Harry’s Place

“We’ve already dealt with the ludicrous notion that Israel has acted disproportionately on numerous occasions.” ~ Eamonn McDonut (the stand in for Comical Ali)

Far away from internet La La Land:

The International Committee of the Red Cross accused Israel of failing in its international obligations after its staff were met with “shocking” scenes. One medical team found 12 bodies in a shelled house, and alongside them four very young children, too weak to stand, waiting by their dead mothers, the ICRC said.

Aid workers had been denied access to the site for days, it added.

“This is a shocking incident,” Pierre Wettach, ICRC head for Israel and the Palestinian territories said in a statement.

“The Israeli military must have been aware of the situation but did not assist the wounded. Neither did they make it possible for us or the Palestinian Red Crescent to assist the wounded.”

Meanwhile, the United Nations said it was suspending aid operations in Gaza because of the danger to its staff. “Unwra decided to suspend all its operations in the Gaza Strip because of the increasing hostile actions against its premises and personnel,” a UN spokesman was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying. On Thursday, the UN relief agency Unwra said one person had been killed and two injured when a fork-lift truck on a UN aid mission came under Israeli tank fire at Gaza’s Erez crossing.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7817926.stm

“Inflicting a defeat on Hamas of sufficient proportions to make Gaza as docile as Chechnya is well within Israel’s military capabilities. It’s not going to happen though.”

I agree. And that’s why this argument works on some level. Its not clear that Hamas will be weakened in the long run by this attack. Hezbollah wasn’t. Although it may become more perilous, politically, for Hamas to allow rocket attacks in the future if such attacks are expected to result in such a forceful retaliation. The concrete questions are: Will the rockets stop? If not, will Israel respond like it did this time, immediately? Will Hamas be able to re-arm during the next “ceasefire”?

In the long term we can speculate on the future of Hamas as a political organization. But it seems very hard to predict how “normal” Gazans will change their minds based on this operation, one way or the other.

That was the same UN that was working away in Gaza while the Hamas war criminal rocketeers were in charge.

Methinks they would have been better occupied sending in a force to cart the Hamas war criminals off to the Hague. Then this whole conflict wouldn’t have happened.

“.. the more force and brutality that Israel uses against the Arabs the stronger their reaction will be, in the form of more effective resistance movements with more support from the population.”

This in itself is just nerdish bollocks from someone paraphrasing Ben Kenobi from Return of the Jedi: To Darth Vader “If you strike me down now, I shall become more powerful than you can ever imagine.”

Sorry, just got back from Le Caprice so this may not all make sense…

Love & kisses,

Barad ben Josef Baruch

So the Red Cross and the Unwanted Nobodies are screaming blue murder about Israel - funny there has been a deafening silence these past eight years from these august organisations about the 6000 or so assorted missiles that have rained down on the citizens of Southern Israel. In any event the Red Cross and the UN have themselves committed War Crimes by allowing their facilities to be used by terrorists to carry out these attrocities. Whose for setting up a fund to prosecute them at the International Criminal Court?

Lucky you.

I can’t understand how missiles were launched from Lebanon.

I thought that there was a UN policed ceasefire.

I agree that the presumption that attacking Hamas will only strengthen it is frequently taken to be more self-evident than it actually is - as if no power has ever crushed its opponents. Of course that doesn’t tell us that Israel can be expected to achieve anything that justifies what they are currently doing. Likewise, while opponents of what Israel is doing do often abuse the concept of proportionality, if you think that you have “dealt with” the idea of proportionality, or that the idea is “ludicrous”, you really are a lunatic whom the editors of this site would be well advised not to give space to. There is every possibility that all this death and misery is going to achieve very little, or that what it will achieve does not justify the cost of achieving it, rendering it entirely disproportionate, and it makes perfect sense to argue that what Israel is doing is disproportionate on that basis. In any case, the issue is not cut and dried enough to regard is dealt with and as something you can dismiss. A collection of arguments why what Israel is doing may be proportionate, which is all you have, is not the final word.

Indeed David T given those rockets from the Lebanon were also war crimes I look to the UN investigation on how they occured especially given the UN presence.

Do you think the Red Cross will issue a statement on the Lebanon rockets ?

“I thought that there was a UN policed ceasefire.”

With Hezbollah, no? But not the Palestinian “refugees” they’re now giving their missiles to.

“Lucky you.”

If that was aimed at me, thanks, it was pretty superb actually. Takes my mind off Israel-Palestine and Senagal for a few hours anyway…

You can take me there ;)

That same Red Cross has still not raised so much as a squeak about seeing to the well being of Hamas’s Israeli prisoner of war, Gilad Shalit.

Fuck’em.

Out of interest, how would commentators vote on this question:

Are Israel’s actions in Gaza

A) definitely disproportionate
B) potentially disproportionate, and the balance of evidence suggests so
C) potentially disproportionate, but the balance of evidence suggests not
D) definitely not disproportionate

Proportionality being defined by what’s being done versus what good it’ll do. It’s a bit tricky because its difficult to separate out the extent of disproportionality and your certainty about that extent, but let’s conflate the two - if you think the extent is large, but you still like to admit you’re a fallible person in an uncertain word (hah! few of those round here I fear) then still answer A or D.

“In April 2006, Henry Siegman, former director of the American Jewish Committee, stated that according to “a prominent senior member of Hamas’s Political Committee” Hamas is prepared to explicitly recognize the state of Israel. “Members of Hamas’s political directorate do not preclude significant changes over time in their policies toward Israel and in their founding charter, including recognition of Israel, and even mutual minor border adjustments. Such changes depend on Israel’s recognition of Palestinian rights. Hamas will settle for nothing less than full reciprocity.” These sentiments “are in striking contrast to the odiousness of Hamas’s founding charter,” said Siegman.” Wikipedia

To date, Hamas has signaled recognition of the 67 borders, a small step forward, and negotiated (through Egypt) with Israel resulting in a four and half month total cessation of their rocket and mortar fire in 2008, as verified by the Israelis. It has also implemented previous ceasefires, and stated its willingness to negotiate on other occasions. Carter (and Siegman) have urged that Hamas be included in negotiations.

Meanwhile settlements in the West Bank have continued, even under Olmert, who has denounced the notion of a Greater Israel, and said that Israel needs to withdraw from all the occupied territories. Netanyahu has pledged to step up the settlements if he is elected.

This war will achieve absolutely nothing, accept kill more innocent people, and enrage, disillusion, traumatise and depress many others, while playing to right wing fanatics in Israel, some of whom openly support increased human rights violations against Palestinians.

Henry Siegman, Council on Foreign Relations, 2006:

“Hamas is determined that Palestinian recognition of Israel will not come about without Israel’s recognition of Palestinian national rights, and that only an end to the occupation and Israel’s acceptance of the principle that no changes in the pre-1967 borders can occur without Palestinian agreement (a principle enshrined in the road map that Israel pretends to have accepted) will constitute such recognition.

The most widely respected Israeli security expert, Efraim Halevy, believes Israeli and American efforts to overthrow the Hamas regime are misguided. A hawk who headed Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, under five prime ministers and served as Ariel Sharon’s national security adviser, Mr Halevy is convinced these efforts damage Israel’s vital interests.

His view shocked members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations when Mr Halevy addressed them recently in New York. He has held it for some time. In September 2003, he said Israel should signal to Hamas that if “it enter(s) the fabric of the Palestinian establishment, we will not view that as a negative development. I think that in the end there will be no way around Hamas being a partner in the Palestinian government”. At that time, when Hamas had the support of only a fifth of the Palestinian population, Mr Halevy said: “Anyone who thinks it is possible to ignore such a central element of Palestinian society is simply mistaken.” How much more so today, when Hamas enjoys majority support.

Asked last week on Israeli television how he could justify advocating engagement with a terrorist organisation that does not recognise Israel’s right to exist, Mr Halevy ridiculed the stale assumptions that underlie that question. Do not look at Hamas’s rhetoric, he said, look at what it does: Hamas declared a truce 18 months ago and has committed no terrorist acts against Israel since. In spite of Hamas’s refusal to change its theological rejection of Israel, Ismail Haniyeh, prime minister in the Hamas-led government, ordered his ministers to seek practical co-operation with their Israeli counterparts. Mr Haniyeh also confirmed that Hamas’s self-declared truce is open-ended.

Why should Israel care whether Hamas grants it the right to exist, Mr Halevy asked. Israel exists and Hamas’s recognition or non-recognition neither adds to nor detracts from that irrefutable fact. But 40 years after the 1967 war, a Palestinian state does not exist. The politically consequential question, therefore, is whether Israel recognises a Palestinian right to statehood, not the reverse.”

This is the standard BS - Israel shouldn’t do anything, so people who already hate her won’t…. hate her.

before anybody asks why I am asking that question about Israel not Hamas, I think we can all agree that firing those rockets qualifies as disproportionate; the harm being done might be small, on the scale of things military*, but the good being done isn’t just small, it’s negative.

* I don’t mean those rockets are just a “nuisance”; I’m sure they’re terrifying and make life is misery to those they don’t actually kill, I just mean that on a continuum starting at firing a catapult and ending in carpet bombing, they are toward the catapult end. I wouldn’t want somebody firing a catapult at me either.

Luis - The proportionality of a decision to go to war (jus ad bellum) is not generally determined by the end state of a conflict.

In answer to your question I’m plumping for option D in terms of jus ad bellum and mystery option E “it’s too early to tell, more information please” with regards just in bello.

Typically I add an extra ‘t’ to the second jus (and caught myself doing it again here!). :(

> Barad ben Josef Baruch

Barad?!?

Luis Enrique, you talk a lot of sense.

“This in itself is just nerdish bollocks from someone paraphrasing Ben Kenobi from Return of the Jedi: To Darth Vader “If you strike me down now, I shall become more powerful than you can ever imagine.””

This was in “A New Hope”, not RotJ. Leia´s words to Tarkin (´the more you squeeze…´) could also be of relevance; but considering what happened to Alderan shortly thereafter, perhaps not.

meh,

okay - we need an ex-ante rather than ex-post - you can rephrase my question in terms of expected benefits and expected costs. So, D for you.

Barad?!?

Imagine if his surname was Barak ;)

I see Benjamin we should not have looked at Hitler’s rhetoric but what he was doing. I suppose the 6000 rockets over the past eight years was also rhetoric. Henry Seigman considers every Israeli political party to the right of Meretz to be fascist and Ephraim Halevy thinks he’s Bismarck lucky for us he’e retired!

This is just begging to be bent over a table and given a good fisking, don’t you think?

Nachman

Thanks for your response. One Godwin and two unsupported, rather bizarre allegations about two people I reference in my comment. I hope someone else can do better than that.

Luis Enrique,

Hamas represents three threats: short, medium and long term.

Short term are the rockets it sends, or allows to be sent. These are difficult to address defensively or offensively. 1) is technically difficult and does not stop the source 2) is dangerous, since it entails going after the personnel, equiptment and infrastructure that practise or allow it.

Medium term are other threats, such as digging tunnels to Egypt or Israel. The former smuggle weapons, the latter have been used to attack, kill or kidnap Israeli personnel. The tunnel fight on November 14 2008 was likely addressing such a ‘medium’ term threat.

The long term threat is the growth and development, economically as well as militarily of a state on Israel’s border openly dedicated to her destruction.

All these threats are difficult to address, short of genocide, which Hamas is always gambling Israel will not undertake: if Israel committed genocide in Gaza, Hamas would be hard put to say it had been successful as a ruling administration.

Israel cannot commit genocide, or ethnic cleansing, for all kinds of reasons. But neither can she do nothing.

So, she must do something in between. Thus, the IDF is entering Gaza, on foot, with air, naval and other support, at great risk. It has to act aggressively to both maximise Hamas casualties and minimise Israeli casualties. Compared to Russia or, I suspect, even the US and UK, Israel is doing pretty well.

Some set the bar for Hamas victory pretty low: survival (e.g. Hamas apologist, Jonathan Game) of Hamas and failure of Israel to topple the government.

I’m not so sure. Hizbullah are keeping fairly quiet, so far, in no small part because their recklessness led to their spectacular ‘victory’ in 2006. Israeli kill ratios in their favour is usually 20-1. In summer 2006 it was just under 10-1: Israel made some mistakes.

I’d say all Israel has to do is maximise Hamas casualties and minimise her own, while destroying a fair amount of Hamas infrastructure and personnel (i.e. people).

Then Hamas will have a hard time maintaining her foreign and domestic policy have been a success.

Thus a large part of Israeli policy must lie in deterrence.

Now we hear that UN aid convoys are being ambushed by “rogue?” units of the Israeli army - killing and wounding aid workers. There is only one thing that should be said with all deliberation at present: it is essential that the preparatory work is done to bring Israeli political and military leaders to account at the International War Crimes Tribunal.

Where did you hear that John ? The Jerusalem Post says a Hamas sniper hit the aid truck driver :

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1231424892324&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

BTW - where were you when Hamas was committing war crimes for years by firing rockets at Israel ? Were you calling for a War Crimes tribunal then ? What about when Hezbollah did the same ?

