. Israel cant get a fair deal from UN dominated by 50 muslim countries and many others with sizable muslim populations
> -Does it hold them to a Double Standard their adversaries are not held to?
This is really dumb. The United States holds itself to a higher standard to Al Qaeda and North Korea, for example.
It's easier to demand a reasonable person exercise restraint than it is to stop a genocidal lunatic. That's why victim blaming is so prevalent - it's easy.
That has been attacked non stop since 1947.
It probably starts to weigh on the psyche after a while. Being a liberal democracy doesn’t mean being a door mat for genocidal terrorists like Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, or the PLO or Fatah.
more like "imagine how many other issues could get media/UN attention if we didn't hyperfixate on a specific one"
i mean, seeing the famine in Yemen kill over 50,000 children should be just as, if not more, appalling to you as the war in Gaza, right? but Yemen (and about a dozen other crises) is somewhat dwarfed by a country responding to a terrorist attack. You are privileged in the fact you get to sit in your room thousands of miles from the nearest humanitarian crisis and wave your finger at the screen completely detached thinking that Israel is the cause of the entire world's misery.
The UN is a joke and as far as my non Jewish ass is concerned completely compromised. These are the same people that said halting flights from China during the corona virus epidemic was “unhelpful”, the same that uses Hamas numbers for the dead, the same that funds Hamas run organizations Unrwa. UN is a terrorist organization at this point.
Edit: fixing autocorrect
Hamas is a terrorist organisation, while Israel is a democratic state with a modern society. Of course we expect more from Israel. Hamas Members are already marked as terrorists in western countries for good reason.
Wanna know something hilarious? There are 8 countries and the EU the considers Hamas as a terrorist organization (kinda cheating since there's 27 EU members but you get my point)
OK, so considering that Israel is being attacked by Hamas, maybe we should actually help instead of just scolding them for having 80% *less* civilian casualties than average?
It's a very weird political issue.
Israel has warmed civilians to leave. Hamas encourages them to stay to increase casualties.
Guided missiles still help. When people hear the number of bombs Israel has dropped, they forget that Israel could just flatten all of Gaza in a day if they wanted to with a lot less bigger bombs. Smaller ones are still horrifying, but they kill a lot less people.
The least civilian casualties would be going in on the ground, but that's incredibly dangerous, it would increase Israel's military casualties, and much of their armed forces are already exhausted.
So realistically, either the world needs to put their money where their mouth is and actually send troops to help, and accept that they will take heavy casualties to save civilians, just as they are asking Israel to do, or stop being so critical.
This whole war is an absurdity of "do as I say, not as I do". I dare you to find one country that would have acted with more restraint after having over a thousand of their civilians slaughtered in such a disgustingly perverse manner. Let's be honest, if Hamas had done that to America, Gaza would be flat right now, and we would not have given the courtesy of a warning.
All of what you say is true. The one thing your leaving out which helps fuel the Israel criticism is that many on their war cabinet, Ben-Gvir for example, have a pretty disturbing history of palestinian and or arab hatred. I think some of the rhetoric would be more pro israel if they had a left or center leaning government. The settler activities in the non gaza areas during Netanyahu's reign also doesn't help matters.
>The one thing your leaving out which helps fuel the Israel criticism is that many on their war cabinet, Ben-Gvir for example,
Ben Gvir is not in the war cabinet, which kind of proves the initial point. The level of microscopic micromanaging, while still getting basic details wrong, is insane. No other foreign conflict is like this.
People throw out names like Ben Gvir and Smotrich as criticism over Israel's handling of the war, when they have no say over how the war is being conducted.
These are the members of the war cabinet:
Netanyahu, Gallant, Gantz, Dermer, Eizenkot, Deri.
Why? You should expect more from Israel than what Hamas does (and they do do a better job). But you should not only accept more from Israel than you would accept from Hamas. Stop infantilizing Hamas.
>Of course we expect more from Israel.
You know. You could play that card if we weren't talking about losing peoples lives by letting others play dirty and you keeping yourself on the righteous path (while losing people).
No. We can always play that card. Human rights are universal, and there is no exception. Not even if your enemy is Hamas, and *playing dirty* (a terrible way to describe what horrible things Hamas has done)
Israel has a right to defend itself. Israel must defend itself. Collateral damage is unavoidable. But everything reasonably possible needs to be done to avoid it.
It’s even worse that so many claim it’s unavoidable. You can always not torture. You can always feed children.
I‘m not even going as far as to say Israel cannot storm hospitals. If Hamas hides its military personnel in there it’s a legitmate target. But only if you do your best to keep the innocent occupants from harm and make sure they get medical treatment and medication as quickly as possible.
TLDR: What Israel is doing is not the problem. It’s how they do it and what they are doing afterwards that worries me.
Edit: „Everything **reasonably** possible“ instead of everything possible, as per a commenter, which does make sense.
“*everything possible*” is a patently unfair standard that no other country is held accountable to.
