You’re ignoring 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem and 2 million in the Gaza Strip who are forced to live under Israel’s military occupation and law but do not have political representation in its government. That’s not even getting into discriminatory practices in Israel against its own Arab citizens. How about the fact that a Jew anywhere in the world can immigrate to Israel, but a Palestinian Arab whose family was forced out in the Nakba, with a valid claim to land in Israel, cannot.
Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005[0], evacuating every Jewish citizen and dismantling homes and synagogues. Today, there are zero Jews living in Gaza.
Gaza is run by Hamas and the West Bank by Fatah. Israel does not "control [that] territory" it does not block "other particular ethnic/cultural groups from becoming citizens", nor does it "govern [it] by military law." Israel does not govern or occupy either territory.
As for Gaza, it's ridiculous to say that Israel doesn't occupy it when even long before October 2023 the Israelis have imposed a complete blockade on the territory. They control the movement of goods, they control the water supply, the power supply, the airspace, they built a 20-foot wall around it, they destroyed the only airport, they control how far fishing boats can go out, and on and on. How is that not military control?
The West Bank is administered by the Israeli Civil Administration which is a branch of the Israeli Ministry of Defense. Even the Israeli High Court of Justice (Supreme Court) says that "Israel holds the Area in belligerent occupation" and that "a military administration... continues to apply". [0]
Not to mention how the Israeli government allows over 700,000 illegal settlers to flood the West Bank and does absolutely nothing to stop them from stealing land or attacking Palestinians. The Israeli military has ultimate authority there. Like the other commenter said, it's a fantasy to claim otherwise.
Israel does have a military presence in the West Bank due to the monthly terrorist attacks on Jewish citizens in the West Bank and Israel, currently at 57 attacks per month this year.
As for settlers, I ask readers to observe the double standard: Jews who live in Palestinian areas are "illegal settlers" and "stealing land", but Arabs who live in Israel are entitled to free education, healthcare, citizenship, voting rights, and representation in the government.
By "Arabs who live in Israel" you mean the minority of Arabs who the Israelis didn't force out at gunpoint during Plan Dalet and the Nakba. The Israelis can rectify the situation at any time by either allowing the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza to have a real state, not a puppet or rump state, or by incorporating them into Israel with full legal rights, political representation, and an end to military occupation.
Ah, the "Nakba", the catastrophe: the 1948 war where Syria, Lebanon, Transjordan, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the Islamic Holy War Army invaded Israel, despite being legally partitioned by the United Nations.
Yes, what a catastrophe that invasion was for Arab nations and Arab population in the land.
Perhaps if those nations had not invaded Israel, and perhaps if local Arab communities had not committed violence and massacres of local Jewish communities leading up to Jewish independence in 1948, things could have turned out better for them.
And maybe things can be different tomorrow, too, if Palestinians turn away from terrorism and seeking the destruction of the world's only Jewish homeland.
The claim that Israel doesn’t control the West Bank is utter fantasy. Yes, they allow a Palestinian civil administration to handle some of the work of governing, however it operates entirely under the ultimate authority of the Israeli military.
Btw, how many Palestinians are studying at Ari’el University in the West Bank?
Perhaps there would be more freedom and self-determination for the West Bank if the Fatah government redirected spending its resources from terrorism to infrastructure and services for its people?
In 2023, there were 214 terrorist attacks per month. Israel instituted more security checkpoints, which has resulted in a decline to 57 attacks/month this year.
And yet, 57 attacks per month still ridiculously high. What nation would tolerate that? Is it any wonder that there are security restrictions in place?
As for Ariel University, it is within a Jewish settlement in the West Bank, so Palestinians are generally opposed to its existence. (And indeed, opposed to the existence of Jews in the West Bank, which is a true form of racism and apartheid.) And yet, Ariel University does have a minority of Arab students among the Jewish majority.
Funny how you were originally arguing that Israel doesn't control the West Bank, but now you say "perhaps there would be more freedom and self-determination for the West Bank", correctly suggesting that there isn't self-determination now. So Israel does control it.
Fatah does rule the West Bank. That Israel has security checkpoints only reinforces the reality that Palestinian self-determination is undermined primarily not by Israel, but by its own violence against Jews.
If there weren't some 50 terror attacks per month coming out of the West Bank, Israel wouldn't have need for security checkpoints. If Hamas didn't invade Israel on October 7th 2023, Israel would have zero military presence in the strip like they did for 20 years prior.
Pro-Palestinian folks need to stop blaming the Jewish boogey man for Palestinian problems and start looking at the violence and hatred of Jews within their own camp.