If you did nothing then - when obvious and admitted war crimes were going on - your talk of tribunals now is just pure hypocrisy of the most bizarre kind.

Luis - it’s A, because like Hamas’ rockets (and in your words) “the good being done isn’t just small, it’s negative.”

The only difficult questions that arise from this conflict are tactical - i.e. what can I do about it. It is simply not complicated to interpret what has happened from the perspective of justice or morality.

Try to be more succinct. Thanks.

Anyway - why on earth would the IDF deliberately fire at an aid truck that they had let in to Gaza in the first place, during a voluntary Israeli ceasefire ?

“It is simply not complicated to interpret what has happened from the perspective of justice or morality.”

If it’s so simple, how come you failed?

I don’t know why Tibet is a valid analogy; they never used these types of tactics.

Certainly military operations can reduce the threat level. But there is still very substantial violence in Checnya, just because it is not in a manner than plays to the media (i.e streetfighting) doesn’t mean peace has broken out.

In Western Sahara, diplomacy has led to a ceasefire! Polsario still holds a very large area and has not been especially subject to military reverses. Did you even research these matters?

MMN: I am sorry but this silly kind of debating point does not do justice to the very grave stage were are now at in this massacre/war. The International Red Cross - an organisation which is universally recognised for its refusal to take sides of conflicts - has just said that Israel has broken international humanitarian law. They cite incidents where a house full of dead and injured Palestinian civilians were refused aid by the Israeli forces. If Harry’s Place and - in particular - some of its Israeli controbutors do not understand where this is all leading - you have a very big shock to come.

Well, its rather fascinating, in a disturbing way, to watch pro-Israel folk toss around ideas like genocide and Grozny as solutions. Genocide, or similar, is openly posited as a solution:

All these threats are difficult to address, short of genocide

if Israel committed genocide in Gaza, Hamas would be hard put to say it had been successful as a ruling administration.

Inflicting a smashing military defeat on insurgent organizations… tends to mean the end of serious resistance. Just look at Chechnya, Western Sahara and Tíbet. Not much evidence of renewed, more effective resistance in any of those places.

But then they admit that Israel cannot commit genocide. Interesting mentality.

myopinionfwiw

You don’t need to convince me that Israel has to “do something” about Hamas. I need convincing about what it is doing now. But I’ve have read as much as I can bear to on that subject and still don’t know. If Israel can weaken Hamas enough not just to stop the rockets but also to change the political situation enough to make a lasting peace significantly more likely, then the current horrific carnage might just be justifiable. If all this achieves is a short-term cessation in rocket attacks, I think there were other paths to that destination and this carnage would not be justified by that end. The question of longer term consequences is unanswerable, certainly by us here webmongs (sorry, foul but fun word). My guess is this action brings peace no closer, but I can see how I might be wrong: if the Gazans disown Hamas, or Hamas capitulates, and the Palestinians are pushed towards accepting a settlement Israel may also accept, because they see what continued “resistance” yields. Hence I’m wavering between B and C, but leaning to B. I think Israel is wrong to be doing this. How about you?

Personally I think anybody answering A or D is out of their damn mind. I very much hope that the editors of this blog think the same.

So you’re not interested in investigating Hamas and Hezbollah war crimes re firing rockets into Israel and using human shields then ?

Good to know when you’re coming from.

If there is a tribunal then all the Hamas leaders would be there for a start. They have admitted war crimes by acknowledging the rockets fired into Israel are theirs.

Don’t you agree ?

Luis - my view is that this will end up like after the Lebanon war in 2006 with a peace keeping force in Gaza that makes it very difficult for Hamas to continue firing rockets for risk of international ire and reprisal.

Note that even now in the North Hezbollah has not admitted any rocket fire into Israel.

“my view is that this will end up like after the Lebanon war in 2006 with a peace keeping force in Gaza that makes it very difficult for Hamas to continue firing rockets for risk of international ire and reprisal”

Reprisal being the keyword here. You think the UN force in Lebanon can stop Hizbullah from shooting rockets? That’s one thing I hope Israel learned from that war - Can’t trust a “peace keeping” force (to do its job) further than you can throw it.

“Oh, and if you think that mass slaughter is exactly what Israel has been inflicting on Gaza in recent days, then you haven’t been paying much attention to world history over recent decades.”
Bang on the money.

As for the emaciated family found - how is that explained by the lack of starved families seen before the fighting? Or the healthy Gazans we’ve seen running about in front of Hamas cameras? Or is it too much to assume the possibility that Hamas starved those poor sods to death in a basement, then propped them up and guided the poor (complicit) ICRC reps to the “theatre”?
This is just so fitting to the fantasies being peddled in the West by pro-Hamas media that it makes me suspicious.

We’ve already dealt with the ludicrous notion that Israel has acted disproportionately on numerous occasions.

Did you? I followed the link searching for an argument or evidence that not only is the IDF’s action here not disproportionate - but that to suggest otherwise is ‘ludicrous’. But lo - I found none. Perhaps you could provide a more specific link? As it stands, I think most people will struggle with the notion that what is happening here is proportionate either in terms of the existential threat that Hamas represents to the existence of Israel or in terms of recompense for the recent rocket attacks.

A particularly disturbing phenomenon I’ve noticed is the way some people are getting all post-modern about the use of the word ‘proportion’, as if it were beyond sensible definition. Critics of Israel’s actions here are invited to explain, “What they imagine proportion would look like.” (It goes without saying sentences like this normally carry inverted commas around the word.) I decline to call this sophistry - it doesn’t deserve the name. As if they, we, are the only ones that had questions to answer! But since it’s being asked, I think most people would answer in the negative and say something like this: it certainly doesn’t look like this.

Having explained Israel’s P.R. a few days ago, BBC Paul Reynolds today decodes Hamas P.R. words:
And more generally, the word [occupier] means that Israel occupies all the land of Palestine. This, Hamas defines by the boundaries of the territory mandated by the League of Nations to Britain after World War I, minus the east bank of the Jordan that Britain sliced off to give to the Jordanian royal family and which is now Jordan.
So when Hamas talks about resisting the “occupier”, it is not just talking about resistance in Gaza.
Its occasional references to a long-term “truce” also must be understood. For Hamas, this does not mean a proper peace agreement with Israel. It means a cessation of violence, which could perhaps last for years, but under which it holds its options open.
And when Hamas says it is ready to accept a Palestinian state within the borders as they existed before the war in 1967, it does not follow that it would accept those borders as the last word. It hopes to re-establish Palestine as it once was.
So there you have it: doubletalking terrorist spokesmen “decoded” by the BBC. Phew!

FISK ME FISK ME FISK ME

Seriously, what the I/P threads need to cheer us all up is some prime Galloway-bashing. And the only way this could be any funnier is if it came with a tin of Quality Street. So get to it, HP.

TheIrie - “It is simply not complicated to interpret what has happened from the perspective of justice or morality.”

A good opportunity then for you to answer another uncomplicated question: do you think that Hamas would ever reject its charter?

John Palmer another blood libel - just consider that the evidence now points to Hamas snipers having killed the UN driver and that Israeli soldiers at great risk to themselves rescued survivors from the convoy who were then evacuated to an Israeli Hospital. It is because of bare faced anti-Semitic liars like you that the Jews of UK need extra protection. Yes anti-Semite because without a shred of evidence except unsubstantiated claims you rush to blame the Jews for killing innocent civilians - if it talks walks and smells like an anti-Semite it probably is an anti-Semite.

As to the IRC let’s not forget that for years under the stranglehold of the anti-Israel members of that body there was no recogition of MDA despite the fact that MDA was involved in a number of international rescue efforts. The IRC has a poor record where Israel is concerned evidence the lack of any real effort to secure any information as to the whereabouts of Gilad Schalit.

Been sobering up and digesting some venison-sorry!

Yes, David T, I would love to have some dinner with you at some point. Possibly not the Caprice for a while as it is a bit on the heavy (and pricey) side. However from previous threads I see that you recognise a spoof Smiths lyric when you see one, which should make you fairly good company.

To others, yes Barad Barak (Thunder Lightning) would be a good way to get the piss taken out of your kids if you named them that in Israel or somewhere where people understood Hebrew. However it is not my real name.

B.

Nachman: ” I suppose the 6000 rockets over the past eight years was also rhetoric.”

After 100 rockets with their resulting small casualties perhaps Hamas would learn to aim better. After say 500 with a similar lack of success , perhaps they would find a different supplier. After 1,000 - success abysmally low - perhaps they’d use new training methods. After 2,000, maybe their military leadership would need to be given a shakeup. After 6,000?? How bad can their aim be?

You are characterising Hamas - deliberately and mendaciously - like Wylie Coyote, as if it were undertaking those rocket attacks because it felt they would be massively effective at killing Israelis.

But of course the rocket attacks are a political statement.

Your method is a type of dishonest screaming, a way of justifying and diverting the eyes from massive Israeli war crimes. “LOOK 6000 ROCKETS. LOOK LOOK. LOOK. OVER HERE. LOOK LOOK. HERE HERE HERE”

But the number of rockets vis a vis the casualties alongside the ridiculous conclusions your argument demands we must draw about the rockets - that their number tout court is equivalent quantitively to a massive atrocity - leads you into the same credibility trap that has now diminished others supporting massive Israeli war crimes.

That is what this site is now dedicated to - justifying Israeli war crimes. You guys who cry freedom and jump on any small human rights abuse from Muslim governments are just sitting here discussing what you think are the important finer points of just war theory. No huge outrage at what is happening, no honest historical context of the serial nature of Israel’s actions.

All those fine words just drift up your bums when war crimes are commited by Israel and to a lesser extent the US and the UK.

This site should be honest about its intentions, repudiate the laughable idea that it is fighting for freedom and peace and simply come out on the basis of what it is: an Israeli propaganda site. The things that concern you are not philosophical. Philosophy is merely used as a weapon which you consistently pack away or endlessly parse when the crimes are commited by Israelis. You should admit this. It is the honest thing to do.

tevya - I don’t know. Probably not. What devastating point do you think you’ve made?

Think about that idea for a moment. The more damage and loss Israel causes to Hamas, for example, the stronger it becomes. If we follow this logic all the way home it would appear to mean that were Israel able to kill every last member of Hamas and destroy all its weapons, down to the last AK 47, then this would represent a defeat for Israel and victory for Hamas. Interesting notion, no?

I’m not surprised you’re having trouble with this, since you clearly haven’t understood what people mean when they talk about “proportionality” if you think the post you link to dealt with it.

You’ve got the insurgency argument arse over tit - the argument people make is that the more damage and loss Israel causes to Palestinian civilians, the stronger Hamas becomes. This would be a more difficult notion to refute, since there’s almost 100 years of historical evidence from all over the world to back it up. Bloody Sunday in N.I. is the textbook example, but you’ll find it from Vietnam to the Shining Path.

Insurgencies want you to overreact and wipe out a lot of civilians - it instantly hands them a propaganda victory, drives a mob of angry, daft young men into their arms, and ensures that everyone who hears about it - from little Johnny to Granny rocking on the porch - will be willing to store arms, note the routines of your military patrols and act as lookouts.

I don’t know how you could’ve mistaken this argument for counsel against attacking Hamas, unless you deliberately don’t want to recognise it. It’s not a controversial thesis - Mao wrote a book about this decades ago and effectively put it into practice, for God’s sake, it was quite famous at the time. If you want to wipe out an insurgency that has popular support, you either have scarily effective death squads or you get on with the democide. Speaking of which…

Inflicting a defeat on Hamas of sufficient proportions to make Gaza as docile as Chechnya is well within Israel’s military capabilities. The Israeli public doesn’t have the stomach for either the casualities on its own side or the mass slaughter of Palestinians that would be necessary to achieve it.

I should bloody hope not - the Russians rendered Chechnya docile by kidnapping, torturing and killing most of the military age men and by saturation bombing of Chechen strongholds. Estimates I’ve read imply that up to 100,000 people were killed in the first Chechen war alone, and I don’t want to think about the second. I find it pretty disturbing that Chechnya is even being mentioned in the same breath as Gaza, although not as disturbing as the wistful if only tone.

kurringai - “others supporting massive Israeli war crimes.”

Define a war crime - shooting 6000 rockets at innocent civilians perhaps?????

Listen tell me where you live and I’ll arrange for 6000 rockets to lobbed into your back yard and lets see how loud you holler - shall we?

Inflicting a smashing military defeat on insurgent organizations, provided that it is accompanied by a viable - not necessarily just or democratic - political strategy, tends to mean the end of serious resistance. Just look at Chechnya, Western Sahara and Tíbet.

Last March, Tibetan mobs burned Han residents alive in the streets of Lhasa. How’s that for serious resistance?

And what about ETA. How many times has its leadership been beheaded. Ditto for IRA: only when they were offered an honorable way out (with the recognition of the “Irish dimension”) did they lay down weapons.

Reality is in fact as complicated as the books say. Any attempt to simplify it is the result of either lack of information or bad faith, and in some cases both.

