Israel/Palestine (Conflict to more Conflicts)

[Embattle]

I'm not sure why Rishi felt the need to rush out to Israel, he isn't that important or going to help much. I also wish MPs wouldn't go from rightfully calling Hamas a terrorist organisation to almost waving pom poms for Israel when it flattens and blows other innocent people to bits because Israel claims the target had something to do with Hamas and act like wilful ignorance can justify the killing/murder of civilians.

 

[Scouse]

"Collective punishment" is irrelevant; if the government of Gaza is Hamas, which it is, Palestine the state (and by extension the people in it) become exposed to military action. Modern rules of war mean proportionality and the avoidance of civilian deaths where possible, but the "where possible" has always given warring states all the wiggle room they need so long as they can show they had to go through civilians to reach military targets. Which in a compact area like Gaza, is pretty much inevitable.

Collective punishment is NEVER irrelevant.

Turning off the water to 2.3 million people is NOT irrelevant. That action almost makes anything else irrelevant.

And that's the thing people refuse to face. The horror of 1300 civilians killed by Hamas in Israel is beyond the pale. But in comparison to turning off the water to 2.3 million people it doesn't scratch the surface. Doesn't make a dent.

The calls for humanity to prevail are the correct calls. Your argument about "rules of war" is inhumane.

Wrong is wrong, no matter what someone's written on a piece of paper somewhere. Take a moral stance - not a "technically correct" stance.

 

[DaGaffer]

Collective punishment is NEVER irrelevant.

Turning off the water to 2.3 million people is NOT irrelevant. That action almost makes anything else irrelevant.

And that's the thing people refuse to face. The horror of 1300 civilians killed by Hamas in Israel is beyond the pale. But in comparison to turning off the water to 2.3 million people it doesn't scratch the surface. Doesn't make a dent.

The calls for humanity to prevail are the correct calls. Your argument about "rules of war" is inhumane.

Wrong is wrong, no matter what someone's written on a piece of paper somewhere. Take a moral stance - not a "technically correct" stance.

My moral stance is irrelevant. Your moral stance is irrelevant. In reality I think Israel reaped the whirlwind of a disastrous policy towards Gaza that's been brewing for a decade, but also what's really obvious is that Hamas (and by extension Iran) want this; this over-reaction is the plan; it's why they explicitly made social media posts of their brutality and why this attack happened on Netanyahu's watch, because he can't NOT play the tough guy.

Neither Hamas or Iran give a fuck about the population of Gaza except as martyrs and are more than comfortable with sacrificing the lot of them, and while we all bleat about Israel's morality, it's secondary to the geopolitical turmoil that's going to follow that will kill a lot more people (and cost a lot more money) in the long run. Western governments should be calling Israel down from the ledge because what they're doing is stupid and counter-productive, not because it makes us feel bad. And that's why you can't just frame arguments to make them about one thing.

 

[Scouse]

Sorry, but that's a game we don't have to play Gaff. I don't particularly disagree with anything you've said in analysis - not at all. But in times of crisis our moral stances are more relevant than ever.


We should be demanding our governments cease unqualified support for Israel (which is also the government of Gaza - which is a prison camp, with Islamic prison guards, not an independent state).

The parallel with nazi germany is stark and obvious - and to 'the west's' shame we did nothing to fix that whilst it was going on.

We're doing exactly the same thing now - turning a blind eye whilst a genocidal state murders a trapped subset of it's own population.

Cards on the table: The allies need to go in there, turf the government out, run the state in a secular fashion - whilst defending it from all threats - until the religious bigotry has died out.

Israel should not be allowed it exist in it's current form. WWII demonstrates that we have a moral duty to defend all the people of Israel. And that includes from the new Nazi party as well as the well-funded militant Islamists that surround that corrupt and broken state on all sides.

 

[Scouse]

Never in Oxfam’s history have we seen a humanitarian crisis like the one in Gaza | Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah

Instead of running relief services, our staff are running for their lives. We need a ceasefire now, says Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah, chief executive of Oxfam GB

www.theguardian.com

The humanitarian rulebook has been thrown out, and polite pleas from politicians to “minimise civilian fatalities” are naive at best, and at worst seem blind to the unimaginable horrors already taking place in Gaza.

Sunak today and the US veto yesterday = "Do what you fucking like".