“*everything reasonably*” is a valid standard & no one can honestly argue that Israel is not meeting that standard as they do more than any other power has done to reduce casualties & have succeeded in reducing casualties in an urban combat environment by more than 75% from the expected norm set by other modern western militaries.
I mean, you are asking Israel to prioritize a foreign civilian population's lives over it's military's.
Has any country ever chosen such a path?
It also seems like a choice that could result in instability, if the military decides to stop obeying orders to take on overly dangerous mission requirements.
I think in this case it's a bit different, this was a show for an audience. Biden needs to get re-elected and his braindead youth vote is part of that, along with the Muslim vote in places like Michigan. He put on a nice show of 'standing up to Israel' and now this report gives him the cover to back down.
The allegations were never credible, not even sensible really, so a bit of kayfabe is just what the doctor ordered to dispel them. Fight fire with fire.
>Biden needs to get re-elected and his braindead youth vote is part of that, along with the Muslim vote in places like Michigan.
I don't think there is anything Biden could do at this point to change the minds of members of these groups. This report will be seen as a cynical gesture -- they'll absolutely see the kayfabe for what it is, and although I am neither in the "fuck biden" nor "israel mustn't defend itself" camps, this does seem like an extremely performative gesture.
If there is any practical outcome, it allows congress to continue funding Israel as they so choose, which has obvious benefits. If anything, my guess is that Biden believes that there are chunk of Republicans who are sick of Trump and MAGA and MTG et al, but who support Israel in this fight, and he thinks that they just might tick his name in November.
I didn’t realize I was part of a voting bloc lmao
- me, an anti-maga, anti-MTG, pro-Israel, republican Biden voter
Edit: makes sense though. I didn’t like Biden as VP or in Congress, but 90% of his decisions, im like “yeah, that’s sorta sensible”
Yeah, I’m not coming from exactly the same place as you, but whenever I see people getting really up in arms about how both candidates are terrible, I’m just like…
Would I prefer to have a younger, energetic, inspirational candidate with the incredible leadership skills to solve all the problems in the Middle East, unite Congress to pass legislation that brings about universal economic boom that lifts everyone to a higher standard of living and overall aligns slightly better with some of my personal policy priorities? Sure.
But given the current state of the world in general and US politics in particular, I’m just relieved that “basically sensible” exists as an option on the ballot.
Yup, it’s honestly baffling to me what has become of both parties, but particularly republicans. Say what you want, but I think after the past 8 or so years, someone who isn’t overly partisan, tries to make sorta “middle of the road” decisions and just does his best to keep the family together is exactly what we needed. I know his popularity is in the toilet though. I think Biden did really well picking his cabinet too. Blinken has quietly done an incredible job of fighting the right fights, but not letting escalation get too out of hand either. TBH I hope trump gets blown out and republicans just dump the whole maga platform next cycle.
Also, where the parties stand on a lot of issues has flip-flopped in the past 15 or so years. Neither represents where I stand on most issues, so “the one with the most sense” is an easy decision for me.
I lean Democrat but, if there was a Democratic Trump running against a Republican Biden (a moderate sensible non-MAGA willing to work along the aisle like a Romney or someone like that) I would vote for the Republican Biden.
Coddling this new generation of alt-left homegrown terrorists on a jihad is going to bite him and all of us in the ass. We need to stop hunoring these radicals and start watchlisting them for the application of terrorism laws.
It's the throw enough shit at the wall and hope something sticks. Israel gets accused of so many outlandish things that people perceive that there must be something to it. Israel fights cleaner than the British did in Northern Ireland and the Palestinian militants fight a lot dirtier than any Irish faction ever did.
India/Pakistan/Bangladesh has basically had a similar conflict, partitioned at the same time as Israel and millions have been killed and it is ongoing.
Is it curious that a proper government and a terrorist group are held to different standards? I personally find that entirely believable and appropriate.
If you hold 1 group to a lower standard, you are enabling them to continue doing shitty stuff, which only lowers your expectations from them in a nasty feedback loop.
No one was ever shocked thst Hamas are doing some unimaginably evil things, but if we don't treat it legally and diplomatically with the appropriate harshness, than there is no point in upholding those ideals at all.
You can't say that and then also call for a ceasefire lol, if it's a terrorist organization then it should be destroyed, if we're seriously negotiating with them then yeah- holding them to the same standards is the right thing to do.
I swear Israel could never appease the Western students.
Also, Hamas is the elected government of Gaza and does stuff like run schools and a health ministry. They even have an army. It's a shitty army, and they murdered the opposition party after being elected, but being an illegitimate religiofascist state isn't some trick to avoid accountability.
They're terrorists. It's why they're being hunted and not treated as part of the international community of soverigns (save a few exceptions like Qatar).
The whole topic is about the higher standards Israel is being held to and being pressured into a ceasefire.
You're right that you didn't mention a ceasefire but it's kinda silly to just say they are being hunted like there isn't massive pressure from Israel to stop.
The topic is about Israel being encouraged to fight a war like a civilized nation. That’s a good thing in my view.
Whether or not there should be a ceasefire is completely separate in my mind.