Nachman: Your comments verge on the demented. You can, of course, dismiss each and every critic of Israeli violations of humanitarian law as manifestations of “anti-semitism.” Seemingly your catch-all catagory now includes all the UN aid organisations AND the International Red Cross (not even the Israeli government goes that far.) Your abusive language only rveals the utter poverty of your thought. Throughout the world, however, there is a growing chorus of Jewish voices condemning Israeli policy. Of course the Israeli government does have some support - in the UK notably from the British National Party whose origins are steeped in the filth of anti-semitism. I, however, prefer to stand with my comrades in Jews for Justice for Palestinians.

TheIrie - “Probably not. What devastating point do you think you’ve made?”

People act because of their beliefs, not despite them. If you agree that Hamas would never reject its genocidal charter, why do you think that Hamas is a partner for peace?

The charter even includes a fatwa that any peace treaty would be null and void under Shari’a law. Why do you think they would ever act against their religion?

John Palmer - obviously the truth hurts. Jews for Justice for Palestinians has one huge problemn it does believe in justice for Jews, at least those who have had the temerity to make Israel their home in pursuance of the Jewish right to self determination. If you remotely believe that that the British National Party actual supports Israel then you are the one suffering from dementia. There is obviously no possibility of reasonable discourse with someone who rushes to spread blood libels without a shred of evidence. As I said the IRC is controlled by countries who are not friendly to Israel and indeed had to perform contortions to save its funding to allow Israel not to have to subscribe to the “Red Cross”. For years Israel was denied membership solely because it did not want to operate under a red cross - for obvious reasons.

As to the Un since the early 1970s, the UN itself has become permeated with anti-Semitic and Anti-Zionist sentiment. The following examples illustrate how ugly the atmosphere has become:
“Is it not the Jews who are exploiting the American people and trying to debase them?”— Libyan UN Representative Ali Treiki.
“The Talmud says that if a Jew does not drink every year the blood of a non-Jewish man, he will be damned for eternity.” —Saudi Arabian delegate Marouf al-Dawalibi before the 1984 UN Human Rights Commission conference on religious tolerance. A similar remark was made by the Syrian Ambassador at a 1991 meeting, who insisted Jews killed Christian children to use their blood to make matzos.
On March 11, 1997, the Palestinian representative to the UN Human Rights Commission claimed the Israeli government had injected 300 Palestinian children with the HIV virus. Despite the efforts of Israel, the United States and others, this blood libel remains on the UN record- so please do your homework.

Nachman: what should my response be?

Maybe: Tell me where you live and I will

- blockade you until your entire region of 1.5 million is full of undernourished, impoverished, traumatised families?
- summarily assassinate anyone you treat as a leader who can talk with me seriously about your position?
- kill 700 of your neighbours, bomb houses, schools and other refuges?

I mean, this is so easy a game to play it’s risible. You’re so full of unctuous and insupportble outrage. Your comments do, as John Palmer says, border on demented.

One overarching fact remains. Israel remains in a position of domination over all of Palestine, has tortured and killed its people unrelentingly and - something that gives away Israel’s reasons for anyone curious as to its motives - continues to steal Palestinian land. Continues to only deal with its enemy if it has recognised abject defeat and agrees to the framework of an Israeli solution for the area.

Everything flows from that, both rationally and legally, which is why the Americans and Israelis insisted that Arafat negotiate outside the constraints of Israel’s international legal obligations ten years ago.

You are a disgrace, if human rights and dignity - the banner pretty much of this site - are something of a concern to you. If not, just say it out straight. The moral dimension of this atrcoity is of no interest to you except as a way of justifying Israel’s atrocities. Go on, just be honest about it.

So let me get this straight. Fighting an unwinnable war against Hamas only makes them stronger yet Hamas will eventually win a military victory against Israel w/o making them stronger in return?

Stop huffing paint. Thank you.

MMN, your comment is absolutely brillaint and for me it cust across all the rhetoric. I mean it!

That was the same UN that was working away in Gaza while the Hamas war criminal rocketeers were in charge.

Methinks they would have been better occupied sending in a force to cart the Hamas war criminals off to the Hague. Then this whole conflict wouldn’t have happened.

So, while Hamas fired 6,000 rockets targetting Israeli civilians, a War Crime, the UN people in Gaza said and did nothing!

Brilliant point!

Now we hear that UN aid convoys are being ambushed by “rogue?” units of the Israeli army - killing and wounding aid workers. There is only one thing that should be said with all deliberation at present: it is essential that the preparatory work is done to bring Israeli political and military leaders to account at the International War Crimes Tribunal.

And we ALSO know that Hamas have IDF uniforms so they can shoot up a few ambulances, kill a few children and then blame it on the IDF

Kurragai - First please take your bleeding heart elsewhere. Where were you when Hamas were throwing people off the rooves of Gaza in order to cement their hold over that territory? Secondly, if Hamas didn’t shoot its stupid rockets- which cause terror especially to children whether or not they actually kill, and they have done that too,Israel would have no reason to blockade Gaza. The rockets were being fired long before there was any blockade. Furthermore if the people on the other side of the fence don’t recognise your right to exist and indeed speak of taking you out given the opportunity are you likely to invite them into your home? Despite that Israel has made sure the Gazans haven’t gone without - I have yet to see a starving Gazan in any of the pictures we have seen. That civilians have been killed is a tragedy of great magnitude but to lay the blame for that on Israel’s doorstep is immoral since you are then saying that Israel has put the safety of its own citizens second and the safety of an enemy, which has no interest in reducing its own casualties but which considers each such casualty a PR victory, first. You speak of attrocity but which attrocity - the use by Hamas of the Gazans as human shields - if so I would agree with you. So far as I can see leafletting people to warn them of an impending attack on the “heroes” who are sheltering among them hardly amounts to an attrocity.

Seemingly your catch-all catagory now includes all the UN aid organisations AND the International Red Cross (not even the Israeli government goes that far.)

Right on the money, JP. Israel apologists are more Catholic than the Israeli pope.

Quite a sensible contribution to the thread from Benjamin I thought

I, however, prefer to stand with my comrades in Jews for Justice for Palestinians

Does that include Justice for the Palestinians killed by Hamas and those sacrificed as human shields by Hamas?

Does it include identifying Hamas for hijacking Palestinain aspirations for peace?

Or is it just an organisation for mutual masturbation and a self-help group for people who find themselves to be Jewish without ever choosing to be?

MMN, why is that a brilliant point? It’s not a UN +military+ presence. Should they have got out there with their stethoscopes and washpans? Or set up with a pair of binoculars and texted in coordinates to the Israeli military? Should they have just undertaken a completely different mission to the one tasked?

Is that why the point is brilliant?

A massive war crime that dwarfs anything that has happened to Sderot is taking place. A massive blockade that similarly dwarfed anthing that happened at Sderot has taken place and inflicted large-scale impoverishment, malnourishment, death due to lack of medicines and health facilities and terror to a civilian population. Casualties to Gazans prior to this blockade dwarfed anything that has happened to Israeli civilians.

What do you say to this?

If this leaves you cold, just be honest and stop asserting a moral framework. The honesty would involve you admitting you didn’t give a damn for the ethical dimension, only that Israel wins.

So, the author posits that we can defeat insurgencies by military action. As examples, he quotes areas ruled by 3 unplesant dictatorships, which is not a promising start.

In one case (Tibet), there has been nothing worthy of the term insurgency, so it is irrelevant.

In another, there have been many, many massacres and conduct probably worse than anything the insurgents did (and I’m not forgetting their attacks on civilians here; Russias conduct has been awful)… and the insurgency is still significant, if reduced.

In another, there is a long lasting ceasefire and contiuing negotiations because a diplomatic route was taken. The insurgency never really suffered a military defeat (indeed, they still have regular forces with tanks, ect).

From these examples we are supposed to agree that a military solution is a workable one for Israel? Because I think you have succesfully dismembered your own point.

A massive war crime that dwarfs anything that has happened to Sderot is taking place. A massive blockade that similarly dwarfed anthing that happened at Sderot has taken place and inflicted large-scale impoverishment, malnourishment, death due to lack of medicines and health facilities and terror to a civilian population. Casualties to Gazans prior to this blockade dwarfed anything that has happened to Israeli civilians.

What do you say to this?

STOP CALLING THEM DWARVES!!!! STOP USING THEIR SMALL STATURE TO MAKE POLITICAL POINTS!!!

Its is more polite to call them people of restricted growth!

Offensive idiot!!!

I read the “attrocity” claims and I say liars. Israel’s has made every effort to avoid civilian casualties through its “roof knocking” policy for example - whereby the inhabitants of buildings housing military assets are notified by Israel via telephone ahead of bombing so they have time to evacuate - which is dismissed by the anti-Israel posters here. It does not interest them that the Palestinians themselves know they can count on Israel to call off attacks when they cynically climb to the roof-tops of these buildings to serve as human shields rather than evacuating. Isn’t it a pretty strong indication of Israel’s adherence to international law that Palestinians are willing to bet their lives on it? Another striking confirmation of the abuse of Israel’s sensitivity to international law, as well as moral codes, is the fact that the leadership of Hamas in the Strip has been hiding in bunkers, prepared specifically for this purpose, under the hospital of Gaza City. Moreover, Hamas operatives are regularly accompanied by small children when they cross the street.
Israel’s defensive action is labeled as “excessive, disproportionate, and ineffective,” and as violence which “contravenes the basic principles of international law.” What would be a proportionate response to a daily threat to civilians, backed by a political platform that rejects any possibility for a lasting, comprehensive solution to the conflict? Israel’s response was indeed disproportionate. It has been using its power and force to convince Hamas of the limits of its ability to dictate the agenda of the Israeli-Hamas conflict. Israel refuses to moderate its response to the blatant targeting of densely populated civilian areas simply because it is the stronger party and is acting within International law in defending its citizens from terrorism.

I’m inclined to agree with Shuggy and Luis that the issue of whether Israel’s response can be correctly descibed as “proportionate” is far from settled. I also agree that “proportionality” is not some incohate concept that Israel can decide to aspire to or not, as she sees fit.

That said, Israel has a pretty decent casus belli given eight years of rocket attacks and the self-avowed emnity of Hamas. It wouldn’t be difficult, or unreasonable, for Israel to cite self-defence. It needn’t be shown that the threat from Hamas is of a certain magnitude, only that Israel have been attacked and remain under threat. Can anyone deny this? In law, Israel is entitled to take steps to remove that threat and, again, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for them to claim that the decapitation of Hamas is a prerequisite for the removal of the extant threat to her southern popuation and the sine qua non of peacable existence for Israelis generally.

Of course, in midst of what could be argued is an entirely “proportional” repsonse to attacks from Hamas, what Israel is not permitted to do is absolve itslef of its responsibility for the welfare of non-combatants in Gaza. And it’s her efforts in this direction which are generating most disquiet. Can it always be right to wipe out entire families just becasue the head of house is Hamas? It’s almost certain that it can’t always be.

So, I can accept that all out war against Hamas that results in their anihilation is entirely proportional. But each individual act Israel commits in pursuit of this entirely legitimate aim must adhere to jus in bello principles. For the sake of her own humanity, and that of the wretched souls in Gaza.

If this leaves you cold, just be honest and stop asserting a moral framework. The honesty would involve you admitting you didn’t give a damn for the ethical dimension, only that Israel wins

Yes, the ethical dimension can get a bit cold without thermal space-suits. We usually only visist in the 17th quadrant when the Ork Orb appears on the horizon to spread its Teasel Dust - said to be lucky by the Grummians. Then we generally head back to the pleasure dimension for a bit of massage and rumpy. (!)

Bottom line, the Israel haters have the same reaction whether it’s this or a crop failure or a Palestinian dog gets hit by a car. Doesn’t matter. Everything is a genocide everything is a warcrime. Israel is always the most evil horrible creation in the history of people. Ever. See? Wasn’t that easy? Now all the haters can go back to doing whatever it is they do on their day jobs.

That nasty man,Daniel Barenboim,has been saying in Radio 4 that the Israeli government nurtured and supported the then insignificant Hamas as a useful counterweight to Fatah.How dare he say such horrible things!

If there is one thing I like doing its bollocks busting the word proportionality.

I also agree that “proportionality” is not some incohate concept that Israel can decide to aspire to or not, as she sees fit.

So, if you can choose to aspire to something - what is it? Please describe it because if it can’t be described then you can’t aspire to it. In classical terms “You can’t know if you’ve arrived if you don’t know where you are going”

And don’t use self-referential bullshit to end up NOT defining it.

Example of self referential bullshit: “How long is a piece of string?! Answer: “Twice the distance from one end to the centre”.

From these examples we are supposed to agree that a military solution is a workable one for Israel?

I don’t think Israel believes that a solution will emerge on the back of purely military gains. But such gains may pave the way to one.

Israel and Hamas will one day talk and, hopefully, sign the same piece of paper. Leaving aside Israel’s entirely legitimate right to defend her territory and population, the war is intended to ensure that when Hamas and Israel do eventually sit down together, they do so on terms more acceptable to Israel than they are to Hamas.

