Israel Hamas War | IDF Kills peaceful American Protester in West Bank

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RaiGuy said:
Netanyahu could have had them all back months ago, but he continues to put them under unnecessary danger. It's frustrating
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True — he and Ben Gvir and Smotrich saw their chance and went for it, hostages be damned. But Hamas could have let them go immediately or never done O7 in the first place. A lot of bad actors are contributing to this hellscape.
 
nycfan said:
True — he and Ben Gvir and Smotrich saw their chance and went for it, hostages be damned. But Hamas could have let them go immediately or never done O7 in the first place. A lot of bad actors are contributing to this hellscape.
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Very true, but I haven’t seen a soul on this thread excusing Hamas for their role in this mess, but several are JCDing the Israeli government and glossing over their role in perpetuating this situation.
 
farce said:
Very true, but I haven’t seen a soul on this thread excusing Hamas for their role in this mess, but several are JCDing the Israeli government and glossing over their role in perpetuating this situation.
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Yeah, was responding in a vacuum — I tend to skim this thread a lot more than read it — it’s a blood pressure thing.
 
farce said:
Very true, but I haven’t seen a soul on this thread excusing Hamas for their role in this mess, but several are JCDing the Israeli government and glossing over their role in perpetuating this situation.
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A lot of people (not in this thread) have attempted to excuse Hamas for 10/7. Have you seen some of the language from the campus protests? UNC's own SJP celebrated 10/7 just after it happened, and a guest speaker at the university also attempted to justify it.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
A lot of people (not in this thread) have attempted to excuse Hamas for 10/7. Have you seen some of the language from the campus protests? UNC's own SJP celebrated 10/7 just after it happened, and a guest speaker at the university also attempted to justify it.
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Justifying it isn't the same as condoning it. Justifying it means giving a reason to why they acted that way but it doesn't mean that they should have done it. Attacking civilians is always wrong. However, resisting an occupation and fighting back against an oppressor is allowed in the Geneva Conventions. Palestinians have a right to fight back against the Israeli oppression/occupation.
 
RaiGuy said:
Justifying it isn't the same as condoning it. Justifying it means giving a reason to why they acted that way but it doesn't mean that they should have done it. Attacking civilians is always wrong. However, resisting an occupation and fighting back against an oppressor is allowed in the Geneva Conventions. Palestinians have a right to fight back against the Israeli oppression/occupation.
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If they had fought back against military targets, you might have a point. However, someone attempting to justify 10/7 is the same as someone trying to justify 9/11- you can't. Likewise, you can explain why a serial killer might target women (he was abused as a child, he has a psychological disorder, etc) but this does not justify his actions.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
If they had fought back against military targets, you might have a point. However, someone attempting to justify 10/7 is the same as someone trying to justify 9/11- you can't. Likewise, you can explain why a serial killer might target women (he was abused as a child, he has a psychological disorder, etc) but this does not justify his actions.
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Well, of course. Any mentally healthy person would not do that. However, you see the trauma that Israel is causing and Hamas is a direct result of that. They all have been affected by Israeli aggression and add in many are living in tough situations with no real future, then that is a recipe for disaster. One cannot rationalize their actions based on how a mentally healthy person would respond because they are traumatized. I'm not saying they are all violent, by no means. However, it is easy for them to be manipulated into doing those actions because they feel helpless and want to fight back. Explaining that does not mean I condone them, but just shows the reasons to how things like this happen. It's not that these people are born with evil in them. It's also not, as you have stated many times, because they hate Jews. If it was Mormons or even other Muslims that did this to them, they would still behave the same.
 
It's just not that complicated.

After WWI, the Allies imposed harsh conditions on Germany. Those conditions helped produce Hitler. After WWII, the Allies were like, "nah, let's not do harsh again. Let's help them rebuild and be friends." That was not condoning Hitler. It was just a realization that we are all better off when we help each other than when we fight each other.

Israel should have been helping to develop Gaza over these years. Instead, it put in a blockade that created human misery for no reason or benefit. Surprise, surprise -- the harshness created resentment and we've seen the fruit of that. Now Israel has its own private WWII. The difference is that they aren't going to learn. They aren't going to help Gaza rebuild. They are going to complete its colonization.
 
superrific said:
It's just not that complicated.

After WWI, the Allies imposed harsh conditions on Germany. Those conditions helped produce Hitler. After WWII, the Allies were like, "nah, let's not do harsh again. Let's help them rebuild and be friends." That was not condoning Hitler. It was just a realization that we are all better off when we help each other than when we fight each other.