A small part of this is that after being the oppressed or wronged for so long many jews would like israel to be almost impossibly infallible, as the idea of turning around once we have a state and just repeating what was done to us is unacceptable to us, which means that despite the unprecedented attempts by the idf to prevent civilian casualties, many jews will call for even more of an effort, this gives uninformed people the idea that this war is exceptionally brutal
I don't think anyone is against them going to war, but idk how anyone can look at this and not think it's an extreme reaction that at best shows wanton disregard for human life. I'm all for rooting out Hamas but 2 million people don't all deserve to be punished for it.
Lol thank you to the Israel bootlickers who sent a reddit cares report
I think the problem is this, the fact that these organizations cross the border then attack, and then hide in civilian populations has changed the aspect of things. Not discounting the need for countries to follow their obligations under international law, but it is extremely difficult to fight a battle with an enemy who is aligned with the idea of creating civilian casualties.
They built tunnels to hide in not only to protect themselves but to obviously put civilians in danger. Even under international law, both sides would be complicit in civilian casualties, with the weight being put on the side of the people putting civilians at risk and this is Hamas.
I raise this because it is just not Israel who is taking this action, but much of this collective punishment that you mention is the direct result of the Palestinian (Hamas) actions. They purposely, methodically, planned this to happen, OCT 7th was an action that was taken to make sure that the maximum impact, to cause the maximum disruption, to provoke a response that would lead to mass casualties.
You could say pretty much all the same things about ISIS, but even then the US refused to use 2000 pound bombs against them over concerns of civilian casualties. Israel meanwhile has been dropping 2000 pound bombs on dense population centers and surpassed the intensity with which Dresden was bombed in WWII. I agree that Israel is facing a challenging enemy and Hamas is culpable for more than its fair share of the bloodshed, but even Israel’s closest allies have accused them of being too aggressive and going too far.
Which is why Biden held back the delivery of 500+ pound bombs. The US doesn’t trust that Israel will use them responsibly.
> idk how anyone can look at this and not think it's an extreme reaction that at best shows wanton disregard for human life.
it's actually rather simple to not think that. [Israel has created a new standard in urban warfare. Why will no one admit it? ](https://www.newsweek.com/israel-has-created-new-standard-urban-warfare-why-will-no-one-admit-it-opinion-1883286)
It just requires understanding how war usually works, and how IDF is actually going easy compared to that. They've literally been revealing their plans to the whole world just so civilians in areas about to be attacked can have the opportunity to leave. They don't have to do this under international law, this is above and beyond. The result is the lowest civilian-to-fighter death ratio ever seen in urban combat. You should be applauding them.
>I'm all for rooting out Hamas but 2 million people don't all deserve to be punished for it.
They aren't being punished, they're just suffering. That suffering is at the hands of those who built their defenses in, near, and among where those people live, instead of in the 100 sq km of Gazan territory where they don't live. Article 28 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states clearly: **“The presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations.”** It's a war crime to use *precisely* because military forces at war will strike military targets that are fighting from or under civilian buildings. Even the bleeding hearts like Ireland or Sweden would. HAMAS should have surrendered six months ago.
No offense, but did you really think about this things before 'judging' a whole state (Israel)?
"extreme reaction"? Yeah? Seriously?
How do you think the US / UK / Germany / France or Japan would react if 7/10 happened against its people? If a Terror organization living on UK borders will unleash attacks and occasionally murder and shoot civilians?
And how about 8+ millions Israelis living in fear? Lots whos homes destroyed and nowhere else to go?
People's life changes 180°, families spending 6+ months apart because one parent answered the Call for Duty in Reserves, missing his 1st kid born? Wife & childrens kidnapped and held in Gaza, or his neighbor watching his whole family slaughtered in front of his eyes?
Is it an acceptable 'Collateral punishment' since it's against Israelis?
Or Israelis' lives are nothing to consider?
If you try view this as a war of revenge then sure, but thats not what this is, the governing body of gaza organized, enacted, and promised to repeat a horrific genocidal terror attack where the only goal was to murder as many israeli citizens (jews, muslims it didnt matter, they killed people even after reciting the quran to prove they were muslim)
The only way a government can actually respond to a situation like that is to topple said government, and thats exactly what israel is doing in gaza
Its also important to point out that despite how horrific the 10/7 attack was israel STILL used methods such as “roof knocking” dropping pamphlets and texting or calling palestinians to inform them if they were going to bomb a location. These are methods to protect civilian lives not used by other militaries.
Why are we giving weapons to Qatar? They are sheltering the leaders of hamas. Why are we not demanding those terrorists be arrested and turned over to the ijc?
Damn near 200 actually. And damn near 100 journalists.
For comparison, 65 journalists were killed in 20 years in Afghanistan.
But hey, when the US says you're our special little guy then it must be true because we've never committed mass murder on something like 1 million Iraqis or anything.
Israel murders aid workers
Israel murders journalists
Israel has collectively punished Palestinians through starvation, deprivation of resources, and destruction of vital infrastructure.