“entirely legitimate right to defend her territory”
But it would be helpful if Israel decided to let the rest of the world know where that territory extends to.

Of course, in midst of what could be argued is an entirely “proportional” repsonse to attacks from Hamas, what Israel is not permitted to do is absolve itslef of its responsibility for the welfare of non-combatants in Gaza. And it’s her efforts in this direction which are generating most disquiet. Can it always be right to wipe out entire families just becasue the head of house is Hamas? It’s almost certain that it can’t always be.

Brownie, I am inclined to agree with your point here. After hearing about that particular attack I thought about my own children. My daughter, aged 2, I believe is incapable of believing that anyone holds ill will against here, and my six year olds are only marginally more aware. None of them hold any meaningful political ideologies, nor can possibly comprehend them. The death of children, is the true tragedy here, and I am forced to admit that if the home itself had no military stategic value, then the presence of children in the house should have rendered it immune.

Of course I placed the caveat, if the house had no military strategic value. But what if the house was a communications hub? How does that change the equation? If the Hamas leader was using his domicile as a command post, does this not make his children “human Shields”? I admit that this is merely speculation, and I agree that if this is what happened than the onus is on Israel to demonstrate this strategic imperative.

But, Brownie, what I find lacking is analysis of the effect of Hamas military strategy in the death counts occuring in Gaza. While it might not be true in every case, Israel has shown that the School attack was against a military target, and that Hamas was using that building or its environs as a launch site. To what degree do we hold Hamas accoutable, and to what degree does this exonerate Israel?

A

Re the UN convoy: I find the JPost article alleging Hamas terrorist responsible very unconvincing. It relies on an unnamed MDA medic who heard from an Israeli soldier. If it was a tank shell or a sniper should not be hard to verify. Interestingly, I just read the NYTimes article on the attack, it was even less informative.

So, if you can choose to aspire to something - what is it? Please describe it because if it can’t be described then you can’t aspire to it.

It’s a fundamental tenet of just war theory. I literally can’t be asked to google “jus ad bellum and “jus in bello” to get a definition, but you and I both know there is one.

I don’t know about you, but I’m keen for Israel to fight just wars, not unjust ones.

BlahBlah,

The UN had, I believed, certified that Israel had withdrawn from Gaza to the ‘48 armistice lines. Further Israel has a defined southern border with Egypt, so I think that Israel’s Southern Boundary is not in dispute.

Nachman:The International Red Cross said Israeli troops refused to allow ambulances to pick up starving children lying alongside the bodies of their mothers. All they would allow is a donkey and cart to be used to bring these people to where they might get help. Now you can either choose to believe that the IRC - contrary to all evidence - has become “anti-semitic” or some kind of agents of Hamas OR this is further evidence of the disgusting brutalisation of IDF forces in a war where they regard Palestinians as some kind of lower order of humanity. In any event it must all be investigated indendently and - if necessary - referred to the International War Crimes Tribunal.

:The International Red Cross said Israeli troops refused to allow ambulances to pick up starving children lying alongside the bodies of their mothers.

Now, I might be wrong about this, but I don’t think that either the IRC or the IDF knew that there were starving children there. I think there presence was discovered after the fact. There is a difference.

Nachman, you’re just repeating old old talking points that long ago were discredited. What happens is that you are replied to, you fail to reply to the points with anything like a lively mind and fall back on talking points that do not address the evolution of the discussion. Hint: stop repeating false narratives when they are pointed out to you. Take exception to the counter-narrative or concede you now stand corrected. Not to take one of the 2 courses is to automatically ced the point.

“Where were you when Hamas were throwing people off the rooves of Gaza in order to cement their hold over that territory?”

- You mean the hold they +rightfully had+ through an electporal mandate which was stolen from them by Israel and the US through arming Fatah in Gaza thus ensuring more internicene bloodshed? We can tit-for-tat over the ruthlessness of Hamas vis a vis the Israeli military, but the figures are not in your favour.

” Secondly, if Hamas didn’t shoot its stupid rockets- which cause terror especially to children whether or not they actually kill, and they have done that too,Israel would have no reason to blockade Gaza. ”

Yes and if the Kurds didn’t resist Saddam he would have had no reason to gas a town. The traumatisation of childeren in Gaza, both qualitively and quantitively is of a far larger order than in Sderot.

“The rockets were being fired long before there was any blockade.”

The rockets are a response to ethnic cleansing, occupation, and the stripping of human dignity and freedom from millions of Palestinians. It beggars belief that in a similar situation the Israelis would not claim the right to resist.

The same rationale you use to apologise for the Israeli atrocities is the same that your enemy can and will use. What can you say against it? You agree with mass civilian killling if you think the other side started it first.

Since the Israelis started the whole colonial project and since their actions have seen the destruction of a whole society, you are justifying Hamas’ terrorism. You agree with it. Or would if you were a Palestinian. Your framework is tribal, not ethical.

” Furthermore if the people on the other side of the fence don’t recognise your right to exist and indeed speak of taking you out given the opportunity are you likely to invite them into your home? ”

Again this reverses the record. Israel has shown through its actions that it is determined to destroy any chance of a viable nationhood for the Palestinians. It has never recognised the right of the Palestinian nation to exist within internationally recognised borders. Nor is this demanded of Israel.

Hamas, charter not withstanding, has said many times it will begin negotiations. As is obvious to even the utterly moronic, you don’t hand up your negotiation position +prior+ to negotiations. You can, however, signal your intent to find a lasting solution. Hamas has done this multiple times. Israel has deliberately destroyed ceasefires both now and earlier whenever the threat of a negotiated settlement began to form. Its actions show it to be what you say Hamas is. Hamas’ actions show the opposite. Since 2006, when it could converge on a negotiation process it has attempted to do so. Israel in ALL cases destroyed that attempt.

But your reaction is instructuve and fully in line with the Israeli government. You use the charter to prevent any negotiation taking place. How can you negotiate with a government (for that is what Hamas are if electoral mandates mean anything) ) that promises your destruction? A consciousness of mendacity lies in those words.

Because it costs nothing to negotiate to uncover this so-called immovable Hamas line to the world.

To do so can only help Israel. But it is not finding this bottom line that the Israeli government fears. This would be good for their cause. It would show the world how right they are. No. What it fears is that Hamas will negotiate peace within the rights framework of the international community (not USUK, but UN law and charter rights).

Israel’s actions, in spurning negotiations with the Palestinians’ elected representatives shouts its obstruction to a real solution.

You reverse the record of Hamas and Israel in the last 3 years to back your case. Here is the reality:

- all negotiations between enemies start from unreasonable positions. That is why you are negotiating with your enemy: to find common ground.

- Israel is undertaking the actions necessary to destroy the Palestinian national hope. Their actions speak louder than any words in the Hamas charter.

- Hamas as of yesterday is the only elected entity in Palestine with a mandate from the Palestinian people (Abbas’ presidency has expired). Israel needs to negotiate with the democratic choice of the Palestinians, not with quislings it unilaterally chooses. Imagine if Palestine would only negotiate with Gilad Atzmon who used the US to impose himself as the sole conduit of negotiation on Israel? You would need to imagine this because Israel need not submit to something so abysmally idiotic. However, Palestine is being forced to do exactly this with Abbas.

“Despite that Israel has made sure the Gazans haven’t gone without - I have yet to see a starving Gazan in any of the pictures we have seen.”

That’s so nice of them. Tell me, if we reverse the situation could you honestly praise Palestinians for treating say an Israeli enclave in the same fashion? I’ll answer that.

It’s inconceivable.

You would be shouting +anti-semite, holocaust, blah blah blah ” and on and on. Only because it is Israel enacting the oppression can you see this as an act of grace. That is why you have no ethics in regard to this problem. Your outlook is tribal and relies on the actors being in the positions they hold and not in a reverse situation.

“That civilians have been killed is a tragedy of great magnitude but to lay the blame for that on Israel’s doorstep is immoral since you are then saying that Israel has put the safety of its own citizens second and the safety of an enemy, ”

You see? Someone answers you around the rocket issue and it is water off a ducks back - as if the answer has never existed. You just act as if this ridiculous comparison hasn’t been shown for the idiocy it is.

” the use by Hamas of the Gazans as human shields - if so I would agree with you. ”

What should Hamas do here? Should they designate an open patch in which to stand and get annihilated? ISRAELIS are attacking a civilian target, not Hamas. You need to take responsibility for this.

Hamas is not a separate entity, like some parasite, from the Palestinian people. It is their leadership. It could not exist within the population without substantial support. Palestinians are fighting you, not some alien entity. You need to deal with this. You cannot finesse Israeli war crimes by foisting them onto Hamas.

You need to find an ethical centre and speak from it. Otherwise you need to stop the whining about the unfairness to Israelis and just admit that all you want is for Israel to win.

Now, I might be wrong about this, but I don’t think that either the IRC or the IDF knew that there were starving children there. I think there presence was discovered after the fact. There is a difference.

Joe you are right. I believe that IDF’s reason for not allowing ICRC was nothing to do with knowing there were distressed children there but operational reasons. ICRC defied the troops and discovered the unfortunate children. From this they extrapolated that the IDF’s reticence was because they knew there were children in there who were alive.

kurringai , that is a great post. Greater than many posts by about 4,000 words. Must have take quite a while to write it. Made you feel better I suspect.

I have no idea what point you are making. I got bored about 300 words in.

kurringai, What planet do you live on? Israel has tried to give the Palestinians their own state, only to be refused. Your comment is so far fetched from reality that it is hard to even know where to begin to answer it.

But lets try”

” the use by Hamas of the Gazans as human shields - if so I would agree with you. ”
What should Hamas do here? Should they designate an open patch in which to stand and get annihilated?…

UMM, actually the answer to your question is yes! resoundingly Yes. If Hamas is going to engage in military action they have an obligation to make sure that they separate themselves from the civilian population. They have an obligation to distinguish themselves (often via uniforms). I also note that you don’t even deny the truth that Hamas is using human shields, only that you find this practice acceptable.

The truth is that Hamas must take responsibility for their actions, and the inevitable consequence of the beligerence is Israeli retaliation. The inevitable consequence of their beligerence from behind the skirts of women and toys of children is death to those people in whose name they claim to be acting.

The quality of thought behind this comment (that I have quoted) is indicative of the infantile and ill informeed nature of the remainder of you comment. Moron!

Maven, you should read the last three paragraphs of his obscene 10:16 comment. It is quite instructive.

Indeed I think it deserves its own thread! At least an update!

Joe: “While it might not be true in every case, Israel has shown that the School attack was against a military target, and that Hamas was using that building or its environs as a launch site. ”

First it never showed this, it just asserted it and drug out of its hat a couple of names.

Second, Israel has a long history of simply making up stories to relieve itself of the responsibility for its atrocities. Qana is a good example

Third, the Israelis have recanted in private to UNRWA Chris Gunness and admitted there was no Hamas presence in the Jabalaya school.

Fourth the use of the word ‘environs’ is to use weasel words. Again, if this had been done by Hamas to an Israeli town ad the proximity of Israeli forces was used by Hamas as an excuse then you would never credit it. We actually have an example of this when Hezbollah targetted Israeli isntallations and hit civilian targets. It was inexcusable. You and I would admit to that. But only you would use weasel words to exculpate Israel of its atrocity.

As far as Israel withdrawing from Gaza, if it is enforcing a blockade, if it is fully controlling the lives of the people there and the access of Gazans to the outside world, then occupation has not in any meaningful sense been brought to an end. So no border delimitation has actually taken place. You have to speak in a manly and rational way and not use these weasel words.

What happened to Harry’s Place. It used to be full of red-blooded fellas who beat up on Leftists for moral equivalence and sneered at anyone who couldn’t call an atrocity an atrocity. Now its full of mincing, furrow browed atrocity lovers who are in such a dilemna it needs to endlessly parse just war theory to relieve its object of Love from responsibility?

Is this the new Harry’s Place , where Liberty, if it means anything, is to fall into girlish anguish and tepid, half-hearted expressions of concern when near a thousand peoples lives were taken by a brutal military machine? Is this the new Harry’s Place?

“Aid workers had been denied access to the site for days, it added.

“This is a shocking incident,” Pierre Wettach, ICRC head for Israel and the Palestinian territories said in a statement.”

@Zin - this is a pretty good turn around really. How long have the Red Cross been waiting to see Cpl. Shalit?

900+ days…

kurringai,

1) Israel has recanted? I was not aware of this. Could you point me in the direction where this was reported.

2) “Environs”: well as it happens Israeli munitions did not hit the UN school, only environs nearby. No Weasel words here, only accuracy!

3) I have seen the UAR video of the Hamas mortor activity, you need to show me how this was a hoax.

4) Qana? I beleive that Israel still maintains that a)they warned the inhabitants of the impending attack. b) that Hizbollah was firing missiles from adjacent to the building.

5) “We actually have an example of this when Hezbollah targetted Israeli isntallations and hit civilian targets. ” What are you talking about?

Kurringai,

I’m sorry you’ve lost me: Gilad Atzmon is Abbas?

