Israel-Hamas War 2023

[crazy canuck]

If you can have a "Israel! Stop killing innocents!" march it seems you could also have a "Hamas! Stop killing innocents!" march.

Except that's clearly pointless. They're a terrorist group controlling an open air prison and the government is already in agreement with the position that they're very naughty boys.

With Israel on the other hand they are still a democracy, they're a normalish country with a functional economy, and in theory influencable by western pressure, and western governments do give them too much leeway.

So it's pointless to protest against violent evil organisations? Gotcha'

The Palestinian people are a "violent evil organization"? 

This is the problem with people having such a simplistic view of what is happening. But I suppose it is a good indicator of why the acts of Israel engaging in collective punishment of everyone in Gaza is being defended here.

To restate again, HAMAS is not the Palestinian people and the Palestinian people are not HAMAS.

Woa are we all of a sudden equating Hamas with the Palestinian people? I am confused.

So am I.  You expressed frustration with the fact that the "government" of Gaza had launched an attack on Israel and that fact went unremarked.

It is clearly an terrorist organization and always has been.  The only thing really approaching a governmental organization in Gaza is the UN.

HAMAS simply won a power struggle against other Palestinian groups in the early 2000s and has kept a strangle hold on Gaza every since. Those who suggest that it is in any way a representative government misunderstand the situation.

[Grey Fox]

You are moving the goal posts.

[Tamas]

You are moving the goal posts.

Indeed. Hamas is not the government of Gaza, they simply took power over Gaza and are ruling it, and when I talked about Hamas I really talked about the Palestinian people since I guess they are the same thing even though they aren't, and Hamas is not even their government they just rule over them.

I am out CC.

[crazy canuck]

Talking out your ass is most like it.

What so hard to understand, there are probably two dozen Isreali-Americans/US citizens held hostage by hamas and 500-600 Palestinians-Americans who can't get out of Gaza due to the Rafah crossing being closed to them.

I applaud you for continuing to try to explain basic facts. But very few here want to hear anything but Israel is always right and any criticism of Israel is always wrong.

It is scary to see, but that is the world we live in.

I'm not sure why it is so hard for people to understand that it is possible to both condemn HAMAS and have concern for Palestinians. But again that is now the world we live in.

For me what is frustrating and telling is that there is no end to protests and articles about the tragedy that is inevitably unfolding in Gaza. Yet none of those protests or articles (apart from a sentence or two) let alone separate protests/articles aim to address the problem that Hamas -the government of Gaza- perpetrated a terror attack on hundreds if not thousands of Israeli civilians. That is already forgotten and gone from concerns of the general world. It seems if Israel opted to do nothing and simply return to the status quo, passively waiting for the next such massacre, that would be a-ok with a lot of people.

Tamas, if you did not mean to call them the government of Gaza, that is fine.  I accept that you mispoke. 


But I can only respond to what you wrote. 

[Sheilbh]

Yes, and that is what I am also addressing.  Why would anyone think the fact Israel is responding to the attack from HAMAS has been forgotten.  It is repeated on a daily basis.

Yes. But there's a significant amount of denialism that it happened, that it happened as reported or that it was done by Hamas. It's very, very present all over social media.

For example, Asa Winstanley who's been published in The Guardian (many years ago), is a regular speaker at various left events and is author of a book on Corbyn called Weaponising Anti-Semitism posted this today:


Edit: And to be clear this is a guy who's been speaking the last few months at music festivals and events hosted in Meeting Houses - I have no doubt he'll be back at those events soon.

This is the reason the IDF today showed 100 journalists footage, primarily from Go-Pro cameras worn by Hamas attackers, in the hope that that type of reporting will be able to counter denialism. I think in the context of this much and this rapid a spread of a denialist conspiracy theory there is value in simply affirming the fact that it happened, that Hamas did it and that they killed and kidnappend people.

Tamas, if you did not mean to call them the government of Gaza, that is fine.  I accept that you mispoke. 

I don't really understand how they're not.

[Barrister]

Clearly Hamas is the de facto government of Gaza.  I'm not sure how anyone can claim otherwise.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I had a social event this weekend with a lot of leftists from, amongst other places, Malmö. The capital of Jew-hatred and a very muslim-heavy city.

In that circle Israel was talked about, laughed at and joked about as Jewish nazi babykillers. Hamas is right to protest.

I did not say anything as that would have made me persona non grata. Today I read about children getting their eyes gouged out in front of their parent and the vice versa by Hamas.

I would guess that protests in the west against Israel is probably very very very heavy with Hamas-supporters. And useful idiots.

Being the son of a European and having spent a large % of the first 25 years of my life over in Euroland, something that I found really surprising there was how you had a broad agreement that things like Nazism and the Holocaust were great, inexcusable evil--but massively more "casual antisemitism" than I have ever seen in the United States. To a degree I think most Americans would find surprising.

However, that part of my life is way in the rearview mirror now--so my personal experiences are a good 25 years out of date or more, I think I assumed on some level contemporary Europe was much less antisemitic than what I saw back in the 80s/90s, but sounds like maybe not.

