Israel-Gaza war

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Terrible, terrible, terrible. Hundreds of people have already died, and I fear the count will continue to skyrocket. And this was completely out of the blue, not like the Ukraine war at all. Hopefully it doesn't spill over into other countries.

When people are oppressed and have their land stolen from them, they tend to lash out.

This was entirely predictable.

Then the oppressors, who now have an excuse, lash back even harder and the oppressed usually end up in a worse place. People have to be cleverer than that.

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If Israel had known about the attack, their only option would have been to strike first and who would have believed them?

Golda Meir concluded in 1973 that a second pre-emptive strike wasn't the best option.

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It was organised by a government, because that is what Hamas is.

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How exactly are Palestinians trapped in Gaza supposed to inform the Israelis of such an attack? Try to get the attention of a bomber flying overhead? There aren't exactly a lot of opportunities for interfaith dialogue in the region.

They have the Internet in Gaza.

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Some of their ancestors would have been in the Red Army though. After what the Germans did in the USSR, the desire for revenge was very real.

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Coincidentally, Israel and Ukraine are the two countries in the world with a Jewish head of state right now.

Panama has a Jewish President. When you add heads of government, Russia and France join the list.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jewish_heads_of_state_and_government

France had a Jewish PM during the tail end of the Third Republic and the beginning of the Fourth, when the Prime Miniser had much more power.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A9on_Blum

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Coincidentally, Israel and Ukraine are the two countries in the world with a Jewish head of state right now.

Panama has a Jewish President. When you add heads of government, Russia and France join the list.

Laurentino Cortizo is Catholic, although his mother was of Jewish descent.

Which makes him Jewish enough for the Law of Return.

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Is the Israeli military using white phosphorus in its military attacks? That seems like a war crime to me.

They've denied it. It's also only a war crime in certain circumstances and Israel isn't a signatory to one of the relevant protocols:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/13/israel-military-white-phosphorus-gaza-lebanon

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Both Israelis and Palestinians are "off white" for lack of a better term if you insist on classifying them into discrete racial groups.

"White-passing" is a common term used and that's common across the Middle East. Asma al-Assad could be played by Keira Knightley fairly easily.

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South Africa experienced all sorts of atrocities at the hands of the ANC and other rebel groups. Necklacing is among the most brutal methods of execution and it was pioneered by the ANC. Yet despite the atrocities they were somehow able to end apartheid. Why should we not hold Israel to the same standard?

They never did anything of the scale and type of what Hamas did a week ago. Their targets were generally military or police personnel and infrastructure.

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OP was very crass, but I think you underestimate how damaging an assymetrocal urban warfare could be for the land forces of the IDF. They are for sure one of the top forces in the world but there's a reason they disengaged from Gaza in the first place. Urban warfare is already a night mare in a normal city, then you add the underground highly dense city of Gaza to the equation. Israel has no real "good" options. Ideally it would pursue a further deepening of diplomacy to ensure Gulf states join them in cracking down on the Hamas leadership in exchange for a commitment to 2 state solution and softening the settler policy. With Ben Gvir and Smotritch still in government this ain't happening.

Sometimes cities surrender without much of a fight - Kabul had a bigger population than the entire Strip and the Taliban were pretty much unopposed, having already defeated most of the loyalist forces or had them desert.

Russia also retreated from Kherson, which it had "annexed", of its own volition.

The Israelis are definitely not going to want a long occupation - the problem will be finding someone else to run the place for them. Fatah have lost a lot of support in recent years due to corruption. They're also too hostile for Israelis and not hostile enough for the Palestinians.

Jeremy Bowen from the BBC thinks the Israelis aren't ready to go in yet. They're firing artillery, but he's seen nothing that looks like an imminent ground offensive. One wonders what behind-the-scenes diplomacy is going on.

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The two cities you mention weren't defended by a death cult. 

Germany in 1945 would be the classic example of urban warfare, where there was plenty of "death cultists". Once the Western Allies were across the Rhine, a lot of German cities fell pretty quickly.

The main thing slowing them down was arguably the sheer number of prisoners they were taking.

The Eastern Front was a different thing entirely, but after Hitler killed himself, Germany capitulated in under a week and  no serious resistance movement to Allied occupation materialised. The SS was too busy trying to not end up in the dock for war crimes.

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https://twitter.com/barakravid/status/1713547533601956014?s=46

In Southern Gaza only, to encourage people to move south. I don’t know whether there will be enough capacity for everyone there, but it will probably suffice for drinking water if the farmers are willing (or coerced by locals) to take a hit.

This is still much better than the status quo ante.

Humans need about 3 or 4 litres of water per day just for drinking. The World Health Organisation recommends a minimum of 100 litres a day per person for drinking, cooking, bathing, washing etc. Israel was using about twice that, Gaza was at 88 litres.

https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/water-gaza-scarce-polluted-and-mostly-unfit-use

The average American consumption is over 300 litres a day, for point of comparison.

So, basically, since cooking and drinking will need prioritising, there's going to be a lot of smelly Gazans in need of a shave soon.

There's also religious issues here - the ritual ablutions required for prayer. There is an alternative to using water in cases such as this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tayammum

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Worth reading that thread in full. Hamas have quite possibly destroyed the Palestinian cause with their actions.

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The other comment I've heard from more than one person is that while its true that the Palestinian cause has been doomed by Hamas' terror attacks, it doesn't matter because the cause was doomed anyway; that all Hamas has accomplished was to accelerate the inevitable.

Quite. To quote a line that wasn't said by the man who turned down the offer to become Israel's President: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results."

The Palestinians have spent 75 years engaging in violence against Israel and gone backwards.

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A lot of Palestinian protest seems to be throwing Molotov cocktails, stones and rocks at people, which hardly seems peaceful from my perspective. Where I come from, peaceful protest involves holding placards, blocking roads and chaining yourself to things. Although I admit the latter two aren't being that effective for some groups.

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That's called a riot.

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J'Accuse...!

Ironic you picked that headline as the Dreyfus Affair is the reason modern Zionism exists.

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I mean, they legitimately don't just level buildings with hundreds of civilian casualties, but either way it seems nobody is disputing "there was a depot in the hospital and it blew up", which I think is sufficient to assign blame.

Possibly the Israelis struck something in the hospital and caused a much bigger explosion than they'd anticipated.

It's common for warships to be sunk not from the initial impact of the missile but a fire causing the magazines to explode. That's why firefighting is a key part of all sailors' training.

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Whoops!

https://twitter.com/MnarMuh/status/1714373915529613463

I somehow doubt he's sitting in the situation room.

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It isn't as though hospital administrators can be expected to stand up to authoritarian regimes.)

Quite the opposite, considering the Soviet abuse of psychiatry.

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https://twitter.com/alextomo/status/1714670858914894046?s=20

He's also sceptical of the evidence on the other side.

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All these actions can be and are illegal at the same time, clearly. What's the point of this post?

The use of those facilities for military purposes eliminates their protected status while they are being used as such.

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Gaza's population has grown from less than a million to 2.4 million in the last 20 years, with Israel providing the bulk of their utilities and resources.

Partly that's because poverty with decent medical provision tends to lead to increased birth rates.

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Spoiler alert: The ties are it's headed by a former National Security Adviser to Bibi.