Israel should have been helping to develop Gaza over these years. Instead, it put in a blockade that created human misery for no reason or benefit. Surprise, surprise -- the harshness created resentment and we've seen the fruit of that. Now Israel has its own private WWII. The difference is that they aren't going to learn. They aren't going to help Gaza rebuild. They are going to complete its colonization.
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Israel didn't just put up a blockade for fun. Israel put up a blockade because terrorists were coming in from Gaza and slaughtering Israeli civilians. Then, afterwards, they were using humanitarian aid to build secret tunnels, buy weapons, and launch thousands of missiles at Israeli cities. Those are important facts that you appear to be glossing over. Tens of billions of dollars have been given to Gaza to "rebuild". The elected government of Gaza chose to use that money instead to wage terrorist attacks and construct underground military infrastructure that benefits no one other than Hamas. That's not on Israel.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
Israel didn't just put up a blockade for fun. Israel put up a blockade because terrorists were coming in from Gaza and slaughtering Israeli civilians. Then, afterwards, they were using humanitarian aid to build secret tunnels, buy weapons, and launch thousands of missiles at Israeli cities. Those are important facts that you appear to be glossing over. Tens of billions of dollars have been given to Gaza to "rebuild". The elected government of Gaza chose to use that money instead to wage terrorist attacks and construct underground military infrastructure that benefits no one other than Hamas. That's not on Israel.
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We've been through this before. First, the "tens of billions of dollars" diverted to military infrastructure is a ridiculous exaggeration. Whatever the true number is, it's high but it's not freaking $10b. Of this I am very confident, because I know people who traveled to Gaza to do humanitarian aid and their trips were funded by a Gaza ministry. I suppose it's theoretically possible for me to know all three people who received such grants from Gaza, but I think it's highly, highly unlikely.

Second, the blockade was not triggered by terrorism. Israel threatened to blockade if Hamas won the election, and when Hamas did, Israel blockaded. It was in response to an election, not terrorism.

As for this humanitarian aid, how exactly should Gaza spend this money if it is blockaded? People can't be expected to invest in businesses if they can't get water and power reliably. Nobody is going to invest to build factories in Gaza if the infrastructure could be turned off at the whim of the Israeli government. From a political angle, the blockade has meant that Palestinians blame Israel for their material deprivations, and thus they don't blame Hamas for grifting or skimming. By all measures, the blockade has been self-destructive in addition to being cruel and inhumane.

The present conflict owes more to that blockade than any other factor. This isn't really an open question, in my mind. It's like the Treaty of Versailles. Collective punishment doesn't work and it's wrong.
 
superrific said:
We've been through this before. First, the "tens of billions of dollars" diverted to military infrastructure is a ridiculous exaggeration. Whatever the true number is, it's high but it's not freaking $10b. Of this I am very confident, because I know people who traveled to Gaza to do humanitarian aid and their trips were funded by a Gaza ministry. I suppose it's theoretically possible for me to know all three people who received such grants from Gaza, but I think it's highly, highly unlikely.

Second, the blockade was not triggered by terrorism. Israel threatened to blockade if Hamas won the election, and when Hamas did, Israel blockaded. It was in response to an election, not terrorism.

As for this humanitarian aid, how exactly should Gaza spend this money if it is blockaded? People can't be expected to invest in businesses if they can't get water and power reliably. Nobody is going to invest to build factories in Gaza if the infrastructure could be turned off at the whim of the Israeli government. From a political angle, the blockade has meant that Palestinians blame Israel for their material deprivations, and thus they don't blame Hamas for grifting or skimming. By all measures, the blockade has been self-destructive in addition to being cruel and inhumane.

The present conflict owes more to that blockade than any other factor. This isn't really an open question, in my mind. It's like the Treaty of Versailles. Collective punishment doesn't work and it's wrong.
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The blockade was indeed triggered by terrorism. Hamas was a terrorist group that had conducted numerous suicide bombings and terrorist attacks aimed at Israeli civilians prior to their election in 2007. The fact that a known international terrorist group that has sworn to kill Israeli citizens was elected to govern Israel's neighbor was what triggered the blockade. Israel can't be blamed for not allowing Hamas free access to continue to slaughter teenage Israeli girls at dance parties, for example. And Hamas lived up to expectations by diverting international aid to build tunnels, hide weapons, and launch thousands of missiles at Israeli cities. If the blockade had not been in place, it is likely that Hamas's attacks would have been far more severe. That's why the best thing for Palestinians and Israelis alike is for Hamas to be removed from the equation in Gaza. As the NYT article I posted on a previous page has shown, it looks like this war is close to accomplishing exactly that.
 
2ManyBlueCups said:
The blockade was indeed triggered by terrorism. Hamas was a terrorist group that had conducted numerous suicide bombings and terrorist attacks aimed at Israeli civilians prior to their election in 2007. The fact that a known international terrorist group that has sworn to kill Israeli citizens was elected to govern Israel's neighbor was what triggered the blockade. Israel can't be blamed for not allowing Hamas free access to continue to slaughter teenage Israeli girls at dance parties, for example. And Hamas lived up to expectations by diverting international aid to build tunnels, hide weapons, and launch thousands of missiles at Israeli cities. If the blockade had not been in place, it is likely that Hamas's attacks would have been far more severe. That's why the best thing for Palestinians and Israelis alike is for Hamas to be removed from the equation in Gaza. As the NYT article I posted on a previous page has shown, it looks like this war is close to accomplishing exactly that.
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Basically none of this is true, especially the idea that Hamas' attacks would have been more severe if not for the blockade. That's just not how things work. One way to know that you're wrong is to understand that the casualties on O7 substantially exceeded the death toll of ALL Palestinian terrorism in the first decade of this century and I think it was greater than all Palestinian terrorism ever (though I'm not sure about that). The blockade didn't prevent attacks. It prompted them. When people have no future, they are much more eager to sign up for dangerous activities like drug smuggling, armed conflict or suicide bombings. When they have nothing else to do, they can afford to spend their time in military training.

It's not a coincidence that paramilitary activity across the globe occurs almost exclusively in poor places, and especially places subject to foreign domination.
 
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