[Razgovory]

Obviously Hamas has nothing to do with Gaza.  The entire population of Gaza is made up of wide-eyed orphans asking for another bowl of gruel.

[viper37]

You are moving the goal posts.

Indeed. Hamas is not the government of Gaza, they simply took power over Gaza and are ruling it, and when I talked about Hamas I really talked about the Palestinian people since I guess they are the same thing even though they aren't, and Hamas is not even their government they just rule over them.

I am out CC.

They are the government of Gaza the same way Saddam Hussein was the leader of Iraq, the same way the Talebans governed Afghanistan in 2001, the same way Khadafi governed Lybia from 1969 to 2011.

I'm not aware of the US intentionally bombing all the civilians in an area when they were targeted by these governments.

[viper37]

Poll: 80% of Israelis say Netanyahu must take public responsibility for Oct. 7 failures

PM still hasn't said publicly that he will shoulder blame; 69% of Likud voters think he should; Yesh Atid MK criticizes leader Lapid, says party needs to join emergency government


The vast majority of Israelis believe Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should publicly accept responsibility for the staggering failures that led to Hamas's devastating onslaught on October 7, according to an opinion poll by the Maariv newspaper published Friday.

Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi and Shin Bet head Ronen Bar have already taken such responsibility, as have Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

Eighty percent of Israelis said Netanyahu, who has not made any public statements accepting responsibility, should follow suit, including 69% of those who voted for the premier's Likud party in last year's election, according to the survey.

Only 8% of the general public think he should not.
Asked who is better suited to be prime minister, 49% picked National Unity party leader Benny Gantz and only 28% picked Netanyahu, with the rest undecided.
Regarding the war in Gaza against the Hamas terror group, 65% of Israelis support a ground offensive in the Strip, while 21% oppose it.
Not going to happen, but interesting nonetheless.

Additionally, 51% backed a large-scale military operation on the northern front following increasing skirmishes with Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon, while 30% want a limited operation.

Asked who they would vote for had elections been held today, the poll again gave abysmal grades to the current coalition — 43 seats compared to their current 64 — with Gantz's party alone soaring to 40 seats from its current 12.
The survey was conducted on October 18 and 19 by the Lazar Institute, along with Panel4All, among 510 respondents constituting a representative sample of adult Israelis. The margin of error was 4.3%.

With Gantz's National Unity party now a member of Netanyahu's emergency wartime government, a senior member of Opposition Leader Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid party criticized his party chief on Friday for refusing to join.

Lapid has declined to join forces with the coalition unless it removes key security-related authorities held by far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir. The coalition has not considered making such a move.

"I hope we enter. I'm doing everything so that we enter the unity government, I think we need to be there," Yesh Atid MK Elazar Stern told Channel 12 news.
Asked if Lapid has erred, Stern replied: "Ask him, I think we need to enter," adding that the answers he has received from the opposition chief on the matter haven't satisfied him.

Last week, Lapid said it's still necessary to "take the extremists out of the government of extremists," and pointed to Ben Gvir and Smotrich, saying their presence in the security cabinet is "no way to make decisions."
The national emergency government has formed a smaller war cabinet — including Gantz and representatives of his party — which is entrusted with powers to set wartime policy and give operational and strategic directives to the security forces.
Lapid has called this "a structure that can't work, it'll just add to the mess," because "instead of one cabinet, [there are] two cabinets that will clash."

Additionally, Lapid has said that the October 7 massacre — which saw at least 1,500 terrorists burst across the border into Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,400 people and seizing 200-250 hostages of all ages under the cover of a deluge of thousands of rockets fired at Israeli towns and cities — was a "failure without reparation."

Lapid said those "who started the failure can't fix it."

[crazy canuck]

Clearly Hamas is the de facto government of Gaza.  I'm not sure how anyone can claim otherwise.

Yes, and that is what I am also addressing.  Why would anyone think the fact Israel is responding to the attack from HAMAS has been forgotten.  It is repeated on a daily basis.

Yes. But there's a significant amount of denialism that it happened, that it happened as reported or that it was done by Hamas. It's very, very present all over social media.

For example, Asa Winstanley who's been published in The Guardian (many years ago), is a regular speaker at various left events and is author of a book on Corbyn called Weaponising Anti-Semitism posted this today:


Edit: And to be clear this is a guy who's been speaking the last few months at music festivals and events hosted in Meeting Houses - I have no doubt he'll be back at those events soon.

This is the reason the IDF today showed 100 journalists footage, primarily from Go-Pro cameras worn by Hamas attackers, in the hope that that type of reporting will be able to counter denialism. I think in the context of this much and this rapid a spread of a denialist conspiracy theory there is value in simply affirming the fact that it happened, that Hamas did it and that they killed and kidnappend people.

Tamas, if you did not mean to call them the government of Gaza, that is fine.  I accept that you mispoke. 

I don't really understand how they're not.

The fact that there is an active misinformation campaign going on which denies HAMAS carried out the attacks is a serious but different issue. 