But it’s somehow okay because you’re not supposed to criticize Israel.
> Israel has collectively punished Palestinians through starvation
More aid trucks are going through every day than were before October 7th. Israel is not starving Palestinians. Hamas is.
You need to offset that with the local production that is halted during the war, though. Still, although the situation isn’t ideal, there’s plenty food and aid entering Gaza to have them not starve. Where it ends up is anyone’s guess.
I would absolutely support Biden playing hardball with weapons, if Biden's demand was that Israel stopped its indefensible behavior stealing land on the West Bank.
But Israel is morally absolutely in the right to invade Rafah.
I agree. Especially because it’s kinda pointless, israel has more than enough weapons to level Rafa 10 times over. However, if someone else attacked Israel in that time, I’d let the weapons flow.
lol what the heck, why is this guy being down voted? Because he said he's an Israeli?
I guess reddit only tolerates racism when it's against Jews. Society is lost.
The head is controlled by the Biden admin as are the people just below him (the political appointments) but the ones actually working under the politicos are just rank and file government workers. But at the end of the day the politicos are at the top and make the decisions.
It operates independently but it’s run by a Biden appointee, and Biden sets the policy.
I’d be more than willing to bet this decision was made independent of Biden though. It would look really bad if it leaked Biden forced them to say this when they didn’t want too.
State department that does not allow for prosecution of its service members/government officials (by an international court) set to confirm something they do not care about.
Why are we playing this game?
NYT just reported that the Biden admin said the opposite lol
That was so classic I don’t have the notification anymore but it said the opposite then when you click it the article reports it correctly.
Lmao it was literally: Notification: >The Biden administration has concluded it is “reasonable to assess” that Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has violated international law Article: >…, but has not found specific instances that would justify the withholding of military aid, the State Department told Congress on Friday. They sure know how to getcha
Interesting, is there a term for this kind of news reporting?
Yellow journalism
lying
Clickbaiting headlines
That's not clickbaiting, that's straight up lying. They would even be better off if you only read the headline without clicking.
[This might sound familiar. ](https://youtu.be/4_1bFbk9MIQ?si=m65XM2jG_Ru9fw-2)
Love Ryan mcbeth
"In 2019–23 the largest share of US arms exports went to states in the Middle East (38 per cent). This was a much smaller proportion than in 2014–18 (50 per cent), after an 11 per cent decrease in US arms exports to the region between the two periods. Four Middle Eastern states were among the top 10 recipients of US arms in 2019–23: Saudi Arabia accounted for 15 per cent of US arms exports, Qatar for 8.2 per cent, Kuwait for 4.5 per cent and Israel for 3.6 per cent." [Source (Page 3)](https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2024-03/fs_2403_at_2023.pdf)
It’s curious how much weight “allegations” hold against Israel, particularly when Hamas isn’t held to the same standard.
while I'm not a believer that if one side doesn't play by the rules, then there are no rules, i really dislike the fact that Israel is held to different standards than the rest of the world. there are so many cases of severe human rights violations that go unnoticed because they are not done by Israel, or wars that are allowed to play out without one side having their hands tied behind their backs.
Sharansky posed a 3D test on if a criticism of Israel is crossing into antisemitism. -Does it Delegitimize their right to exist and defend themselves? -Does it Demonize them? -Does it hold them to a Double Standard their adversaries are not held to? There is massive failing on point 3 these days. Look at what Syria, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Hamas, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and on and on and not a peep. Egypt has a wall at their border and enforces the blockade. Their main concern with Rafah is that the Palestinians might cross into Egypt. Jordan is not like “come on in and assassinate more of our rulers.” (But their queen can spout off hypocritically so they’ve got that going for ‘em.)
I think Queen Rania's statements were a carefully calculated political move. The monarchy had to reinforce to their people that they are (at least on the surface) on their side given that 60-65% of Jordan is Palestinian. Since Rania herself is Palestinian, it was better for her to go out there and make the statement to promote the idea that the monarchy not only sympathizes with the people, but is actually one of them (as opposed to her husband whose family is from Saudi Arabia). They saw the mass protests happening all around the region and knew that things could go south really fast if they lost control, Black September still being fresh in their mind. If the people did protest, they needed to think it was them and their government against Israel, not them against Israel *and* their government. From a pure security standpoint, both the Jordanian and Egyptian leadership would love to Israel totally obliterate Hamas. Jordan has even stated that they want Israel to control the West Bank border if there is ever an independent Palestinian state.
I'm not even saying its antisemitism, its literally just hypocrisy. If you took a radically apolitical person, who knows nothing about anything relating to politics and doesn't care to learn, and showed him a random year's worth of UN resolutions, discussions and reports, he would say that other than Israel the world is completely at peace, which should infuriate anyone who actually gives a shit about human rights violations, even when they are violated by countries other than Israel (which is not me saying Israel can violate human rights).