Israel is not a democracy. You cannot call yourself a democracy when 5 million people live under your military occupation and are subject to military law without any political representation. An apartheid state cannot be a democracy.
> Israel values the lives of their hostages above all else and will try to rescue them no matter the cost.
Then why did the Israelis violate the ceasefire in March earlier this year, after they refused to move on to the second phase which would've seen the release of more of the hostages? They broke the ceasefire by killing 400 Palestinians in one day, including over 200 children. [0] Conveniently Netanyahu used it as an excuse to get out of a court appearance for his corruption trial the next day.
Probably because Israel violated the ceasefire earlier this year (that was a sham from the beginning) that lasted from January to March. The first phase of the ceasefire saw an exchange of hostages, but then the Israelis refused to move on to the second phase and broke the ceasefire by bombing Gaza in the middle of the night, killing over 400 Palestinians in one day, including over 200 children. [0]
Not to mention the fact that Israel just killed a top Hamas negotiator in Doha, Qatar only a few weeks ago. [1] How can you negotiate with someone who just killed your negotiator?
> Probably because Israel violated the ceasefire earlier this year (that was a sham from the beginning) that lasted from January to March. The first phase of the ceasefire saw an exchange of hostages, but then the Israelis refused to move on to the second phase and broke the ceasefire by bombing Gaza in the middle of the night, killing over 400 Palestinians in one day, including over 200 children.
Israel has been rather consistent that a permanent ceasefire will only happen when Hamas effectively surrenders and gives up power. Hamas had also refused to continue releasing hostages which effectively ended the ceasefire(as the terms of the second phase were never finalized).
> Not to mention the fact that Israel just killed a top Hamas negotiator in Doha, Qatar only a few weeks ago. [1] How can you negotiate with someone who just killed your negotiator?
I suppose when attempting to negotiate the surrender of Hamas if the negotiators refuse to surrender after having clearly lost a war they started then eliminating the current negotiators may result in their replacements being more likely to capitulate. That seemed to work out with Hezbollah at least.
>I suppose when attempting to negotiate the surrender of Hamas if the negotiators refuse to surrender after having clearly lost a war they started then eliminating the current negotiators may result in their replacements being more likely to capitulate.
So how exactly do you negotiate with genocidal terrorists that refuse to surrender despite having clearly lost a war? There certainly isn't an easy solution here.
> The point is that surrender is something that has to be negociated.
It actually doesn't have to be negotiated, one side can simply make a demand for surrender with their terms and then apply military pressure until capitulation. This is largely what happened with Germany/Japan in WW2.
> By organizing boring meetings with negociators and never killing them.
If it's clear the current negotiators/leaders will never surrender then there is arguably no benefit in keeping those particular negotiators/leaders alive. Once an organizations leadership tree is wiped out a few levels deep there's a decent chance you will get negotiators/leaders that will eventually capitulate to the demands(i.e. like what happened with Hezbollah).
> Well Israel's current solution is to impose famine and genocide on the civilian population.
There is no credible evidence that there is famine or genocide occurring in Gaza. Obviously the situation in Gaza is bad but that's to be expected for a war.
> This thread is literally about an article in which it is outlined that there is indeed a famine in Gaza.
It's not credible however[0]. There have been many claims without appropriate evidence for a while[1] and those involved tend to be antisemitic individuals interested only in pushing a specific narrative regardless of the facts on the ground.
As opposed to the first source you posted which is the text of a sky news interview with Hillel Neuer
From wiki
"Neuer was selected as one of the "top 100 most influential Jewish people in the world" by Israeli newspaper Maariv,[9] and by the Algemeiner Journal in 2017. He is an outspoken defender of Israel[10][11] and critic of the UN's human rights councils' actions.[12]"
So he's not pushing a pro-Israel view? How can you dismiss one source with claims of bias by providing a source that is also bias but of the opposing view?
I want to point out that I don't think sources should be ignored merely due to bias. You do though so I await your defense
I don't think I ever claimed his view was neutral. Groups on both sides putting out analysis papers will likely have some degree of bias.
> How can you dismiss one source with claims of bias by providing a source that is also bias but of the opposing view?
I mostly consider them unreliable because they have a history of putting out reports that push a narrative that simply isn't in line with reality and tend to have major methodological issues. They also have a history of putting out wildly inaccurate future projections.
> I want to point out that I don't think sources should be ignored merely due to bias. You do though so I await your defense
There's two aspects, one is the history of methodologically problematic analysis put out by these organization like those involved in the IPC report along with other UN organizations.
