A senior was killed in palestine several hours ago

[Sandwich]

I have friends living in Israel, the West Bank and even some fighting in the Israeli Defense Force.

I have heard mixed messages about the conflict from many of them, and although their responses to me are quite vague as obviously they are not allowed to give away certain information about their duties.. the message does seem to be unanimous that they are seeking peace and not war. We saw earlier today, in fact 4/5 hours before the ceasefire was over, rockets fired at Israel from Gaza that landed just over the border.

In my honest opinion, the war occurring in Israel is a war against terror, that is a war against Hamas. Hamas being a terrorist organization according to the USA, Australia, EU, Jordan, Egypt etc.

However it would be ignorant of me to ignore the casualties on both sides of the conflict, there are over 1000 Palestinians that have been killed due to the conflict, but is the Israel army really the ones to blame?

Surely, when rockets are being shot from civilian buildings including (confirmed) UN hospitals and schools, there will be civilian casualties!

Not everything the IDF does is right by no means, they are conscripted kids mostly 18-21 years old, but they are still battling terrorists who have no concern for human life whatsoever.

Unfortunately there have been dozens of rockets fired at Israel today now that the ceasefire has ended, so far no response but I expect there will be an extremely large response from Israel, and that scares me purely because of the innocent Palestinian civilians that do not deserve to be caught in the crossfire.

 

I think the whole 'Palestinians are terrorists attacking Israel' thing falls short on two counts though.

 

Firstly that, like you said, there is a huge disparity between the outcomes of the two sides. Israelis are bombing schools, hospitals and so on in a way that you can't pretend not to know mass slaughter will be the result. Targeting a highly populated area is an atrocity whichever way you look at it. If there were a building full of Israelis and a couple of terrorists were hiding in it, would they bomb the **** out of it until everybody there is dead? No, because that's murdering innocents. To rationalise what they're doing, you have to basically say every single Palestinian, women, children, old people, whatever, all of them are complicit. "Oh sorry, you're just in the wrong place at the wrong time, we can't help ourselves we just had to kill you"... It's SO messed up! You can't be a humanitarian and then also say "to hell with all these people because there are a few bad eggs". I think it reflects so badly on Israel.

Hamas on the other hand are bombing essentially just empty fields, almost all the people on the Israeli side but 3 who have died in this conflict are soldiers who have invaded their country and recently been involved in the merciless and indiscriminate killing of their people. Israel also have their whole 'iron dome' system so basically any rockets from Palestine are shot down. So they don't really do much, certainly not kill thousands of civiliansl! It's like comparing throwing a toothpick at somebody and their reaction being to thunk you in the head with an axe.

 

Secondly, you have to look at the motivation behind the 'terrorism'. The Palestinians are oppressed, their land has been grabbed and repeatedly invaded, their people killed, they have more or less no freedom of movement, nowhere to go, all their supplies are basically controlled by Israel. I mean, Nelson Mandela was considered a terrorist at one point. I'm not comparing Mandela to Hamas but the underlying principle is the same - is it really terrorism if you're actually fighting against oppression? I think to say that Hamas is a terrorist organisation targeting Israel in some campaign of evil is to overlook thousands of wrongs committed by the Israelis, which they have the power to fix, and which actually breed groups like Hamas. If somebody dropped a bomb on my peaceful mother, father and family, who's to say I wouldn't join an organisation fighting to get my land back and kick back too? Calling them terrorists is very loaded language that warps the situation and somehow absolves Israel from what they're doing.

 

And of course there are innocents on both sides, but the people inflicting the real damage are the Israelis (one can argue that sending your soldiers into another country is sort-of like shooting yourself in the foot with regards to the fact that some of them are obviously going to be harmed in some way!) and in doing so they seem to be just perpetuating a situation that frankly they sort-of also set up. That's my opinion, anyway.

[CiaranAussie]

 

I have friends living in Israel, the West Bank and even some fighting in the Israeli Defense Force.

I have heard mixed messages about the conflict from many of them, and although their responses to me are quite vague as obviously they are not allowed to give away certain information about their duties.. the message does seem to be unanimous that they are seeking peace and not war. We saw earlier today, in fact 4/5 hours before the ceasefire was over, rockets fired at Israel from Gaza that landed just over the border.

In my honest opinion, the war occurring in Israel is a war against terror, that is a war against Hamas. Hamas being a terrorist organization according to the USA, Australia, EU, Jordan, Egypt etc.