 

[Embattle]

I like the fact Biden said about allowing aid in via Egypt, as of now still nothing.

 

[Scouse]

I like the fact Biden said about allowing aid in via Egypt, as of now still nothing.

And as if 20 lorries a day is going to be enough for 2.3 million people.

Israel needs to turn the fucking water back on, the cunts.

 

[Lamp]

Rishi Sunak is in the Middle East. Yay ! He'll sort it all out. Arrives 48 hours after Biden leaves. Like leaving a fart trapped in a room. He's got so much experience. Highly respected around the globe.

/Sunak knocks on the door
No answer

 

[caLLous]

It's a mad coincidence that the timing aligns perfectly with 2 dreadful by-election results. I seem to remember Johnson scuttling off to Ukraine and missing the Wakefield by-election last year (or some conference in the run-up to it).

 

[Lamp]

They'll lose the next election, then Sunak will get his seat in the Lords, and he'll disappear into obscurity. The good news is he'll be entitled to £300 a day expenses. Poor sod. Down to his last £600 million. Be a shame to lose someone who is so in touch with ordinary people.

Commodus: I shall hold them to my bosom and embrace them tightly.
Graccus: Have you ever embraced someone dying of plague, Sire ?
Commodus: No. If you interrupt me again I assure you that you will.

 

[Scouse]

Israel being demonstrably facist:

Arabs in Israel face reprisals over online solidarity with Gaza

Citizens who post on social media in support of Palestinians under bombardment threatened with arrest or sacking

www.theguardian.com

 

[Scouse]

And predictably, Israeli"s are using the cover of the news to grab more land, beat the shit out of people, smash solar panels etc. - drive people out of their villages and steal their stuff.

‘The most successful land-grab strategy since 1967’ as settlers push Bedouins off West Bank territory

Herders report violence driving them from their homes in accelerating, aggressive and highly effective campaign

www.theguardian.com

 

[Wij]

View: https://twitter.com/mrconfino/status/1716426427455655964?s=61&t=iv1E1O7hVRuRm0TFdyUzyw

 

[Scouse]

Interesting that with 5000+ Palestinians dead (nearly half children) and 2.3 million people without enough water food and medical aid, your only post in here is about the atrocities suffered by the Israelis. with no context.

(The context being that Israel has been running a concentration camp for palestinians, and both Israeli civilians and military have been murdering, raping and killing palestinians en-masse during "peace" times (and are ramping this up big time whilst they've the cover of what they're doing in Gaza))

I acknowledge the validity (indeed, the necessity) of posting about the atrocious crimes against Israeli civilians. However, if all your posts ignore the ongoing atrocities, war crimes and collective punishment of a civilian prison population by a well-armed state, if they never attempt to provide a wider context for the current conflict, then the posts become simple apologism I'm afraid.

Nothing excuses Israel for doing what it's doing, not just right now, but for decades.

 

[BloodOmen]

 

[Scouse]

Yeah, bullshit.

Beeb's getting it from both sides tbh. You could write the same thing just replace Israel with it. Whatever the beeb does they're going to get fucked.

 

[Raven]

Far too many people conflating Hamas with Palestine.

It's like saying all Irish are IRA.

 

[Embattle]

I see the Israeli foreign minister at the UN got a serious weed up his arse over what Guterres’s said:

At a meeting of the United Nations Security Council in New York, secretary general Antonio Guterres said that "the 7 October attack by Hamas on Israel "did not happen in a vacuum”.

Guterres added “The Palestinian people been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation. They have seen their lands steadily devolved by settlements and plagued by violence. Their economy stifled. Their people displaced and their homes demolished. Their hopes for a political solution to their plight have been vanishing."

But he also said: "the grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the appalling attacks by Hamas and those appalling attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people”.

 

[Scouse]

So Guterrez is "shocked by his words being misinterpreted"...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-middle-east-67201465

Bascially, Israel bitch-slapped the UN, and rather than the UN turning around and going "fuck you Israel, it was clear what we said" they've backed down.

Hopefully that's just sensible pragmatism on the UN's part. They need aid workers to get access, and if Israel denies visas to aid workers then the palestinians go from totally fucked to, erm, slightly more totally fucked.