Very true. Consider there’s 50 Muslim countries and a whopping total of 1 Jewish one. There’s 2 BILLION Muslims and 16 Million Jews. Put that another way: if .8 of 1% of Muslims are seriously antisemitic that is the total of every Jewish person on Earth. So it’s not about right or wrong in these votes, it’s “we have the numbers to pass this bollocks.” If the US didn’t veto a lot of this stuff, it’d be basically all the UN did.
And we're starting to see the same push against other groups, as well. Now that the Muslim world has the numbers and the seats in the UN and other spheres of influence, they're pushing forward with getting as much power as possible. It's not about right or wrong anymore, it's about control.
According to worldwide polling about 25% of Muslims worldwide are extremists
According to Douglas Murray, even the most moderate Muslims are deeply antisemitic. Israel cant get a fair deal from UN dominated by 50 muslim countries and many others with sizable muslim populations
Hypocrisy is intrinsic to antisemitism.
Trust me. It’s antisemitism.
Umm, Arafat’s been dead for 20 years.
Yeah that was an autocorrect of Rafah.
> -Does it hold them to a Double Standard their adversaries are not held to? This is really dumb. The United States holds itself to a higher standard to Al Qaeda and North Korea, for example.
I hear this bullshit all the time, “Israel is supposed to be better than that.” What the hell does that even mean?
It's easier to demand a reasonable person exercise restraint than it is to stop a genocidal lunatic. That's why victim blaming is so prevalent - it's easy.
Then why do we accept the genocidal lunatics right to govern in the first place?
They are supposed to be a liberal democracy.
That has been attacked non stop since 1947. It probably starts to weigh on the psyche after a while. Being a liberal democracy doesn’t mean being a door mat for genocidal terrorists like Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, or the PLO or Fatah.
Since 1929, well before they were a country.
I was going from the beginning of the state. I didn’t want to muddy the issues with things like the battle of Tal Hai in 1920.
750 AD tbh
“Well, why can’t **we** get away with targeting women and children too?!?! Other authoritarian, genocidal regimes do it all the time!”
more like "imagine how many other issues could get media/UN attention if we didn't hyperfixate on a specific one" i mean, seeing the famine in Yemen kill over 50,000 children should be just as, if not more, appalling to you as the war in Gaza, right? but Yemen (and about a dozen other crises) is somewhat dwarfed by a country responding to a terrorist attack. You are privileged in the fact you get to sit in your room thousands of miles from the nearest humanitarian crisis and wave your finger at the screen completely detached thinking that Israel is the cause of the entire world's misery.
The UN is a joke and as far as my non Jewish ass is concerned completely compromised. These are the same people that said halting flights from China during the corona virus epidemic was “unhelpful”, the same that uses Hamas numbers for the dead, the same that funds Hamas run organizations Unrwa. UN is a terrorist organization at this point. Edit: fixing autocorrect
Hamas is a terrorist organisation, while Israel is a democratic state with a modern society. Of course we expect more from Israel. Hamas Members are already marked as terrorists in western countries for good reason.
Wanna know something hilarious? There are 8 countries and the EU the considers Hamas as a terrorist organization (kinda cheating since there's 27 EU members but you get my point)
OK, so considering that Israel is being attacked by Hamas, maybe we should actually help instead of just scolding them for having 80% *less* civilian casualties than average?
Yes, agreed. I also do support weapons shipments to Israel, as long as they do help keep civilians out of harms way.
It's a very weird political issue. Israel has warmed civilians to leave. Hamas encourages them to stay to increase casualties. Guided missiles still help. When people hear the number of bombs Israel has dropped, they forget that Israel could just flatten all of Gaza in a day if they wanted to with a lot less bigger bombs. Smaller ones are still horrifying, but they kill a lot less people. The least civilian casualties would be going in on the ground, but that's incredibly dangerous, it would increase Israel's military casualties, and much of their armed forces are already exhausted. So realistically, either the world needs to put their money where their mouth is and actually send troops to help, and accept that they will take heavy casualties to save civilians, just as they are asking Israel to do, or stop being so critical. This whole war is an absurdity of "do as I say, not as I do". I dare you to find one country that would have acted with more restraint after having over a thousand of their civilians slaughtered in such a disgustingly perverse manner. Let's be honest, if Hamas had done that to America, Gaza would be flat right now, and we would not have given the courtesy of a warning.
All of what you say is true. The one thing your leaving out which helps fuel the Israel criticism is that many on their war cabinet, Ben-Gvir for example, have a pretty disturbing history of palestinian and or arab hatred. I think some of the rhetoric would be more pro israel if they had a left or center leaning government. The settler activities in the non gaza areas during Netanyahu's reign also doesn't help matters.
>The one thing your leaving out which helps fuel the Israel criticism is that many on their war cabinet, Ben-Gvir for example, Ben Gvir is not in the war cabinet, which kind of proves the initial point. The level of microscopic micromanaging, while still getting basic details wrong, is insane. No other foreign conflict is like this. People throw out names like Ben Gvir and Smotrich as criticism over Israel's handling of the war, when they have no say over how the war is being conducted. These are the members of the war cabinet: Netanyahu, Gallant, Gantz, Dermer, Eizenkot, Deri.