However it would be ignorant of me to ignore the casualties on both sides of the conflict, there are over 1000 Palestinians that have been killed due to the conflict, but is the Israel army really the ones to blame?

Surely, when rockets are being shot from civilian buildings including (confirmed) UN hospitals and schools, there will be civilian casualties!

Not everything the IDF does is right by no means, they are conscripted kids mostly 18-21 years old, but they are still battling terrorists who have no concern for human life whatsoever.

Unfortunately there have been dozens of rockets fired at Israel today now that the ceasefire has ended, so far no response but I expect there will be an extremely large response from Israel, and that scares me purely because of the innocent Palestinian civilians that do not deserve to be caught in the crossfire.

 

I think the whole 'Palestinians are terrorists attacking Israel' thing falls short on two counts though.

 

Firstly that, like you said, there is a huge disparity between the outcomes of the two sides. Israelis are bombing schools, hospitals and so on in a way that you can't pretend not to know mass slaughter will be the result. Targeting a highly populated area is an atrocity whichever way you look at it. If there were a building full of Israelis and a couple of terrorists were hiding in it, would they bomb the **** out of it until everybody there is dead? No, because that's murdering innocents. To rationalise what they're doing, you have to basically say every single Palestinian, women, children, old people, whatever, all of them are complicit. "Oh sorry, you're just in the wrong place at the wrong time, we can't help ourselves we just had to kill you"... It's SO messed up! You can't be a humanitarian and then also say "to hell with all these people because there are a few bad eggs". I think it reflects so badly on Israel.

Hamas on the other hand are bombing essentially just empty fields, almost all the people on the Israeli side but 3 who have died in this conflict are soldiers who have invaded their country and recently been involved in the merciless and indiscriminate killing of their people. Israel also have their whole 'iron dome' system so basically any rockets from Palestine are shot down. So they don't really do much, certainly not kill thousands of civiliansl! It's like comparing throwing a toothpick at somebody and their reaction being to thunk you in the head with an axe.

 

Secondly, you have to look at the motivation behind the 'terrorism'. The Palestinians are oppressed, their land has been grabbed and repeatedly invaded, their people killed, they have more or less no freedom of movement, nowhere to go, all their supplies are basically controlled by Israel. I mean, Nelson Mandela was considered a terrorist at one point. I'm not comparing Mandela to Hamas but the underlying principle is the same - is it really terrorism if you're actually fighting against oppression? I think to say that Hamas is a terrorist organisation targeting Israel in some campaign of evil is to overlook thousands of wrongs committed by the Israelis, which they have the power to fix, and which actually breed groups like Hamas. If somebody dropped a bomb on my peaceful mother, father and family, who's to say I wouldn't join an organisation fighting to get my land back and kick back too? Calling them terrorists is very loaded language that warps the situation and somehow absolves Israel from what they're doing.

 

And of course there are innocents on both sides, but the people inflicting the real damage are the Israelis (one can argue that sending your soldiers into another country is sort-of like shooting yourself in the foot with regards to the fact that some of them are obviously going to be harmed in some way!) and in doing so they seem to be just perpetuating a situation that frankly they sort-of also set up. That's my opinion, anyway.

 

The "Hamas on the other hand are bombing essentially just empty fields" is an absolute joke, they indiscriminately shoot their rockets into civilian areas, if it wasn't for the Iron Dome and its 90% success rate there would be a hell of a lot more dead Israelis.

There is no oppression from the Israelis, Jews, Muslims and Christians share equal rights in Israel... Let us not forget that Hamas is a registered terrorist organization that oppresses its OWN civilians comparing what is happening in Israel to what is happening in South Africa is disgusting and it demeans the atrocities that occurred in South Africa (coming from someone who lived in South Africa, and who's mother lived in South Africa before moving to Israel). There is no proof that Israel were at fault in the school bombings, they did blow up a hospital which had already been fully cleared of civilians and there is VIDEO EVIDENCE that it was being used to fire rockets at innocent Israelis. If Ireland started bombing Britain, I am sure they would fight back, and not allow them to continuously bomb your people. 3,400 rockets in under 1 month is absolutely disgusting, only 600 of them have been intercepted by the Iron Dome.

Keep in mind that hundreds of those rockets fired by Hamas have landed in Gaza... killing their own people.

[Sandwich]

The "Hamas on the other hand are bombing essentially just empty fields" is an absolute joke, they indiscriminately shoot their rockets into civilian areas, if it wasn't for the Iron Dome and its 90% success rate there would be a hell of a lot more dead Israelis.