Also, you say Israel ‘has never recognised the right of the Palestinian nation to exist within internationally recognised borders’. Any evidence for that?

And any evidence for Hamas recognizing the right of Israel to exist within internationally recognized borders?

The IDF Spokesman has been on the BBC explaining that they felt the safest place for civilians at the time was inside the building because Hamas was indiscriminately firing mortars and the soldiers feared for the civilians safety. Here we have the IDF attemting to save the Gazans from Hamas what irony. Unfortunately as the saying goes a lie is half way round the world before truth has the chance to put its boots on.
In all this Israel is obligated to prosecute a war against an implaccable cynical enemy who thinks nothing of the lives of those it claims to represent. Hopefully the Gazans will after this realise what they have allowed to rule their lives and will reject the nihilism of Hamas once and for all. And yes I want Israel to win as I would, had I been alive, have wanted the Allies to beat Nazi Germany because Hamas is Nazism reincarnate since Hamas wants to finish what the Nazis did not.

CLEVEREST ARTICLE on Israel/Pal yet, and doesn’t even take sides, cause it’s not about that:

In Slate.com
By Anne Applebaum

Circumstances change, and so do the names of the leading players. Peace negotiators come and go, and so do the details of their agreements. But in the end, there is one aspect of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that always remains the same: When all else has failed, you can be absolutely sure that someone, somewhere, will issue a statement calling for peace.
The last few days have not been short of such declarations. In the wake of Israeli attacks on Gaza, Ban Ki-moon, the U.N. secretary-general, appealed “to all members of the international community to display the unity and commitment required to bring this escalating crisis to an end.” Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign-policy spokesman, also called for a halt to hostilities. “The cease-fire has to be a cease-fire complied (with) by everybody and be clearly maintained,” he proclaimed. “What we need,” echoed British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, “is an immediate cease-fire.”

As night follows day, these statements were accompanied by a mass migration of politicians to the Middle East. French President Nicolas Sarkozy set off for Israel. So did Karel Schwarzenberg, the foreign minister of the Czech Republic, which now holds the rotating presidency of the European Union. There, both may encounter Tony Blair, Solana, and who knows how many others. Even Russian President Dmitry Medvedev sent an envoy to the region. Like having an Olympic team that wins lots of gold medals, having your own Middle East peace policy has, it seems, become a sign of international prestige.

But other than that prestige, it’s increasingly hard to see the point of such gestures. In the Middle East, the most significant and successful diplomatic initiatives have always been the quietest: The Oslo peace accords of 1993 were, at least in their initial phase, negotiated in absolute secrecy. By contrast, the diplomatic initiatives most clearly designed to serve the interests of the diplomats (or at least their constituents back home) are the loudest and most public. Think of the Annapolis peace conference of autumn 2007, at which toasts were drunk, cameras were plentiful, and all kinds of marginal players were at the table. It would be giving that gathering too much credit to blame Annapolis for Israel’s recent ground invasion of Gaza. Still, it’s surely fair to say that that conference, for all of its pomp and circumstance, failed to prevent a new explosion of violence.

Nor could it ever have done so. For the trouble with all of these peace efforts, peace conferences, peace initiatives, and peace proposals is that none of them recognize the most obvious fact about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: It’s not a peace process; it’s a war. At least at the moment, both parties are still convinced that their central aims will be better obtained through weapons and military tactics than through negotiations of any kind. To be more explicit, Hamas and its followers believe that the continuing firing of rockets at southern Israel will, sooner or later, result in the dissolution of the Israeli state. The Israelis—both on the “peacenik” left and the more bellicose right—believe that the only way to prevent Hamas from firing rockets is to fight back. Intervention—whether from well-meaning Europeans, U.N. delegations, Russian envoys (or even Condoleezza Rice, who has wisely stayed home, so far)—can postpone the conflict but cannot halt the violence, at least not until one side or the other waves a white flag and surrenders.

That brief, halcyon period of the Oslo peace process was possible because this is precisely what happened: A combination of Russian emigration into Israel, the end of Soviet support, and general weariness led at least a part of the Palestinian leadership to conclude, after 30 years, that it would never push Israel into the sea. At least a part of the equally weary Israeli leadership came to believe that their occupation policies were doing them more harm than good and that they would gain more from negotiating than from fighting. Further negotiations will make sense only when Hamas’ leadership—currently emboldened by a combination of popular indignation and Iranian support—finally arrives at the same conclusion as its secular counterparts, and a new generation of Israelis is again convinced to believe them.

Until then, there is no point in bemoaning the passivity of the Bush administration, the silence of Barack Obama, the powerlessness of Arab leaders, or the weakness of Europe as so many, predictably, have begun to do. It’s no outsider’s “fault” that the fighting continues, and it merely obscures the real issues when we pretend otherwise. Diplomats might be able to slow its progress, but this war won’t be over until someone has won it.

Didnt take long for the lies that Hamas were firing from the UN School in Jabalaya to come out did it?

Israeli retraction of those lies to be found here…..

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=s0BRJS6WnMs

As people consider answering kurringai consider his response to this question ” the use by Hamas of the Gazans as human shields - if so I would agree with you. ”

<blockquote) What should Hamas do here? Should they designate an open patch in which to stand and get annihilated? ISRAELIS are attacking a civilian target, not Hamas. You need to take responsibility for this.

So according to this moron, it is perfectly acceptable for Hamas to cower behind civilians as a way to protect themselves from civilians!

I think we should show kurringai the respect he deserves.

Bob Latchford, thanks for that link. Israel maintains that the missile fire come from where they targeted, outside the UNRWA site.

What is the issue here. No one actually claimed Israel hit or targeted the school! But your youtube link does admit that missile fire come from outside the school.

So the distinction is that if I am on the street next to the civilians, I am not using them as a shield? You believe that you are a bigger idiot than kurringai.

lookit bob latchford et al rubbing their hands with glee, as though they’ve got a gotcha. I really thought i was gonna hear UNRWA say that the Israelis admit they made a mistake and there were no fighters. What UNRWA says is that the Hamas fighters were outside the school not in it, which is the way it was reported yesterday. Those reports also said that israel returned fire outside the school, but the explosions from that fire killed people inside the school. There is nothing new there. And Hamas is still to blame — obvious to anyone who isn’t seething with anti-Israel bias — for firing on troops from a position right next to a school.
It’s always the same with these guys — if you’re lucky you get a “israel has the right to defend itself BUT …. and the but includes pretty much everything other than filing a complaint with the UN. How ironic is that.

Had to share this. Today the Washington Post gives column space to yet another anti-Israel Hamas supporter: Jimmy Carter.

Featuring our insane line of the day:

…this fragile truce was partially broken on Nov. 4, when Israel launched an attack in Gaza to destroy a defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas…?!!@@$$!!!

Bob Latchford,

What a mug you are. The fact that the Hamas mortar fire came from outside the school compound adds greater legitimacy to Israel’s decision to strike back. The further away from the school the outbound fire, the less reckless Israel’s decision to return fire.

How many own goals did Bob Latchford score in his career?

“defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas”

‘defensive’ suggests ‘in the direction of Israel’, the same way Shalit was kidnapped.

The science of killing civilians is very well-developed. It’s been going on for about a hundred years. It involves a particular range of weapons, a particular set of policies concerning the coralling or grouping of civilians in places where they are more not less vulnerable, and it also requires a particular managing of witnesses, observers, press etc. Whichever way you look at it, the Israeli forces are much more successful at killing civilians than Hamas.

Now, you can decide that this is a consequence of mistakes or unintended acts or some such, but I suggest that this is hard to maintain over years of action in the Middle East, or wherever there is a steady stream of civilian killing. So, if it what’s happening to civilians in Gaza is not a series of mistakes or unintended acts, what are they? Again, I suggest that the Israeli military has shown itself to be extremely capable and what’s more probably full of people who have expert knowledge on how civilians get killed in warfare. In other words, everything that has taken place in Gaza over the last month is entirely predictable and indeed was predicted within the military top brass. How could it be otherwise? It would be preposterous to maintain that Israeli top military men are now sitting about amazed or even mildly surprised by the numbers of civilian deaths in Gaza. Therefore, I can only assume that these numbers are planned. They are the inevitable part of the process. And following from this, I can only assume that these numbers (all of which could have been plotted on a graph before this round of hostilities, relating firepower used on a land area with x number of inhabitants) that civilian deaths was part of the politics of this round of Israeli action.

So, to take one example: the school. It now seems that the Hamas fighters were outside the school and the Israeli attack targeted these fighters. However, the military must have known exactly what kind of firepower they were using, and therefore what kind or size of impact this firepower was going to have - five metres square, twenty metres square, five hundred metres square or what? In other words, the military people must have known with some degree of accuracy if the firepower they used would have knocked out the yard, the school and the yard, the yard, school and surrounding streets or what.

As I say, the science of killing civilians is very well developed. I’m surprised that most of the conversation that ever goes on about civilian deaths in war talks as if these deaths are ‘mistakes’ or even ‘unavoidable consequences’. They’re neither of these things. They must be consequences or even intentions that are factored into the military plan. In fact, if you go back to where it really started - aerial bombing in the first world war, when you read the minutes of what the top brass said to each other both in Britain and Germany, you see that they knew straight away that civilians would die, no matter where they dropped the bombs. Now if they had stopped at that moment, then we could say that they did not intend to kill civilians. But if you proceed with an action, in the full awareness and certainty of the consequences, I view that as acting with intent.

What, pray tell, is a “defensive tunnel” built by Hamas from Gaza into Israel? I can’t ask Jimmy, but i’m sure some of you inveterate Israel-bashers can explain.

“the yard, the school and the yard, the yard, school and surrounding streets or what. ”

More helpful if I punctuated that as:

‘the yard; the school and the yard; the yard, school and surrounding streets; or what.’

vild., I can’t read Jimmy Carter’s mind, but a cease fire is broken when you fire. If you remove the word ‘defensive’, it doesn’t alter the intention of what he is saying, namely that this particular ceasefire was broken by Israel firing something - unless one of the terms of ceasefire was that no tunnels were to be built. Whatever you think of these tunnels, in military terms they aren’t much different from troop movements. And you’re not going to tell me that Israel didn’t move its troops during this period.

Well, Michael, Don’t you think tunneling across a border, with the intent to harm the neighbour across the border, is itself a violation of the ceasefire.

Sort or like invading a foreign invasion.

Sort or like invading a foreign invasion.

should read

“Sort or like invading a foreign country”

Michael, Interesting post about the science of killing, but totally irrelevant. Fact Hamas fired from a postion where civilians were, knowing that retalitory fire would cause those civilians harm. It is absurd to beleive that the presence of those civilians renders the belligerent immune from retaliation. Ergo, logic demands that the onus of responsibility falls on the beligerant that fired from that position.

What is clear is that there was mortar fire from the environs of the school. Thus Hamas bears the major responsibility for the death that it caused.

It certainly was predictable that Hamas would use its own citizens as human shields. And yes, even in a just war, unfortunately, innocent people die, particularly when they are being used by their own leaders in such a cynical way; the only alternative, after all, is to “proportionately” have a stalemate with your enemy (ie, gauge their weaponry, and make sure your weaponry is precisely the same, no better), which would defeat the purpose of going in in the first place wouldn’t it.

I am truly glad Michael Rosen et al weren’t around to second guess every allied move in WWII; then again Churchill (yes i know, the warmonger who rallied Britain) would have found a much cleverer way than me of telling them to piss off.

Joe, so intention doesn’t come into the equation at all? Does this apply to all human action and reaction? This is not an analogy but in law, if you slap me round the face and I shoot you with a gun, then most courts around the world would find me guilty of murder. That’s because they would figure that because I owned a gun, and because as an ordinary human being, I would know what guns do (consequences etc) that when I fired it, I did it knowing that almost certainly it could or would kill someone. My intention is clear. Of course, the court would concede that you shouldn’t have slapped me, but you are not responsible for your own death in a court of law. Yes, in street parlance, people might say, hey you shouldn’t have slapped that guy, he carries a gun, but it doesn’t make you responsible for your own death in law.

I said this wasn’t an analogy with the present situation, but are you looking for what I’ve called a ’street parlance’ definition of responsibility here.

re the tunnels. People here seem to be more expert on where the tunnels were, where they were going, and whether they had crossed the border or not. What I asked though, was there a condition on tunneling in the protocols of the ceasefire? That was an open question. I don’t know.

Please note, vild., it was you who brought WW2 into this debate not me. As you suggest, decisions were made on all sides in that war about how to kill civilians. Many of the actions taken on both sides have been questioned for military reasons. In other words, military historians have pondered whether killing this or that group of civilians had any military benefit to the overall aim of the war. When they have found none, they have concluded that the intentions were therefore political. This may be a laborious way of approaching something like the genocide of the Jews, when the political intentions were clear all along, but when it comes to the firebombing of Tokyo or the bombing of Dresden, it all starts to get more murky. Actions were taken with known consequences re civilians but which had little or no military benefit and, what’s more, endangered the lives of the forces carrying out the mass civilian deaths ie weakened the military of the side carrying out the mass civilian deaths. You talk, vild, as if this is feeble-minded lefty talk, but I think you’ll find that this is hardnosed military talk as well.