Edit: Either way, he's not shocked at all. Like none of us are. Israel punishes anyone who doesn't follow a blindly pro-Israel line.

 

[BloodOmen]

So Guterrez is "shocked by his words being misinterpreted"...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-middle-east-67201465

Bascially, Israel bitch-slapped the UN, and rather than the UN turning around and going "fuck you Israel, it was clear what we said" they've backed down.

Hopefully that's just sensible pragmatism on the UN's part. They need aid workers to get access, and if Israel denies visas to aid workers then the palestinians go from totally fucked to, erm, slightly more totally fucked.

Edit: Either way, he's not shocked at all. Like none of us are. Israel punishes anyone who doesn't follow a blindly pro-Israel line.

Of course, Israel is still living in this delusion that going through a holocaust gives them a free pass to commit genocide.

Quite accurate.

 

[Scouse]

Reports that the United States has bombed sites in Syria in response to Iranian drone attacks.

You'd hope they'd be threatening Israel as well considering they've killed more than 2500 children so far. But hey ho.

 

[Wij]

Reports that the United States has bombed sites in Syria in response to Iranian drone attacks.

You'd hope they'd be threatening Israel as well considering they've killed more than 2500 children so far. But hey ho.

Link?

 

[Wij]

OK - seen it now. It was in response to US forces and assets being attacked by Iranian forces and proxies. Not quite sure there's much of a link to Israel but OK.

 

[Scouse]

Link?

US strikes Iran-linked sites in Syria amid fears Israel-Hamas war could escalate

Defence secretary says strikes in response to attacks on US troops and warns others against triggering ‘broader regional conflict’

www.theguardian.com

Edit: Ah, you'd seen it

But:

Not quite sure there's much of a link to Israel

No link to the current ongoing crisis?

 

[Scouse]

Anyone on a life support or oxygen machine in hospital tonight is going to die. There will be no emergency medical services.

Good going Israel.

 

[Wij]

Is this the real Gerry Adams posting an obviously AI generated image or a fake Gerry Adams posting a fake image?

Misinfo is the norm these days tbh:


View: https://twitter.com/gerryadamssf/status/1717836851325612133?s=61&t=iv1E1O7hVRuRm0TFdyUzyw

 

[Scouse]

Are you trying to say the reports in the guardian about hospitals running out of fuel, therefore electricity, and therefore their ability to run emergency services is misinformation?

Is the ongoing collective punishment of gazan's misinformation too?

We need a secular Israeli government that governs for all.

 

[Wij]

Are you trying to say the reports in the guardian about hospitals running out of fuel, therefore electricity, and therefore their ability to run emergency services is misinformation?

Is the ongoing collective punishment of gazan's misinformation too?

We need a secular Israeli government that governs for all.

No. I was talking about that photo and that senior politicians can’t spot obvious AI fakes.

 

[Scouse]

No. I was talking about that photo and that senior politicians can’t spot obvious AI fakes.

I guess it doesn't really matter if it's an accurate depiction of the atrocities in gaza really.

Won't be too long before anyone can create any image they want and nothing will be verifiable. And it still won't make collective punishment and the deaths of all the people hooked up to ICU in Gazan hospitals tonight OK.

 

[Wij]

I guess it doesn't really matter if it's an accurate depiction of the atrocities in gaza really.

Won't be too long before anyone can create any image they want and nothing will be verifiable. And it still won't make collective punishment and the deaths of all the people hooked up to ICU in Gazan hospitals tonight OK.

It won't make it OK no.

However, I question what you mean when you state that there should be a 'secular Israeli government.'

I was friends with an Arab-Israeli at uni. 30 years ago I know. He had the vote. As far as he was concerned he had the same rights as anyone else.

If you mean a single, secular state in all the area you think of as Palestine/Israel, then what you are advocating for really, you might not realise, is the end of Jewish people in the middle-east. If the population of Gaza and the West Bank was lumped together with the population of Israel, and former refugees returned then in no time at all it would vote to be an Arab state and join the Arab league (current Israeli Arabs might not all vote for it but they'd be outnumbered). Before the currently Arab states were explicitly Arab states (22 of them from the former Ottoman empire (then ruled by Turks, not Arabs)) there were well over a million Jews in those territories. Now there are about a thousand. Jews don't last long in explicitly Arab states.