There is no oppression from the Israelis, Jews, Muslims and Christians share equal rights in Israel... Let us not forget that Hamas is a registered terrorist organization that oppresses its OWN civilians comparing what is happening in Israel to what is happening in South Africa is disgusting and it demeans the atrocities that occurred in South Africa (coming from someone who lived in South Africa, and who's mother lived in South Africa before moving to Israel). There is no proof that Israel were at fault in the school bombings, they did blow up a hospital which had already been fully cleared of civilians and there is VIDEO EVIDENCE that it was being used to fire rockets at innocent Israelis. If Ireland started bombing Britain, I am sure they would fight back, and not allow them to continuously bomb your people. 3,400 rockets in under 1 month is absolutely disgusting, only 600 of them have been intercepted by the Iron Dome.

Keep in mind that hundreds of those rockets fired by Hamas have landed in Gaza... killing their own people.

 

 

They share equal rights in Israel. However these people aren't actually in Israel, but in Palestine, and we're talking nations not religious equality - trade and supplies to which are controlled by Israel and subject to heavy sanctions and policing. And I already stated I wasn't comparing it to South Africa ( ), just that I was trying to demonstrate that people fight for their principles and that whether you label them as principled individuals or as terrorists can be grey. When it's about the freedom of your country and stopping people from marching in and grabbing your land - what's the difference between terrorism and just what any normal person would do? The perception of what is terrorism is grey, because I don't consider what happened in South Africa to be terrorism but at the time many people did. As for demeaning the atrocities, I don't think they're really something which ought to be compared, but arguably atrocities occurred in both these things. Over 1,000 civilians killed by bombs is an atrocity and what happened in S. Africa is also an atrocity. Saying one belittles the other is sort-of missing the point that neither are acceptable actions for humanity to perform on each other.

 

If the iron dome is so rubbish and all these rockets fired from Gaza are so on-point, how come only 2 Israelis have actually died? I'm not even sure if they died from rockets, it's just they happen to be the only civilian casualties. The technology Hamas have is not good, it's back-room-of-your-house stuff versus high powered bombs. How Hamas acts towards its own citizens is somewhat irrelevant in terms of justification for Israel bombing the crap out of them. Unless you say that Hamas kills innocent people so they've set a standard Israel wishes to emulate, which I imagine most Israelis would protest against. The hospital had not been fully cleared of civilians, loads of people died! Regardless of which you shouldn't be firing at a hospital in the first place. The whole thing is just so disproportionate between the two sides in terms of damage done and then the 'retribution' currently being undertaken. Is it 1,000 Palestinians must die for every Israeli, and that's fine? It's not to say Israel shouldn't respond, but the manner in which they're going about it is more or less grand scale murder.

 

Northern Ireland did start bombing Britain, and many people died in terrorist attacks. However it was ultimately solved peacefully, and nobody 'bombed them back'. Because that would have been an atrocity! If you can't discriminate innocent people from guilty people, you shouldn't be sending high powered weaponry in.

[CiaranAussie]

 

The "Hamas on the other hand are bombing essentially just empty fields" is an absolute joke, they indiscriminately shoot their rockets into civilian areas, if it wasn't for the Iron Dome and its 90% success rate there would be a hell of a lot more dead Israelis.

There is no oppression from the Israelis, Jews, Muslims and Christians share equal rights in Israel... Let us not forget that Hamas is a registered terrorist organization that oppresses its OWN civilians comparing what is happening in Israel to what is happening in South Africa is disgusting and it demeans the atrocities that occurred in South Africa (coming from someone who lived in South Africa, and who's mother lived in South Africa before moving to Israel). There is no proof that Israel were at fault in the school bombings, they did blow up a hospital which had already been fully cleared of civilians and there is VIDEO EVIDENCE that it was being used to fire rockets at innocent Israelis. If Ireland started bombing Britain, I am sure they would fight back, and not allow them to continuously bomb your people. 3,400 rockets in under 1 month is absolutely disgusting, only 600 of them have been intercepted by the Iron Dome.

Keep in mind that hundreds of those rockets fired by Hamas have landed in Gaza... killing their own people.