RE: your last point, If the tunnels crossed the border for beligerant purpose, well then your question about whether tunnels are covred in the ceasefire is mute and a red herring.

Re your analagy: you have a point. If Hamas were throwing rocks, then response with an artilary shell would be overkill (no pun intened). However Hamas were acting with a deadly weapon, intent on killing someone (who I cannot say). The armies response is therefor calibrated with the cause, i.e. stop the deadly force the most expedianet way possible. This is the true meaning of proportionality.

To go back to your analogy, if someone attacks me with a hand gun, because they are only using a hand gun does not make the use of a shot gun in defence an illigtamate response!

An intersting modification of your analaogy, if someone attacks me with a small calibre gun, would the use of a shot gun be an illigitamat response? I would reason no, since it is a very real concern tha the .22 can still kill or severely maim me, hence the shotgun, which would likely still kill the foe, is still calibrated to my realistic fear of harm.

Michael, you analogy, by the way, is very stupid, since Hamas is not slapping Israel and Israel responding with a gun. Hamas is using a gun to provoke an Israeli response with a bigger gun.

“But if you proceed with an action, in the full awareness and certainty of the consequences, I view that as acting with intent.” Particularly well put. I shall be using that one.

“But if you proceed with an action, in the full awareness and certainty of the consequences, I view that as acting with intent.” Particularly well put. I shall be using that one.

So you agree Hamas are culpable for using civilians as a shield?

“But if you proceed with an action, in the full awareness and certainty of the consequences, I view that as acting with intent.” Particularly well put. I shall be using that one.

Of course the converse is also true: Failure to act in awareness of the consequences is also irrisponsible. Thus knowing that not killing a killer will result in your or others death makes you culpable for their death!

Joe, I tried to say it wasn’t an analogy. I was saying that if you know that you are going to kill someone, (ie handling a weapon that can kill) then that is called killing in law and the person doing it is ‘responsible’, their intention was plain. I didn’t intend a direct analogy.

You run a scenario of a shootout with different powers of weapon involved. I agree that this is more analogous to the political situation, however if we want to get analogous then we have to include all the civilians who get killed who get anywhere near a shootout. If you come to the shootout with a pistol and I come to the shootout with a helicopter gunship. You kill my navigator and I kill you and about a hundred bystanders, I suggest that there is no way that my intentions (knowledge of possible consequences) couldn’t have been clearer, and I am responsible for the deaths of the bystanders. If you’ve got a better analogy of the relative levels of firepower between Hamas and Israel, I’m all ears. I mean, put it this way, are there any modern weapons that Israel does not have at its disposal, and apart from nuclear warheads and WMDs it is not using at the moment?

Michael,

I haven’t got time for a complete response, but the question is whether I come to the shoot out knowing that the bystanders where there and that I was hoping that their presence would prevent you from retaliating to your shooting.

In your scenario, where I provoke an overwhelming response, and, I presume, I am trying to “defend” the bystanders, the best way to protect the bystanders would be for me to

a) not provoke your response

b) seperate myself from the bystanders.

If I delibrately choose to hide amongst the bystanders, then I am culpable for their death. Your right to self defence is not deminished by their presence.

As I said to the Idiot, If I know that my actions will bring about a retaliation, I am responsible for provoking the proverbial sleeping giant.

A second point, and this is somewhat philisophical, from the IDFs perspective, how many Israeli lives need to be imperaled befor they are allowed to kill a Palestinian. While this may seem callus to you, but from the IDFs perspective, they have primary obligation to protect Israeli lives. Palestinian lives are only a secondary consideration, from their perspective.

Joe, I’ve never been to Gaza but I keep trying to figure out the stats on population density in the area. The logic of your argument is that if you live at that level of density, don’t fight because your streets and houses will be destroyed. Conversely, according to your logic, the only legitimate way for a largely civilian population to fight, is to come out into the open and fight there. Again, you have noticed that there is a massive difference between the firepowers of the two sides. You don’t sympathise with Hamas’s cause, but take one that you might sympathise with (historically, I mean) - the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. At one level, this was ’suicidal’, and the reprisals were inevitable. Is your position (ie to be consistent) that the Warsaw Ghetto fighters were responsible for their own deaths, and for the final liquidation of the Ghetto? Were the French resistance fighters in the liberation of Paris responsible for the civilian deaths from Wehrmacht shells?

So, to take one example: the school. It now seems that the Hamas fighters were outside the school and the Israeli attack targeted these fighters. However, the military must have known exactly what kind of firepower they were using, and therefore what kind or size of impact this firepower was going to have - five metres square, twenty metres square, five hundred metres square or what? In other words, the military people must have known with some degree of accuracy if the firepower they used would have knocked out the yard, the school and the yard, the yard, school and surrounding streets or what.

Do you really want to know they way it works most of the time, Michael? You’re in theatre with your troop or squad or whatever, you take incoming and have a few seconds whether to get the hell out or return fire with whatever it is you have available. Would that wars and each battle they contain are fought the way your comment imagines they are.

Is that what happened in the case of the UN school? I have no idea and neither does any other blogger or commenter, including those who pretend they do.

To respond to your thoughtful comment more generally, the brutal truth is that just war theory and the Geneva Convetions allow for civilian casualties. There are rules, of course there are and we can argue the toss all night - and perhaps even agree - about specific instances where these rules may have been broken by Israel. But the war that doesn’t result in civilian casualties has never been fought and never will. Moreoever, any state prepared to break this mould and fight in such a way that no civilian dies, can probably expect to lose.

Yep, war certainly is hell.

“A second point, and this is somewhat philisophical, from the IDFs perspective, how many Israeli lives need to be imperaled befor they are allowed to kill a Palestinian. ”

I don’t think the maths is working out like this, is it? Note your plural ‘Israeli lives’ and singular ‘a Palestinian’. At the very least, your maths is two Israelis for one Palestinian. Check the stats of the last week, last month, last year, last decade, last thirty years. I don’t think 2:1 Israeli to Palestinian deaths is what’s going on, is it? What happens when we look at the real stats and try to second guess the Israeli military. Aren’t calculations being made all the time that every military engagement will produce at least ten Palestinian deaths for one Israeli, isn’t it?

I can’t read Jimmy Carter’s mind, but a cease fire is broken when you fire

Come on Michael, you’re better than that. Absent codified ceasefire terms, a ceasefire can be broken by any hostile act. Are you suggesting Israel has to wait until another solider is kidnapped before it can close a Hamas tunnel?

And if you really want to be absolutist about this “when you fire” stuff, how do yo know it wasn’t Hamas who fired the first shots as the IDF soldiers moved in to close the tunnel? I know 6 Hamas operatives were killed in the ensuing firefight, but I’ve yet to read an account that clarifies who exactly was first to pull a trigger. Have you?

Brownie, there is the ‘theatre of war’ and there is the top brass sending troops, planes etc into it. Those sending the firepower in know what its killing power is for any given density of population. Whether guys lose their rag, get overheated or not, is kind of beside the point. At least, that’s what lawyers say when it comes to civilian deaths. Come to the hop with a gun, then you know what it can do. You can’t plead ‘I got carried away’ (other than mental feebleness). My argument is that calculations have been made all along with this outbreak of hostilities and what’s going on aren’t mistakes or unforeseen consequences. Military people know what are the likely outcomes. In the specifics here: x tanks, x helicopter gunships, x bombardments from the sea, aimed at targets in this or that part of Gaza with that density of population will produce y number of deaths. You or I could do it in about ten minutes on the back of an envelope if we had the facts.

Joe, so intention doesn’t come into the equation at all?

Michael, your Palestinian/Israeli civilian bodycounts don’t allow for intention, do they?

Michael,

At least, that’s what lawyers say when it comes to civilian deaths.

You started with an argument rooted in morality that paid no heed to what the rules of war allow and disallow, and now you’ve moved to the legalities. Well something else the lawyers say is that party X is not wrong because their acts resulted in more civilian casualties. If party Y killed far fewer but targeted every last one of the dead civilians, guess who is going to the Hague?

Brownie, no, of course I don’t know the exact facts either. I’ve read a few of the different claims made by either side. Don’t you think it’s curious that the shooting of the Hamas men got ‘lost’ in the world’s press (time of US elections) and so was never included in definitions of the breaking of the ceasefire and it’s only because others (not only Hamas) have raised it that we’re discussing it at all?

Of course, at a more general level, then I have a view on what would have been a fair and decent way to have proceeded following the withdrawal from Gaza, whether that was in and around Gaza itself, talking to Hamas, or in relation to settler activity in the West Bank. It’s also my view that if those matters had been addressed immediately, we wouldn’t be where we are now. I see that Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian isn’t a million miles from that position today.

Michael, your Palestinian/Israeli civilian bodycounts don’t allow for intention, do they?

I think they do. Israel knows that it has killed and can kill many more Palestinian civilians than Palestinians can kill Israeli civilians. What’s more, it has done this and can do this without its main protector objecting. Just the opposite, the protector has said over and over again that this is legitimate. (the maths is brutal and horrific, I don’t mean to make light of it anyway. All I’m saying is that the military on all sides are indeed making these calculations.)

Joe; So, ‘philosophical’ = accepting at face value the idea that it is legitimate for the IDF, and by implication, the government that controls it to treat one type of human life as a ’secondary consideration’ to another. That’s how militaries and states have always work in conflict, granted, but its another thing to say it out loud and espouse a ‘philosophical’ theory for it.

Would it not be more honest to cut the crap, stop pretending that the application of military force will secure peace in the long-run, and say;

“The Israeli state must secure Israeli citizens from all threats to their lives, potential and actual, no matter what the cost in Palestinian lives. Proportionality and just war be damned. Israeli and Palestinian lives are matters of different ‘consideration’. The security of our citizens is worth more than the lives of theirs.”

Brownie, there is the ‘theatre of war’ and there is the top brass sending troops, planes etc into it. Those sending the firepower in know what its killing power is for any given density of population.

Michael, I’ve made it clear from the outset that I have reservations about at least some of Israel’s actions, but given Israel’s firepower is what it is and bearing in mind the modus operandi of its enemy which is to maximise civilian exposure to danger, how does Israel possibly prosecute any sort of war in Gaza that avoids significant loss of civilian life? If the answer is that Israel simply never resorts to arms in Gaza, whatever the provocation, then what do you suppose Hamas does with that juicy bit of intelligence.

* I mean for you, not for Israel (by the logic of your ‘philosophical’ para)

Brownie, I have suggested that Israel should not come to the negotiation table while encouraging and defending settlement on the West Bank, that it should negotiate with elected leaders, (as has happened all over the world many times), that it should not demand preconditions to talks which they know can’t and won’t be met (for whatever reasons). The move by the US, UK and Israel to refuse to negotiate with Hamas the moment it was elected has proven to be a disastrous move for everyone. I’m not going to be an apologist for de Klerk in South Africa, but either he (or his allies in the US and the UK) decided that he had to negotiate with the people who wanted to ‘destroy’ the state of South Africa and create a new one. And he did. And it worked.

Michael, your Palestinian/Israeli civilian bodycounts don’t allow for intention, do they?

I think they do.

Only using your simplisitc definition of “intention” to mean that it is known before an act takes place that the commission of the act will have certain consequences. When we’re talking about civilians in war and their “intentional” killing, this definition is the reddest of herrings and has no legal application.

The killing of civilians even when they’re not targeted *might* be deemed to be a war crime if the deaths are not in proportion to the military gain achieved, but intentional killing of civilians leaves no room for argument. And it’s Hamas that has the track record there. The fact they’re not as proficient or well-armed as the IDF - and therefore kill fewer civilians overall - offers no legal mitigation whatsoever. Although you still seem preoccupied with bodycounts.

Don’t you think it’s curious that the shooting of the Hamas men got ‘lost’ in the world’s press

As opposed to the wall-to-wall coverage around the globe that 8 years of Hamas rockets into southern Israel received you mean?

Of course, at a more general level, then I have a view on what would have been a fair and decent way to have proceeded following the withdrawal from Gaza

Not initiating a daily barrage of rocket fire from vacated Gazan settlements before there was any blockade and absent a single Israeli soldier on the southern side of the border would have been a good start. Again, rarely top billing in the newspapers I was reading at the time.

I wasn’t actually talking about war crimes. I was talking about military calculation. In other words, I cannot believe that any general in any country today, does not know the likely civilian death count of any operation he leads. I’m not really saying that this does or does not constitute a ‘war crime’. I was making the point that all the talk of ‘mistakes’ and ‘unintended consequences’ is nonsense. The calculation is made and known. Therefore, I deduce, intention is involved too. Generals deal in deaths. They know the score and the more wars there are and the more computerised data processing that goes on, the more accurate they can be about it. Haig probably did guess his military fatalities, and did it on the back of an envelope. Zhukov didn’t need to count when he threw his soldiers at the Wehrmacht as he had so many to draw on. But now, it’s a form of state accounting, isn’t it? Cost…firepower…deaths….worth it? not worth it?