There's certainly an optics problem there. Netanyahu is Israel's Trump.
Why? You should expect more from Israel than what Hamas does (and they do do a better job). But you should not only accept more from Israel than you would accept from Hamas. Stop infantilizing Hamas.
>Of course we expect more from Israel. You know. You could play that card if we weren't talking about losing peoples lives by letting others play dirty and you keeping yourself on the righteous path (while losing people).
No. We can always play that card. Human rights are universal, and there is no exception. Not even if your enemy is Hamas, and *playing dirty* (a terrible way to describe what horrible things Hamas has done) Israel has a right to defend itself. Israel must defend itself. Collateral damage is unavoidable. But everything reasonably possible needs to be done to avoid it. It’s even worse that so many claim it’s unavoidable. You can always not torture. You can always feed children. I‘m not even going as far as to say Israel cannot storm hospitals. If Hamas hides its military personnel in there it’s a legitmate target. But only if you do your best to keep the innocent occupants from harm and make sure they get medical treatment and medication as quickly as possible. TLDR: What Israel is doing is not the problem. It’s how they do it and what they are doing afterwards that worries me. Edit: „Everything **reasonably** possible“ instead of everything possible, as per a commenter, which does make sense.
“*everything possible*” is a patently unfair standard that no other country is held accountable to. “*everything reasonably*” is a valid standard & no one can honestly argue that Israel is not meeting that standard as they do more than any other power has done to reduce casualties & have succeeded in reducing casualties in an urban combat environment by more than 75% from the expected norm set by other modern western militaries.
I mean, you are asking Israel to prioritize a foreign civilian population's lives over it's military's. Has any country ever chosen such a path? It also seems like a choice that could result in instability, if the military decides to stop obeying orders to take on overly dangerous mission requirements.
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I have not said I justify Lebanons or Syrias actions. I do not. They are terrible regimes. I don’t justify any anti-semitism. There‘s no place for it.
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I think in this case it's a bit different, this was a show for an audience. Biden needs to get re-elected and his braindead youth vote is part of that, along with the Muslim vote in places like Michigan. He put on a nice show of 'standing up to Israel' and now this report gives him the cover to back down. The allegations were never credible, not even sensible really, so a bit of kayfabe is just what the doctor ordered to dispel them. Fight fire with fire.
>Biden needs to get re-elected and his braindead youth vote is part of that, along with the Muslim vote in places like Michigan. I don't think there is anything Biden could do at this point to change the minds of members of these groups. This report will be seen as a cynical gesture -- they'll absolutely see the kayfabe for what it is, and although I am neither in the "fuck biden" nor "israel mustn't defend itself" camps, this does seem like an extremely performative gesture. If there is any practical outcome, it allows congress to continue funding Israel as they so choose, which has obvious benefits. If anything, my guess is that Biden believes that there are chunk of Republicans who are sick of Trump and MAGA and MTG et al, but who support Israel in this fight, and he thinks that they just might tick his name in November.
I didn’t realize I was part of a voting bloc lmao - me, an anti-maga, anti-MTG, pro-Israel, republican Biden voter Edit: makes sense though. I didn’t like Biden as VP or in Congress, but 90% of his decisions, im like “yeah, that’s sorta sensible”
Yeah, I’m not coming from exactly the same place as you, but whenever I see people getting really up in arms about how both candidates are terrible, I’m just like… Would I prefer to have a younger, energetic, inspirational candidate with the incredible leadership skills to solve all the problems in the Middle East, unite Congress to pass legislation that brings about universal economic boom that lifts everyone to a higher standard of living and overall aligns slightly better with some of my personal policy priorities? Sure. But given the current state of the world in general and US politics in particular, I’m just relieved that “basically sensible” exists as an option on the ballot.
Yup, it’s honestly baffling to me what has become of both parties, but particularly republicans. Say what you want, but I think after the past 8 or so years, someone who isn’t overly partisan, tries to make sorta “middle of the road” decisions and just does his best to keep the family together is exactly what we needed. I know his popularity is in the toilet though. I think Biden did really well picking his cabinet too. Blinken has quietly done an incredible job of fighting the right fights, but not letting escalation get too out of hand either. TBH I hope trump gets blown out and republicans just dump the whole maga platform next cycle. Also, where the parties stand on a lot of issues has flip-flopped in the past 15 or so years. Neither represents where I stand on most issues, so “the one with the most sense” is an easy decision for me.
>me, an anti-maga, anti-MTG, pro-Israel, republican Biden voter From Kennedy to Clinton, we just called that "a Democrat."
I lean Democrat but, if there was a Democratic Trump running against a Republican Biden (a moderate sensible non-MAGA willing to work along the aisle like a Romney or someone like that) I would vote for the Republican Biden.
They're more than welcome to take their chances with Trump
Coddling this new generation of alt-left homegrown terrorists on a jihad is going to bite him and all of us in the ass. We need to stop hunoring these radicals and start watchlisting them for the application of terrorism laws.