 

 

They share equal rights in Israel. However these people aren't actually in Israel, but in Palestine, and we're talking nations not religious equality - trade and supplies to which are controlled by Israel and subject to heavy sanctions and policing. And I already stated I wasn't comparing it to South Africa ( ), just that I was trying to demonstrate that people fight for their principles and that whether you label them as principled individuals or as terrorists can be grey. When it's about the freedom of your country and stopping people from marching in and grabbing your land - what's the difference between terrorism and just what any normal person would do? The perception of what is terrorism is grey, because I don't consider what happened in South Africa to be terrorism but at the time many people did. As for demeaning the atrocities, I don't think they're really something which ought to be compared, but arguably atrocities occurred in both these things. Over 1,000 civilians killed by bombs is an atrocity and what happened in S. Africa is also an atrocity. Saying one belittles the other is sort-of missing the point that neither are acceptable actions for humanity to perform on each other.

 

If the iron dome is so rubbish and all these rockets fired from Gaza are so on-point, how come only 2 Israelis have actually died? I'm not even sure if they died from rockets, it's just they happen to be the only civilian casualties. The technology Hamas have is not good, it's back-room-of-your-house stuff versus high powered bombs. How Hamas acts towards its own citizens is somewhat irrelevant in terms of justification for Israel bombing the crap out of them. Unless you say that Hamas kills innocent people so they've set a standard Israel wishes to emulate, which I imagine most Israelis would protest against. The hospital had not been fully cleared of civilians, loads of people died! Regardless of which you shouldn't be firing at a hospital in the first place. The whole thing is just so disproportionate between the two sides in terms of damage done and then the 'retribution' currently being undertaken. Is it 1,000 Palestinians must die for every Israeli, and that's fine? It's not to say Israel shouldn't respond, but the manner in which they're going about it is more or less grand scale murder.

 

Northern Ireland did start bombing Britain, and many people died in terrorist attacks. However it was ultimately solved peacefully, and nobody 'bombed them back'. Because that would have been an atrocity! If you can't discriminate innocent people from guilty people, you shouldn't be sending high powered weaponry in.

 

The Iron Dome will only shoot down rockets if it is believed that they will hit areas with a high amount of civilians.

Remember that in Israel they have the Tseva Adom, which gives civilians 15-45 seconds to get to a bomb shelter, there are so many of them nearby that they're usually fine it is just a major disturbance to their day. But no, rockets often hit civilian areas... look at the videos of rockets hitting factories etc. in Israel.

Also may I add that Hamas digs tunnels into heavily populated areas from Israel with concrete given to them by humanitarian organizations that should be used to create buildings for civilians!

Israel has done wrong in this war, but it has been confirmed that they have not committed any war crimes... Hamas are the instigators and have to be dealt with accordingly, the only group that is oppressing the people in Gaza is Hamas, as shown in the Reddit Ask Me Anything when a man from Gaza said that 60% of Gazans would rather live under Israel law than Hamas and Fatah!

There have been many more innocents killed by rockets, one rockets directly hit a man with his daughter! Sure, most of the Hamas artillery is shed-made rockets, but they do have a lot of rockets given to them from Syria, Iran and bought with the $1 billion given to them by Qatar!!!!!

The fact of the matter is most countries around the world, including fellow middle eastern countries Egypt and Jordan Hamas IS a terrorist organization and thus must be eliminated for their to be peace in the region! They are no different from ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Qaeda and Hezbollah, just to name a few...

The ANC did use terrorism when they were oppressed by the National Party in South Africa, it does not excuse their indiscriminate bombings, however they were seeking equal rights as the white people which at the time they did not have, Hamas is seeking to wipe Israel off the map and create their own country in the area that is inexcusable and very much wrong. Maybe there would be less casualties, if Hamas spent its billions on the people in that area, and not for killing Israelis, Gazans and allowing the leader WHO LIVES IN QATAR, a lavish lifestyle.

[Sandwich]

The Iron Dome will only shoot down rockets if it is believed that they will hit areas with a high amount of civilians.

Remember that in Israel they have the Tseva Adom, which gives civilians 15-45 seconds to get to a bomb shelter, there are so many of them nearby that they're usually fine it is just a major disturbance to their day. But no, rockets often hit civilian areas... look at the videos of rockets hitting factories etc. in Israel.

Also may I add that Hamas digs tunnels into heavily populated areas from Israel with concrete given to them by humanitarian organizations that should be used to create buildings for civilians!

Israel has done wrong in this war, but it has been confirmed that they have not committed any war crimes... Hamas are the instigators and have to be dealt with accordingly, the only group that is oppressing the people in Gaza is Hamas, as shown in the Reddit Ask Me Anything when a man from Gaza said that 60% of Gazans would rather live under Israel law than Hamas and Fatah!