Waseem and Michael, your understanding of proportionality is simply wrong! Proportionality applies to the question of whether Israel had cause to go to war and whether their war aims are justified by the provocations to war. In this specific instance Israel’s war aim is to prevent further belligerent attack on it citizens along it’s southern border. This is a reasonable aim, and the provocation is indisputable.

As for my “philosophical” question, yes I would maintain that the IDF does have primary responsibility to the Israeli polity ahead of any responsibility to the Palestinians. I am not sure why this would be so shocking. In war this means that the army is tasked with protecting civilian life, and on balance and Israeli civilian is worth a certain number of Palestinians. Who many, I don’t know.

Think of it from what should be Hamas’s perspective, they should be fighting to protect the lives of the people they represent. In doing so they should embark on a course of action that minimizes rather than maximizes likely harm to them. Neither of you have addressed Hamas’s blatant disregard for this obligation. Rather you have placed that obligation on Israel’s shoulders, were, frankly it doesn’t belong.

Michael, you have engaged in a number of intellectual fallacies in our little discussion here. But this one is egregious. You, like the moron kurringai, have argued that Hamas is absolved from their responsibility to fight according to the rules of war because they would get annihilated if they did (lets leave aside your even more ridiculous density argument, truly absurd). Michael, Hamas have an option that any rational organization of government would persue, before the fact, don’t provoke the war that you cannot win, after the fact, surrender the war you cannot win.

Michael, you have fallen for the Hamas gambit, absolving them of abny responsibility for their conduct and placing it all on Israels shoulder. They count on you lack of intellectual ability. This lack of reasoning.

Michael, Israel will not negotiate with Hamas because it has openly stated that it will not negotiate in good faith. Israel want a peach agreement and an end of conflict, Hamas wants a Hudna, armistice, until such a time as it thinks that it can actually defeat Israel.

In other words, I cannot believe that any general in any country today, does not know the likely civilian death count of any operation he leads.

And where is the Hamas responsibility to calculate the consequences of their actions. This is conspicuously absent from your argument.

Further, it is Hamas’s responsibility to act in the best interest of the Palestinian polity, not Israels.

Michael, you have engaged in a number of intellectual fallacies in our little discussion here. But this one is egregious. You, like the moron kurringai,

Well, you have engaged in another intellectual fallacy which is that if you call people morons and arguments ‘ridiculous’ that this is itself part of the argument.

But you cant help yourself. So be it.

You come to this discussion with a sense of what is ‘rational’. YOu talk of Hamas having an ‘option that any rational organisation’ could pursue. Well, we can all take a step back and consider rational options. You’ve plucked just one from what is a war zone and has been for several decades. it just so happens to be the ‘rational option’ that the weaker or weakest of all the parties concerned in this war zone should take up. One rational option would be for the most powerful party to stop settlements in the West Bank and to negotiate with Hamas with no preconditions. However, that requires the rational option from the world’s most powerful state too. How odd that you should have made the selection you do.

Michael, here is what I think the Israeli general was thinking. I go to war, and show Hamas that I intend to win. Hamas thinks we cannot win, therefor our best course of action is not to fight.

Here is what Hamas actually thought. If we fight the Israelies, Palestinian civilians will die. Every woman and child who dies is a victory for us, because Michael Rosen and his fellow travelers will always blame Israel and never hold us accountable. Hamas can only win under these circumstances.

First para should of course have been in quotes. Apols.

Brownie: re: your last comment, Hamas would probably take advantage of the situation to rearm. But perhaps, if they didn’t dramatically break a ceasefire or truce out of over-confidence, and if there was an absence of targeted assassinations, IDF incursions into Gaza (with attendant many civilian deaths), and the blockade, it is possible that they would also be more willing to negotiate for the long-term, and/or moderate, at least their public face.

Hamas currently get all their legitimacy from an embittered populace by positioning themselves as the resistance to a hated and feared Israeli state. This is something which Hamas are constantly aware of the need to live up to. This legitimacy feeds off the bloody history of interactions between Gazans and Israel.

The catalyst for Hamas’ emergence was after all, the First Intifada, resistance against Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, an uprising which Israel simultaneously managed to mismanage and repress with great loss of Palestinian life (hate to use a wikipedia link, but its late: The Uprising). Israeli interactions with Gaza have, since 1987, always been punctuated with “significant loss of civilian life”. This isn’t a new phenomenon.

Logically it seems, if the violent character of these interactions were to change, Hamas would be far less popular, lose ground to Fatah, or be forced to moderate their public face - and their actions. As it is, they have nothing to lose, and are happy to initiate a ‘people’s war’ that the people don’t want, but are being sucked into. Plenty of Gazans will be angry with Hamas, but plenty more will see the thousands killed and injured, hate Israel and gladly join Hamas in the future.

Military action by Israel, as the past 20 or so years have suggested, is not going to radically change the situation. In the short-run, Israel can constantly chase (and achieve) greater immediate security for its citizens by destroying Hamas infrastructure, targeting rocket sites etc - and it will have to, as it is beholden to its public. But this is not going to lead to long-term stability

To be honest, I don’t know what would. It’d be nice to wish away Hamas, but that isn’t going to happen, and Israel’s military approach to solving political problems in Gaza certainly isn’t going to make it happen

Michael, your deluded. Address the issue. Hamas has responsibility to protect the Palestinians. Instead it has chosen a course of action guaranteed to result in Palestinian death. And you continue to blame the Israelies.

You blind yourself to everything Israel has done to end the conflict. Israel has removed settlements and withdrawn from Administered territories. Israel has offered the Palestinians there own state, on 97% of territories captured in ‘67, Israel has withdrawn from territories in persuit of peace. And yet you bang on about “settlements” as if they justify murder.

As I said, you are a moron.

Israel can constantly chase (and achieve) greater immediate security for its citizens by destroying Hamas infrastructure, targeting rocket sites etc - and it will have to, as it is beholden to its public. But this is not going to lead to long-term stability

Waseem, I agree with this statement in toto. I also believe that Israel would be out of the territories tomorrow if they could be convinced that belligerency against it would end.

“Michael, here is what I think the Israeli general was thinking. I go to war, and show Hamas that I intend to win. Hamas thinks we cannot win, therefor our best course of action is not to fight.”

Perhaps you meant something else with your last phrase and meant ‘our best course of action is to fight’. Even so, either way, I would agree that the generals probably did think this AND the civilian deaths question. I wasn’t suggesting that this was the only thing they thought. It’s not unreasonable to think that the forthcoming Israeli elections are relevant and the incoming Pres of the US too. I just meant that the civilian calculation is made. I know that this is very unpleasant for you and some others here to contemplate or concede, but my money would be that no top military man would have any problem conceding this. And you talk of me being an apologist!

Please don’t start throwing ‘every woman and child’ accusations at me. The woman and children we’re talking about at the moment, in their scores are in Gaza. I was offering a thought that these could not have been unintended deaths. I tried to argue it through on the basis of what military historians and strategists know. If that isn’t acceptable, I tried to argue it through on the basis of the past success of Israeli military force in killing civilians. If that isn’t acceptable, how about the eliminatory discourse that talks of ‘transferring’ Palestinians, or the Benny Morris theory of what could and should have been done to secure Israel earlier and quicker…etc etc. ? Why should we think that the Israeli military is outside of this discourse?

Joe: “So according to this moron, it is perfectly acceptable for Hamas to cower behind civilians as a way to protect themselves from civilians!

I think we should show kurringai the respect he deserves.”

Yes and be sure not to read what I say beyond this because that would place this in context, which is what Joe needs you to forget. The context is that the struggle is national, not merely Hamas’ and that Israel is fighting the population , not just its elected representatives Hamas.

The corollary. for the sake of the ‘moron’ that Joe is proving to be, is that the Israeli military government should never ever fight within its own cities if the Arabs were to break through. It should never take succour from the population but get out on a clump of sand in the Negev and get blasted to bits.

Not exactly how the Jewish terrorists acted before the formation of Israel - those heroes that lead Israel in its ethnic cleansings and massacres for the following 50 years.

You see Joe, if you play little tricks like this, you only engender contempt. Real contempt, not the pseudo dismissiveness you showed me when you realise how weak your case is.

You’re small beer. But since the tacticsyou use are those of the larger Israeli propaganda effort, they are uncovering Israel for what it is; a criminal state, a terror state whose rhetoric is as dishonest as its actions are psychotic.

This is the report of the retraction:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0BRJS6WnMs

Still not one HP devotee who clearly and unabashedly condemns Israel for a mass slaughter. Still no one here to call a crime a crime and an atrocity an atrocity, still no one to call for a War crimes tribunal to bring Israel’s military and civilian leaders to book.

No one.

All you lovers of liberty, dignity and democracy, furrow browed and voiceless in the face of this. I don’t mean voiceless really, I mean morally insensible. Your voices are strong as hell when it comes to parsing and weaseling and wondering and drawing fine distinctions in a manner unknown for you when dealing with Islamic states or states subject to Israeli, US and UK aggression.

What a shabby showing!

In other words, I cannot believe that any general in any country today, does not know the likely civilian death count of any operation he leads.

Michael, I come from a family with considerable military experience. Maybe you do, too. If so, I can’t fathom this almost unimaginable naivity.

Here’s an example of the sort of thing that is happening. Civilians are living in blocks where the basement is given over to a Hamas arms cache. Israel get a location on this. They telephone Arabic warnings to residnets to get out before the inevitable strike (I take it you know this is happening?). When the dust settles, it may be the case that every last one of the residents took the Israeli advice and fled. Or, for whatever reason, every last one stayed.

Civilian death toll somewhere between zero and 20? Zero and 30?

I’m off to bed. Thanks for the discussion.

“As I said, you are a moron.”

Indeed, and as my position on what could be done immediately re peace overlaps with what millions of other people think, then they too are ‘morons’.

Why don’t we have a bet? That Obama will create a situation in which there are negotiations of some sort with Hamas and that he will try to create a cessation of settlements in the West Bank. Why is this latter point not trivial? For the same reason that anything in international politics is not trivial - because it’s illegal, it’s never-ending, it creates a known double standard, and it humiliates the Palestinians.

Yes and be sure not to read what I say

Count on it, pal. Don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out.

Guardian: “The incoming Obama administration is prepared to abandon George Bush’s ­doctrine of isolating Hamas by establishing a channel to the Islamist organisation, sources close to the transition team say.

The move to open contacts with Hamas, which could be initiated through the US intelligence services, would represent a definitive break with the Bush ­presidency’s ostracising of the group.”

Rosen tried this crap on with me as well.

Anyhow, I note Miliband has managed to pass a UN resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire. Unfortunately the US abstained, but it was better than a veto.

It’s looks like New Labour to the rescue again!

Kurringai,

“Still not one HP devotee who clearly and unabashedly condemns Israel for a mass slaughter. Still no one here to call a crime a crime and an atrocity an atrocity, still no one to call for a War crimes tribunal to bring Israel’s military and civilian leaders to book.”

you’ve clearly not read HP very closely. How about regulars like TheIrie, Flanker or Benjamin?

Not to mention Johng or, indeed, Michael Rosen.

this fragile truce was partially broken on Nov. 4, when Israel launched an attack in Gaza to destroy a defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas

Yes, that’s what Jimmy Carter said.

However, if you look at the Israeli official record, it is not clear how far the tunnel had progressed (had it reached under the border?), and for what purpose it existed. The Israelis only surmise it was about to be used for an abduction, but admit that it could have been used for another action - this indicates they had not uncovered a definite plot, and did not stop an abduction in progress.

The Israelis investigated the tunnel on the Gaza side and killed 6 Hamas. But the Israelis are very vague about it all; there is no further discussion or evidence presented related to the tunnel, which you would have thought would be crucial if the tunnel itself is deemed a violation of the ceasefire. The abduction plot is very vague, and is not discussed in any detail. In fact, if you look at the Israeli record, they state that abduction is a violation of the ceasefire, and yet no abduction took place. If a tunnel is a violation too, they present no evidence that it reached Israel, and in fact present virtually no detail of the tunnel at all.

So, out of all that, how can Hamas be firmly accused of violating the ceasefire? They can’t violate the ceasefire on suspected intent alone. They did not abduct anyone. They were not even on the Israeli side. The tunnel entrance (a hole in the ground) was under a building on the Gaza side, we are told. Well, that alone is not a violation of the ceasefire.

zkharya, I’ve read this blog for years. Just couldn’t be bothered with it in the last year or so.

By devotees I mean people who have consistently taken HP’s tribal position vis a vis Liberty, democracy and human rights.

You’re pointing to those who’ve been consistently critical of HP.

kurringai, a couple of quick points.

1) The youtube link that you provide, as has already been observed by me and others, actually confirms the Israeli story of Hamas terrorist using civilian shields. You might want to listen to it again.

2) It depends what we mean by Israeli city underseige. If the IDF used cities, and civilian houses as a base for operation then either the IDF has an obligation to remove the civilians, or they would be culpable for there death. The alternative is for the IDF to assume a battle formation away from the civilians. I suspect, in the worst case scenario, Israel would evauate all non-combatants.