The other is that individuals involved in the reports tend to hold extremist viewpoints that point to a clear motivation for pushing narratives regardless of the reality on the ground.
UN officials in particular have a rather common habit of straight up lying about facts(and even what their own UN reports say in regards to starvation risk) and when caught they simply try and justify their lies[0] because those lies supposedly help their cause.
The most detailed responses/rebuttals to these IPC reports would generally be reports that COGAT is involved in producing[1][2]. While COGAT is arguably biased they do put out sufficient data/references for one to validate their analysis, groups like UN Watch do likely source from these reports. Keep in mind there's not many organizations that have access to data on the ground, COGAT likely has the most complete view while humanitarian organizations likely only have data specific to their own operations. By cherry picking data(often non-public data), ignoring counterfactual data and largely excluding COGAT data the IPC report authors can paint a false narrative more easily.
Claims of famine citing the UN/IPC are normally appeals to authority, whose convincingness depends on the credibility of the authority.
The UNWatch article isn't that - you can easy verify their points yourself. I.e. by IPC's own definition and Hamas' own casualty data, we're about three orders of magnitude short of meeting one of the requirements of a famine. IPC is just ignoring their own definition and declaring a famine anyway.
That wasn't me. I would say the question of how often UN officials lie is rather moot. If it follows from plain facts and basic math that the famine claim is false, we don't really need to argue about the credibility of those making the claims.
> If Israel believes they are genocidal terrorists that won't surrender why are they even negotiating?
One reason would be to try and get back as many hostages as possible, regardless of whether or not the terrorists surrender.
> You either negotiate or you attack the people you want to negotiate with. Not both
One can still attack an enemy while negotiating with them, I see no reason one would have to pick one option over the other.
It's not at all uncommon to negotiate with ones enemies while you attack them(including trying to kill them). If Israel explicitly gave the enemy representatives they were negotiating with diplomatic immunity then one might have a better argument against attacking those with immunity, but that was AFAIU not the case here.
> How can you negotiate with someone who just killed your negotiator?
The only other option seems to be that Israel is about to destroy the rest of Gaza City, and take out the last major location that Hamas controls. So their options are to either accept the peace plan, or die.
I don't think Israel cares that much which choice Hamas choses. But yeah accepting this peace deal sounds like it it quite obviously the mostly likely option to help prevent all the buildings that are about to be destroyed and people who will be killed.
No. They couldn't come to an agreement with Hamas.
> [Israel] broke the ceasefire
No. The ceasefire was over - it was time limited. The 2nd phase was supposed to be release of the rest of hostages. Hamas wouldn't release the hostages.
Let me take a guess. You are against Trump's plan as well and think Hamas should refuse it.
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UK surgeon Nick Maynard, a volunteer at Nasser Hospital, tells Good Morning Britain that he and other doctors tried to bring baby formula into Gaza and the Israelis confiscated it from them with no justification. [0]
If a justification was given we'd be able to evaluate the worthiness of that decision - if there were technical notes about, for instance, food safety concerns, we could evaluate the justification against other standards in different areas of the world around proper formula storage.
Without a justification the decision is arbitrary and silences any ability to push back against it within the normal bounds of dialog. A justification would potentially allow aid groups to remedy whatever the specific deficiency is if it is a reasonable deficiency to remedy.
If there was a justification it might be acceptable - depending on the justification - without a justification it is unacceptable when there is such a clear need. The aid is blocked and there is no recourse to unblock it outside the current attempts to just smuggle it in.
No, but the callousness of an arbitrary decision without even spending 10 seconds to make up a pretend reason is a pure display of power. They do what they want and they don’t care one bit about even looking like the good guys.
That would be an acceptable justification for confiscating sugar. If Hamas were making rocket fuel somehow out of baby formula, then yes, that would be an acceptable justification.
That said baby formula cannot in fact be meaningfully used to make explosives, so this is not acceptable.
Only in the same way that pointing at a starving infant as a prop is a moral justification for using food meant for the infant instead to manufacture weapons.
That rather depends on the justification. "We think you might be planning to use that to feed babies," no. "There's a small canister of nerve gas concealed in the middle," yes.
The reason for that is apparently that you can use baby formula to make rocket candy. Because apparently extracting the lactose from 40kg baby formula is all it takes to make a quassam rocket.
If you can get your hand om 20kg of oxidiser that is. It is all more than ridiculous.