There have been many more innocents killed by rockets, one rockets directly hit a man with his daughter! Sure, most of the Hamas artillery is shed-made rockets, but they do have a lot of rockets given to them from Syria, Iran and bought with the $1 billion given to them by Qatar!!!!!

The fact of the matter is most countries around the world, including fellow middle eastern countries Egypt and Jordan Hamas IS a terrorist organization and thus must be eliminated for their to be peace in the region! They are no different from ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Qaeda and Hezbollah, just to name a few...

The ANC did use terrorism when they were oppressed by the National Party in South Africa, it does not excuse their indiscriminate bombings, however they were seeking equal rights as the white people which at the time they did not have, Hamas is seeking to wipe Israel off the map and create their own country in the area that is inexcusable and very much wrong. Maybe there would be less casualties, if Hamas spent its billions on the people in that area, and not for killing Israelis, Gazans and allowing the leader WHO LIVES IN QATAR, a lavish lifestyle.

 

 

It's a complicated situation, but I suppose the main point I'd make is that absolutely none of the above justifies Israel's current actions, it just describes a complex situation. You say that Hamas want to take Israeli land - well from another and no less wrong perspective, it's actually Palestinian land taken recently from them by Israel who are harassing Palestinian occupants and building more and more housing there against international law in order to stake an insidious claim on the area. There are groups of Israelis who want to wipe out Palestine just as much as there are groups of Palestinians who would wipe out Israel. Israel accused Hamas (who denied it) of taking 2 teenagers and then conducted a revenge attack by murdering a small boy. It's not black and white by any means, the only thing that is black and white is the wrong-ness of the current situation. Conflating Hamas with Israel is like conflating all Israeli people with Jews. What is going on is not killing Hamas, it's Israelis killing Palestinians - and by no means are all Palestinians Hamas. The vast majority who have died have nothing to do with those people. 

 

Whoever is deciding on the definition of war crimes has an extremely ****ed up perspective if they deny that what's going on is not a crime, in my opinion. Bombing large areas known to contain thousands of civilians and washing your hands of it by saying there might be a few militants there is pretty high on the bull**** scale. Personally I don't think it is right to conflate Hamas with Al Quaida etc. because Hamas were elected and they are in their view fighting for the freedom of an oppressed nation, whether you agree with that or not. And saying that killing thousands of people has to be officially defined as a 'war crime' by whoever decides these things before it becomes 'wrong' is pretty damn morally questionable as well.

 

There isn't really a list of excuses sufficient to justify what's going on. Regardless of who did what to who and who started it, the way the current conflict is being conducted is pretty sick.

[yii yann]

 

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I've been reading both of your replies for a while, and I can see that there is a point to both sides. I'd imagine what Sandwich is saying is correct, but I find it hard to believe that any other powerful country would not react the same, or even more ruthlessly. I mean, imagine the internal backlash if the government didn't completely crush the enemy. As Obama said, (paraphrasing), if someone were shooting rockets into my house, where my wife and children slept, I'd attack them too. 

 

So, I'd like to ask what would both of you do if you were Israel? CiaranAussie, would you continue with the methods used by the IDF? Sandwich, what would you do? 

[Negotiation]

"Five Palestinians have died after the Israeli military resumed strikes on targets "across the Gaza strip", in response to Hamas rocket fire as a 72-hour ceasefire expired this morning." (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israelgaza-conflict-ceasefire-ends-with-rockets-launched-as-hamas-rejects-extending-truce-9655855.html)

 

Sandwich, I'm curious: when civilians die as a result of Israeli retaliatory fire like this, how much of the blame would you say Israel has, and how much of it does Hamas have?

Edited August 9, 2014 by Negotiation

[SallyShariff]

I literally laugh out loud when i hear the "Israel is just defending itself argument".

 

Israel has been illegally occupying Palestine for 67 years, repressing it, starving it, robbing it, and committing acts that could amount to genocide, under the false guise of "self defence".

 

What if i come to your place, and lock you in the bathroom. I'll let you leave the bathroom, but only to leave your house and never come back. I will use your house as my own. You better not attack me to defend your home if I let you out, or else i'll have to defend my self by MURDERING YOUR FAMILY.

 

I mean come on ! When is the bombing of UN schools, hospitals, ambulances, shelters justified ? Never.

 

Want to stop Hamas rocket fire, which isn't the root problem but actually a symptom of it ? END THE ILLEGAL OCCUPATION OF THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE.

Edited August 15, 2014 by SallyShariff