And before you blow on about Palestinians having nowhere to evacuate to, there are two relevent points. (1) Hamas’s strategy is to use the civilians as cover, and (2) Hamas always has the option to surrender.

Michael, perhaps I should have written my intent this way:

“Michael, here is what I think the Israeli general was thinking. I go to war, and show Hamas that I intend to win. Hamas thinks ‘we cannot win, therefor our best course of action is not to fight.’”

I.e. it is not unreasonable for a general to think that an opponant general would surrender befor allowing the people he is presumptively protecting being annihalated. Sort of like the French in WWII.

Michael, I also don’t get your power argument. Indeed, I think you have it inverted. Because Israel is the power, it has no real reason to seek accomidation with the Palestinians. It desire to seek accomidation stems from its desire to have normal and productive relationships with its neighbours. On the other hand the Palestinians cannot force Israel to do anything, therefor they realy are the ones who need to compromise.

And I noticed that you failed entirely, again, to recognise the very real steps Israel has taken to accomidate the Palestinians.

Well Joe, re the clip, you miss the words ‘crucial distinction’ and draw a conclusion which cannot be made.

The IDF has been responsible for bombing and destroying many installations and houses of the enemy in which they knew civilians existed. This current operation is an example of it. So civilian safety means nothing to it. But in terms of its own civilians which is more your point, Israel has the luxury of inflicting urban warfare on another people and not vis versa. Israeli arguments around atrocity, like US ones, are tailor made for self-exculpation. The very particular means by which they inflict atrocities are exempt from the definition. The ones of the Palestinians, much smaller in scope, are all writ large in the doctrine that places suicide bombing killing tens of people as unthinkable terror, the basest form of behaviour, but artillery and air barrages killing hundreds - thousands and even tens of thousands if you include Israeli attacks on the Lebanon in the last 30 years - as a necessary expedient.

So your doctrine may make you feel safe and you feel like you’re a good person because it seems so complete and moral, but its only a doctrine of exculpation. You could never reverse the roles of Israelis and Hamas and maintain your position.

You would have to bring the proof that Hamas is deliberately using civilians against their will or knowledge. Look, in every urban fight in the world, those defending their towns fight through the houses and rubble of their own districts. There are few exceptions to this and none where the aggressor has overwhelming force. The degree of Hamas’ control over the terrain is inversely linked to the degree of Israeli control over it.

The IDF is not leaving an orderly terrain in which Hamas can pick and choose how to evacuate, which safety perimeter to define and so on. Militarily Hamas must react to the IDF. On the other hand, there is no evidence that Hamas is “deliberately” using civilians as shields.

I guarantee that in the reverse situation, Hamas could similarly make the charge against Israelis, because the nature of urban warfare lends itself to that charge.

Hamas is, to remind you, the leadership of the Palestinian people. It is part of the people, not as you and all Israeli apologists insist a thing apart, an alien presence. It is fighting with the widespread support and active aid of those you say are Hamas’ victims. You cannot begin to understand this if you keep trying to separate one from the other.

And to ask them to surrender is to ask something you would never ask of the Israeli leadership.

You have to stop placing the blame for this massacre on other than the perpetrators - the Israelis.

Your argument has a direct analog on the Palestinian side. This states that the Israeli government is responsible for the deaths of its own people by suicide bombing owing to the predictable terrorist actions it takes against the Palestinians. While there is a grain of truth in the analysis of responsibility, I barely think you would support the position whereby the Israelis take the major blame for their own victims. It’s a repulsive calculus.

The perpetrators are, to state the bloody obvious, the perpetrators. The victims are not the perpetrators.

If you don’t hold that the Israelis are entirely morally responsible for suicide bombings, then get a bit universal and stop holding that Israeli atrocities are Hamas’. If you can’t apply a principle universally, then you need to reassess who you are and stop making ethical points.

You should revert to making honest tribal points like “If they’re too stupid to surrender of course we’ll crush them like bugs”.

Because underlying all your words the lack of universality reduces your position to that.

Hamas is, to remind you, the leadership of the Palestinian people. It is part of the people, not as you and all Israeli apologists insist a thing apart, an alien presence.

This is a key point. Its certainly a leadership, and a legitimate one, both in terms of votes won, and its presence and work within communities for many years. Do I like the religious philosophy? No. Would I vote for Hamas? No. Do I like the fact it has not recognised Israel? No. Do I like its war like pronouncements? No. However, it has also shifted positions, engaged in ceasefires, and negotiated with Israel.

As both a legitimate and integral part of Palestinian society it needs to be recognised as such, and negotiated with. The notion that you deal with people who have ideas you dislike by simply killing them (and with them scores of women and children, and much infrastructure) comes close to an endorsement genocide; indeed, genocide was something that was openly discussed as an option in comments at HP.

The problem of rocket attacks has to be seen in the context of the broader Arab/Israeli conflict. Rocket attacks can be massively reduced (including a complete cease fire by Hamas) through negotiation and confidence building, and work towards an overall settlement. This has been proven. Military action like this not only worsens the humanitarian situation and kills many innocent people, but plays into the hands of extremists both in Gaza and the occupied territories, and in Israel.

Getting hung up on the fact that Hamas does not recognise Israel is useless and outmoded. Israel does exist. Hamas poses no threat to its existence. The key point is that a Palestinian state does not. Israel still has the mentality of the colonial power, thinking that bombing and invasion are legitimate to force out the leaders they don’t like, in territory that is disputed, incomplete, but certainly not theirs. No one suggests invading Israel because a section of their political establishment refuses to recognise the legitimacy of a Palestinian state (some of whom are racist), continues human rights abuses against Palestinians, continues building settlements; that’s because its sovereignty and independence are respected. Israel has to talk to people it does not like, and respect Palestinian democracy, even if it does not like the results. It has to accept a Palestinian state. Then, Hamas or no Hamas, Palestine and its economy can be built, trade encouraged, and after time tensions will reduce, because more and more people on both sides of the border will have a stake in the peace.

If we accept (1) the implied approval of Hamas methods by some here (ie you can’t expect them to stay out in the open and fight there, they have to hide behind civilians); and (2) the notion that it is supposedly cruel inhuman barbaric whatever to shoot where you know civilians are, even if you’re being shot at…then what you have is a recipe for Israeli soldiers and civilians to be shot at indefinitely without a right of response whatsoever. Kind of an extrapolation on “israel has the right to defend itself BUT…”

So I am very happy you guys are all just wind and don’t actually have any influence on anything.

I also find it telling that with all this condemnation of Israel (ie “israel is the perpetrator,” what a beastly slander that is given the volume of rockets preceding the invasion), western politicians, who actually have responsibility for their country and the safety of their citizens, continue to blame Hamas.

And by the way, I support peace based on cessation of settlements, 67 borders etc. I however am far less confident that Hamas, the people who voted for it, its western supporters, and the “river to the sea” crowd feel the same way. And none of the tortuous sophistry by the likes of Benjamin or Rosen can change that.

Kurringai, you are on a different plane than benjamin and rosen. your statements simply are bizarre. Your idea about israelis standing not taking it in the negev, well, talk about comparing a reality going on right now with a hypothesis you could never prove… now that’s one way to really win an argument.

Second, you expect people on HP like me to condemn the Israeli “massacre.” I think I and the others have made it very clear that we don’t see it that way at all, and blame Hamas for the sorry state of affairs. We’ve shown that you assign to Israel all the choices and responsibiilties, and absolve Hamas of any of that, as though they don’t have choices or responsibilties. I’ve mentioned that heads of govt. and leading politicians in most western states have openly blamed and continue to openly blame Hamas, not Israel, for what’s going on.

You think you are on the moral high ground, when in fact all that is happening is that the horse you back is taking a beating and you can’t stand it. tough. i always come back to that egyptian saying: if you can’t kill the horse, don’t pull its tail. That’s pretty much says it all about this situation.

And by the way, I support peace based on cessation of settlements, 67 borders etc.

You do. Does Israel? Hamas supports the 67 borders. It does not currently recognise Israel. One of the reasons it doesn’t, apart from the scary religious stuff, is that its unclear that Israel really supports a Palestinian state, proper nationhood. They want reassurance that that is the case. Bantustans and settlements won’t do.

Mirroring extremists in Hamas, there are racists and supremacists in Israel who believe in a Greater Israel, and “population transfer”. They don’t bat an eyelid as Palestinian women and children are slaughtered in Gaza. The fewer Arabs the better.

The Gaza disengagement plan is best described by its architect, Dov Weisglass:

“It supplies the amount of formaldehyde that’s necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.”

The alternative to a political process with people you don’t like is war, slaughter, flirtations with genocide, and this plays to the extremists. As I say, extremist Israeli nationalists will be quietly celebrating as Gazans are killed, while Jew haters will claim that their hateful propaganda is confirmed.

Hamas are a legitimate part of Palestinian society and they are certainly not the most extreme. Moreover, if its made in their interests of them and Palestinians more generally to moderate, they will; in fact there were already several signs of that, and this has been well documented by, apart from others, Henry Siegman at the Council on Foreign Relations.

We’ve shown that you assign to Israel all the choices and responsibiilties, and absolve Hamas of any of that, as though they don’t have choices or responsibilties.

Yes, and you blame Hamas entirely, and so Israel somehow has no choices and responsibilities.

Hence Israel has to bomb schools, apartment blocks, and deny people medical aid. It has to fire on aid workers, and blow up buildings full of people sheltering from attack (after sending them there), and destroy ambulances. It has to. It has no choice, and it has no responsibility.

When it blows up a school with people sheltering inside (it knows that because the UN has told it, and the IDF asked people to leave their homes), because it apparently (we are told) it aims to to kill two or three Hamas, and a mortar, it has to do that. It then has to tell lies to the media and has to accuse the UN of sheltering Hamas, or suggest Hamas has taken over a UN building, when that is nonsense.

It has to do all that. It has no choice, and no responsibility.

Those who openly speculated at HP that genocide might be the only option for Israel to win, may have been right. Thankfully, it doesn’t appear that we are going to test the hypothesis.

The bad news for the remaining pro-Israeli slaughter mongers is this:

Israel’s paymaster, the US, may be getting cold feet. A UN resolution, largely drafted by the UK, has been passed without US veto:

It “stresses and calls for an immediate, durable and fully respected ceasefire, leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza” .

Milliband said the “gravity of what has happened in the Middle East on the ground” had given impetus to the resolution (translation: a lot of people are being killed).

“…in dramatic events on Wednesday night, Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, announced a volte face, seeming to swing the US behind the resolution. That astonished diplomats closely involved in the negotiations, who moved swiftly to issue a text of the resolution.

America’s U-turn signalled a fresh willingness on the part of Washington to incur the displeasure of the Israeli government.

Rice is understood to have had at least six phone calls with Ehud Olmert, Israel’s prime minister, during the course of the day as horsetrading took place over the precise language of the resolution…” (Guardian)

Rice stated that the US agreed with the text and aims of the resolution.

Those who openly speculated at HP that genocide might be the only option for Israel to win, may have been right. Thankfully, it doesn’t appear that we are going to test the hypothesis.

That should be “win” of course. For some extremist Israeli nationalists, killing large numbers of Palestinians is “winning”.

That should be “win” of course. For some extremist Israeli nationalists, killing large numbers of Palestinians is “winning”.

It is? Where are those people? For Israelis, “extremist nationalists” or not, making their country safe is winning.

I think your confused. Remember that Hamas charter you keep avoiding? Might want to check out what it says about killing Jews.

Hamas are a legitimate part of Palestinian society and they are certainly not the most extreme. Moreover, if its made in their interests of them and Palestinians more generally to moderate, they will; in fact there were already several signs of that, and this has been well documented by, apart from others, Henry Siegman at the Council on Foreign Relations.

I feel like I’m being told that Nazism is “legitimate” and “not the most extreme”

Amazing. Fucking amazing.

vildechaye: “You think you are on the moral high ground, when in fact all that is happening is that the horse you back is taking a beating and you can’t stand it. ”

I don’t support Hamas. I just recognise an atrocity when it happens and a leadership when it is elected. I also recognise weasel words from pontificating moralists who become all furrow-browed and girlish when they are called upon to apply their morality in a universal fashion. You puffy big men with your tough words of freedom have become all circumspect and facilating, jumping on any article that supports your love of our atrocities, parsing a massive destruction of human life such that Israel didn’t do it guv. I’ve never seen moral cowardice of such a high order.

Find me one article i’ve quoted, a*hole. jeez you guys will say anything.

RE: Hamas supports the 67 borders. It does not currently recognise Israel. One of the reasons it doesn’t, apart from the scary religious stuff, is that its unclear that Israel really supports a Palestinian state, proper nationhood. They want reassurance that that is the case.

Benjamin there isn’t one portion of this paragraph that stands up to any serious scrutiny. Hamas does NOT support the 67 borders, except as an expedient, the reason it doesn’t recognize Israel is the scary religious stuff, and they don’t strike me as the kind of folks looking for “reassurance.” what rot you talk.