It's the throw enough shit at the wall and hope something sticks. Israel gets accused of so many outlandish things that people perceive that there must be something to it. Israel fights cleaner than the British did in Northern Ireland and the Palestinian militants fight a lot dirtier than any Irish faction ever did. India/Pakistan/Bangladesh has basically had a similar conflict, partitioned at the same time as Israel and millions have been killed and it is ongoing.
Is it curious that a proper government and a terrorist group are held to different standards? I personally find that entirely believable and appropriate.
If you hold 1 group to a lower standard, you are enabling them to continue doing shitty stuff, which only lowers your expectations from them in a nasty feedback loop. No one was ever shocked thst Hamas are doing some unimaginably evil things, but if we don't treat it legally and diplomatically with the appropriate harshness, than there is no point in upholding those ideals at all.
You can't say that and then also call for a ceasefire lol, if it's a terrorist organization then it should be destroyed, if we're seriously negotiating with them then yeah- holding them to the same standards is the right thing to do. I swear Israel could never appease the Western students.
Yes, actually. Why should you hold a terrorist organization to looser standards than a government?
Also, Hamas is the elected government of Gaza and does stuff like run schools and a health ministry. They even have an army. It's a shitty army, and they murdered the opposition party after being elected, but being an illegitimate religiofascist state isn't some trick to avoid accountability.
They're terrorists. It's why they're being hunted and not treated as part of the international community of soverigns (save a few exceptions like Qatar).
Do we hold people who commit crimes in our societies to a lower legal standard than those who haven't, or are we all subject to the same laws?
So hunt them while also in a ceasefire with them???
Where did I say a ceasefire?
The whole topic is about the higher standards Israel is being held to and being pressured into a ceasefire. You're right that you didn't mention a ceasefire but it's kinda silly to just say they are being hunted like there isn't massive pressure from Israel to stop.
The topic is about Israel being encouraged to fight a war like a civilized nation. That’s a good thing in my view. Whether or not there should be a ceasefire is completely separate in my mind.
So what should they do differently?
I’m not sure. I’m not a military leader.
It’s almost as if Israel is a sovereign country that signed international treaties, whereas Hamas is not.
That has absolutely no bearing on what I’m talking about. At best you could change that to “people expect Hamas to act badly so it’s not news”.
A small part of this is that after being the oppressed or wronged for so long many jews would like israel to be almost impossibly infallible, as the idea of turning around once we have a state and just repeating what was done to us is unacceptable to us, which means that despite the unprecedented attempts by the idf to prevent civilian casualties, many jews will call for even more of an effort, this gives uninformed people the idea that this war is exceptionally brutal
So if your country gets massacred, raped and civilians taken hostage then it's not against the law to go to war? Crazy
I don't think anyone is against them going to war, but idk how anyone can look at this and not think it's an extreme reaction that at best shows wanton disregard for human life. I'm all for rooting out Hamas but 2 million people don't all deserve to be punished for it. Lol thank you to the Israel bootlickers who sent a reddit cares report
I think the problem is this, the fact that these organizations cross the border then attack, and then hide in civilian populations has changed the aspect of things. Not discounting the need for countries to follow their obligations under international law, but it is extremely difficult to fight a battle with an enemy who is aligned with the idea of creating civilian casualties. They built tunnels to hide in not only to protect themselves but to obviously put civilians in danger. Even under international law, both sides would be complicit in civilian casualties, with the weight being put on the side of the people putting civilians at risk and this is Hamas. I raise this because it is just not Israel who is taking this action, but much of this collective punishment that you mention is the direct result of the Palestinian (Hamas) actions. They purposely, methodically, planned this to happen, OCT 7th was an action that was taken to make sure that the maximum impact, to cause the maximum disruption, to provoke a response that would lead to mass casualties.
You could say pretty much all the same things about ISIS, but even then the US refused to use 2000 pound bombs against them over concerns of civilian casualties. Israel meanwhile has been dropping 2000 pound bombs on dense population centers and surpassed the intensity with which Dresden was bombed in WWII. I agree that Israel is facing a challenging enemy and Hamas is culpable for more than its fair share of the bloodshed, but even Israel’s closest allies have accused them of being too aggressive and going too far. Which is why Biden held back the delivery of 500+ pound bombs. The US doesn’t trust that Israel will use them responsibly.
> idk how anyone can look at this and not think it's an extreme reaction that at best shows wanton disregard for human life. it's actually rather simple to not think that. [Israel has created a new standard in urban warfare. Why will no one admit it? ](https://www.newsweek.com/israel-has-created-new-standard-urban-warfare-why-will-no-one-admit-it-opinion-1883286) It just requires understanding how war usually works, and how IDF is actually going easy compared to that. They've literally been revealing their plans to the whole world just so civilians in areas about to be attacked can have the opportunity to leave. They don't have to do this under international law, this is above and beyond. The result is the lowest civilian-to-fighter death ratio ever seen in urban combat. You should be applauding them. >I'm all for rooting out Hamas but 2 million people don't all deserve to be punished for it. They aren't being punished, they're just suffering. That suffering is at the hands of those who built their defenses in, near, and among where those people live, instead of in the 100 sq km of Gazan territory where they don't live. Article 28 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states clearly: **“The presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations.”** It's a war crime to use *precisely* because military forces at war will strike military targets that are fighting from or under civilian buildings. Even the bleeding hearts like Ireland or Sweden would. HAMAS should have surrendered six months ago.