Same for water. I've heard they could electrolyze drinking water into hydrogen and oxygen. Then they could explode the hydrogen using the oxygen as an oxidizer.
Only solution is to cut off all wells and water supplies.
> Hamas did not start it though, according to history
Hamas absolutely started this war. It did not start the conflict, and is not the sole party that has antagonised the situation. (Iran, America, Israel, Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf countries each played a role in that.)
The Eastern Mediterranean is probably the most fought-over tract of land in human history, principally because it's on the shore of the largest easily-navigable body of water near where human history began. Before the British and French there were the Ottomans and Mongols; before them, the Greeks, Romans and Parthians; before them, the Macedonians; before them, the Achaemenids and Babylonians; before them the Egyptians. The last time the region of Palestine contained any independent power was under the Crusader Kingdom. (Before that, around the Jewish-Roman wars.)
I think one could credibly claim that pretty much every nation on Earth has some credible historical claim to some land in the Levant.
Okay, let us look at it this way: you are constantly starved, blocked from trading food and water, and all sorts of things Israel did to Palestine. Would you just sit back and watch?
What do you think that Israel is doing to civilians going to do to long-term? There will be another Hamas, I guarantee it. Israel's actions only breeds violence, i.e. Hamas.
What I am saying is that you cannot expect people to be okay with it. And they will not be okay with it. These kids who survived will turn adults and will retaliate for these actions of Israel. They may have fled, but they will come back full force one day.
In any case, no, Hamas did not start the war, they only started this battle. There will be more because of Israel's ways of doing things.
That depends, did you want enough water to flush your shit into some kind of septic system so all the people around you don't get some awful disease, and maybe enough left over to grow something to eat since your territory is effectively blockaded and situated in an area that requires irrigation?
Though different from the rocket fuel, I've read Israel has dumped so much ordinance on Gaza that the Hamas weapons primarily use material from unexploded ordinance as their warheads.
The war's been at a stalemate for over a year with Ukraine having lost control of its eastern provinces in spite of receiving hundreds of billions of dollars in aid from "the West". Sounds like a loss to me, regardless of one's personal feelings.
Stalemate is not loss. Kyiv still standing is not loss. The loss could've been way worse months ago. Both sides are still planning action. "Lost" is disrespectful to people on the ground still fighting and risking lives every day.
True, but let's not forget that the US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin declared the US goal in Ukraine is to 'weaken Russia'.
Puts a different perspective on what winning means.
Just because "we" are from English-speaking countries doesn't mean "we" have the same "enemies", and the idea that people are assigned a list of enemies based on where they're born is insane. Being born on the same patch of dirt doesn't mean I have anything to do with you.
This is a remarkably uncharitable reading of the comment you replied to.
The person was pretty clearly talking in the past tense about WWII, not claiming that anyone is your enemy now.
Whether you like it or not, being born on a particular patch of dirt means that you are in fact part of the shared history of people born on that patch of dirt, which includes having had the Germans as enemies at one or two points in the past.
I can’t wait for the day I can strap on my Apple® Vision Pro® 9 with OpenAI® integration and spend all my time interfacing (wink) with my virtual girlfriend. Sure my unlit 3 by 3 meter LifePod® is a little cramped and my arm itches from the Soylent® IV drip, but I’ll save so much time by not having to go outside and interact with legacy humans!
That sounds like a nightmare! You have to buy so many products, you have to keep them charged and you re still missing on so much. You should instead get the Neuralink plug-in pod with builtin feeding tube and catheter
> I can certainly think of some other ethnicity in that region who had their land occupied and was cleansed from the region.
And I can certainly think of some other ethnicity in that region who that ethnicity cleansed from the region according to their own holy book. :)
Deuteronomy 20:16-17 (God telling Joshua, leader of the Israelites, to go to war)
> 16 However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. 17 Completely destroy them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—as the Lord your God has commanded you.
Well, it was a joke (hence the :)) showing that the quoted statement also applies in reverse and to continue with that joke it certainly seems like this case satisfies the "or are fully exterminated" criteria, so point taken :)
Slightly more seriously (Though only very slightly more seriously :)), IIRC our current understanding of history is that the jews are Canaanites. Quoting from Wikipedia "Ancestors of the Israelites are thought to have included ancient Semitic-speaking peoples native to this area.[59]: 78–79 Modern archaeological accounts suggest that the Israelites and their culture branched out of the Canaanite peoples through the development of a distinct monolatristic—and later monotheistic—religion centered on Yahweh.", so at the very least one of those peoples survived until today :)