As to your second point, how is it that an entity can at the same time be an illegal terrorist organization AND a legal government?  How can it be that an illegal terrorist organization who happens to exert control over a territory, no matter what intimidation or threats they might use to exert that power, is all of a sudden given some form of legitimacy as a government?

They are terrorists.  By definition they maintain power through terrorism.  Please explain why you think they can be both a legitimate government (especially since there have been no elections in about 20 years) and an unlawful terrorist organization?

[crazy canuck]

You are moving the goal posts.

Indeed. Hamas is not the government of Gaza, they simply took power over Gaza and are ruling it, and when I talked about Hamas I really talked about the Palestinian people since I guess they are the same thing even though they aren't, and Hamas is not even their government they just rule over them.

I am out CC.

They are the government of Gaza the same way Saddam Hussein was the leader of Iraq, the same way the Talebans governed Afghanistan in 2001, the same way Khadafi governed Lybia from 1969 to 2011.

I'm not aware of the US intentionally bombing all the civilians in an area when they were targeted by these governments.

Right, that is the very point. 

Obviously Hamas has nothing to do with Gaza.  The entire population of Gaza is made up of wide-eyed orphans asking for another bowl of gruel.

Do you think that every Palestinian man, women and child in Gaza is a member or supporter of HAMAS?

[Sheilbh]

The fact that there is an active misinformation campaign going on which denies HAMAS carried out the attacks is a serious but different issue. 

I'm not sure misinformation is the right framing for this.

As to your second point, how is it that an entity can at the same time be an illegal terrorist organization AND a legal government?  How can it be that an illegal terrorist organization who happens to exert control over a territory, no matter what intimidation or threats they might use to exert that power, is all of a sudden given some form of legitimacy as a government?

Illegal to whom? But I'd lean more to the state as an authority that successfully claims a monopoly on the legitimate use of force within a given space. Hamas won an election, in a subsequent civil war they ousted their political rivals and since then (with some brief exceptions when there were attempts at Palestine-wide rapprochement), they have formed the government.

There's no moral character or judgement in whether someone is a government or not.

They are terrorists.  By definition they maintain power through terrorism.  Please explain why you think they can be both a legitimate government (especially since there have been no elections in about 20 years) and an unlawful terrorist organization?

You don't need elections to be a legitimate governments and legitimate governments can maintain power through terror. Legitimate governments exist outside the west and they existed before universal suffrage. Legitimate governance is not an innovation that we've only achieved in the last century (and arguably the vast majority of the human experience has been government maintained by terror, or at least threat).

Additionally in the context of what Hamas would argue which is that it is a war of national liberation there are many examples of states that are terrorists to what they perceive as their oppressor (and collaborators), but that also set up state organisations (including the coercive power of the state) on the people they claim to represent. This was true in post-1916 Ireland or in FLN Algeria, for example - which are both planting bombs, engaging in guerilla warfare and establishing shadow courts and tax collection systems. It is part of both claiming their legitimacy and denying it to their occupying power..

[grumbler]

If you can have a "Israel! Stop killing innocents!" march it seems you could also have a "Hamas! Stop killing innocents!" march.

Except that's clearly pointless. They're a terrorist group controlling an open air prison and the government is already in agreement with the position that they're very naughty boys.

With Israel on the other hand they are still a democracy, they're a normalish country with a functional economy, and in theory influencable by western pressure, and western governments do give them too much leeway.

So it's pointless to protest against violent evil organisations? Gotcha'

The Palestinian people are a "violent evil organization"? 

This is the problem with people having such a simplistic view of what is happening. But I suppose it is a good indicator of why the acts of Israel engaging in collective punishment of everyone in Gaza is being defended here.

To restate again, HAMAS is not the Palestinian people and the Palestinian people are not HAMAS.

Woa are we all of a sudden equating Hamas with the Palestinian people? I am confused.

That's a classic rhetorical trick used by reflexive contrarians:  try to twist the other side's argument into something it is not.  Also known as "the Strawman Fallacy."  Ignore it as having no intellectual weight.

[Josquius]

I went to a few pro-Ukrainian, anti-Russian demonstrations myself - in spite of Russia being about as democratic as Gaza.

I don't buy that argument, Josq.

Except with Ukraine there absolutely is a change in policy western governments can make - more support for Ukraine, more sanctions and seizure of assets for Russia.
It's a situation where the west putting more weight behind Ukraine absolutely can make a difference.
With Hamas the government is already 100% behind Israel and there's not any practical help they actually need.

If you can have a "Israel! Stop killing innocents!" march it seems you could also have a "Hamas! Stop killing innocents!" march.

Except that's clearly pointless. They're a terrorist group controlling an open air prison and the government is already in agreement with the position that they're very naughty boys.

With Israel on the other hand they are still a democracy, they're a normalish country with a functional economy, and in theory influencable by western pressure, and western governments do give them too much leeway.

So it's pointless to protest against violent evil organisations? Gotcha'

It is when the government is already firmly against them and there's not much else they can do.