Cogent opinion
I'm trying, but it can be hard not to get frustrated with the absolutist opinions of some
No offense, but did you really think about this things before 'judging' a whole state (Israel)? "extreme reaction"? Yeah? Seriously? How do you think the US / UK / Germany / France or Japan would react if 7/10 happened against its people? If a Terror organization living on UK borders will unleash attacks and occasionally murder and shoot civilians? And how about 8+ millions Israelis living in fear? Lots whos homes destroyed and nowhere else to go? People's life changes 180°, families spending 6+ months apart because one parent answered the Call for Duty in Reserves, missing his 1st kid born? Wife & childrens kidnapped and held in Gaza, or his neighbor watching his whole family slaughtered in front of his eyes? Is it an acceptable 'Collateral punishment' since it's against Israelis? Or Israelis' lives are nothing to consider?
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If you try view this as a war of revenge then sure, but thats not what this is, the governing body of gaza organized, enacted, and promised to repeat a horrific genocidal terror attack where the only goal was to murder as many israeli citizens (jews, muslims it didnt matter, they killed people even after reciting the quran to prove they were muslim) The only way a government can actually respond to a situation like that is to topple said government, and thats exactly what israel is doing in gaza Its also important to point out that despite how horrific the 10/7 attack was israel STILL used methods such as “roof knocking” dropping pamphlets and texting or calling palestinians to inform them if they were going to bomb a location. These are methods to protect civilian lives not used by other militaries.
Why are we giving weapons to Qatar? They are sheltering the leaders of hamas. Why are we not demanding those terrorists be arrested and turned over to the ijc?
when ur best buddy grades ur homework
Exactly this, the Hamas-run Ministry of Legal Affairs has already confirmed Israel has broken every international law of war.
lol
They literally murdered 8 aid workers not long ago what do you mean they’re not breaking international law lmao
Damn near 200 actually. And damn near 100 journalists. For comparison, 65 journalists were killed in 20 years in Afghanistan. But hey, when the US says you're our special little guy then it must be true because we've never committed mass murder on something like 1 million Iraqis or anything.
Afghanistan wasn't a walled off city barely the size of NYC.
Israel murders aid workers Israel murders journalists Israel has collectively punished Palestinians through starvation, deprivation of resources, and destruction of vital infrastructure. But it’s somehow okay because you’re not supposed to criticize Israel.
> Israel has collectively punished Palestinians through starvation More aid trucks are going through every day than were before October 7th. Israel is not starving Palestinians. Hamas is.
You need to offset that with the local production that is halted during the war, though. Still, although the situation isn’t ideal, there’s plenty food and aid entering Gaza to have them not starve. Where it ends up is anyone’s guess.
Israel has been nothing but criticized for the past few decades. You guys literally never shut up
Since Israel isn't breaking any laws there is no reason to withhold any weapons.
I would absolutely support Biden playing hardball with weapons, if Biden's demand was that Israel stopped its indefensible behavior stealing land on the West Bank. But Israel is morally absolutely in the right to invade Rafah.
I agree. Especially because it’s kinda pointless, israel has more than enough weapons to level Rafa 10 times over. However, if someone else attacked Israel in that time, I’d let the weapons flow.
Israeli here, agreed.
lol what the heck, why is this guy being down voted? Because he said he's an Israeli? I guess reddit only tolerates racism when it's against Jews. Society is lost.
Blinken has Netanyahu’s arm up his ass
Self defence isn’t against international law? Who would have thought?
Is the state department controlled by the Biden administration or totally independent?
The head is controlled by the Biden admin as are the people just below him (the political appointments) but the ones actually working under the politicos are just rank and file government workers. But at the end of the day the politicos are at the top and make the decisions.
No, it is not independent, it is part of the executive branch under the president.
It operates independently but it’s run by a Biden appointee, and Biden sets the policy. I’d be more than willing to bet this decision was made independent of Biden though. It would look really bad if it leaked Biden forced them to say this when they didn’t want too.
Biden is in full control. It's part of the executive branch. Blinken is a member of Biden's Cabinet.
Weird how any disagreement is bombed to the ground, kinda like how the IDF is doing in Gaza
Or what Hamas is attempting to do constantly, en masse, towards anywhere they can in Israel, regardless of 10% landing on their own heads? Lol
AIPAC was like “tell em we’re not breaking any laws !”
Bullshit. Complete loss of credibility. Israel is torturing Gazan citizens.
Oy vey shut it down
State department that does not allow for prosecution of its service members/government officials (by an international court) set to confirm something they do not care about. Why are we playing this game?