Israel-Gaza war

[pppolitics]

15-20 years from now, the American public would be wondering how the US became complicit in Israel’s war crimes.

I get to say with a straight face that, although it wasn’t a popular position then, I wasn’t one of those complicit Americans.

[pppolitics]

15-20 years from now, the American public would be wondering how the US became complicit in Israel’s war crimes.

I get to say with a straight face that, although it wasn’t a popular position then, I wasn’t one of those complicit Americans.

15-20 years from now there will most likely be another large-scale terrorist attack motivated by Islamism somewhere in the First World which will re-radicalize everyone all over again. (Also, the US will be much more evangelical and very likely view the Israeli state more favorably than it does now in 15-20 years.)

I guess you haven’t heard, but the US is becoming less and less religious.

As an atheist, I will be in good company.

[pppolitics]

Also, the US will be much more evangelical and very likely view the Israeli state more favorably than it does now in 15-20 years.

Irreligiosity is increasing every year. Wtf are you talking about?

I think he likes getting dunked on. At this point I'm not sure what else could lead someone to pick the obviously wrong viewpoint on literally everything. Remember he's an admitted masochist. This isn't a personal attack, he's said so himself.

Vosem said earlier that the Palestinians had no right to a state and Israel is entitled to Gaza and West Bank, so you know where he stands.

[pppolitics]

At least 500 killed in Israeli airstrike on Gaza City hospital, Gaza Health Ministry says

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2023-10-17/israeli-bombings-gaza-kill-dozens-aid-still-stalled

Israel probably wants to see how many war crimes that it can get away with

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/gaza_report/status/1714335125570191370?s=20

https://twitter.com/gaza_report/status/1714337523592208695?s=20

https://twitter.com/IsraelWarRoom/status/1714339337532555693?s=20

You have to be really gullible to believe that this was an accident.

[pppolitics]

If this explosion was actually caused by Israel (or even worse, was deliberately caused), I don't see how they could possibly retain international support. Hell, they have to worry about a revolution in the West Bank and war on 3 or more fronts at that point (Hezbollah+Iran+West Bank involvement).

Have you learned nothing?

Israel can commit all the war crimes it wants and still retain US support.

[pppolitics]

Whoops!

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

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/MirzaMahan/status/1714377238823469399
https://twitter.com/MirzaMahan/status/1714377313691852938
https://twitter.com/ShaykhSulaiman/status/1714408128588947764

[pppolitics]

Are there any instances of Palestinian missiles causing this kind of damage? I imagine terrorists would have done so already against Israeli target. Perhaps capable but missed? Or is this clearly a bunker buster?

No. Palestinian missiles are not this powerful.

[pppolitics]

Are there any instances of Palestinian missiles causing this kind of damage? I imagine terrorists would have done so already against Israeli target. Perhaps capable but missed? Or is this clearly a bunker buster?

No. Palestinian missiles are not this powerful.

It doesn't need to be powerful if it struck somewhere ammunition was being stored. It is possible that either a building at the hospital site or a neighboring building was being used for such purpose. You can hardly rule it out, especially given the GeoConfirmed analysis. It isn't confirmed that a Palestinian rocket caused the explosion but it certainly looks possible.

I would wager that the reason you don't see similar explosions in any cases where Palestinian rockets have landed in Israel is because the IDF is an actual military and follows proper ammunition storage procedures which are crafted specifically to prevent such explosions.

We have seen plenty of ammunition depots being blown up in Ukraine before.

There would be one or more secondary explosions from the ammunition.

[pppolitics]

Wouldnt rockets from Gaza landing in Israeli border towns also have a lot of unspent fuel? The poster from OH also brought up a point. Have we ever seen Israeli mumitions cause this damage? I really dont recall anything like this. Since Israel blows up other targets with Hamas weapons, do explosions like this happen regularly? Wasnt there footage of a high rise collapsing in the first day or so but I dont know anytjimg about this stuff.

Bunker busters that Israel uses to target Gaza's tunnels can easily cause this much damage if not more.

[pppolitics]

It's clear this is becoming an inflection point in international sentiment. Over a decade of diplomacy with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States has been incinerated. The West Bank has become a powder keg.

If Israel did not bomb the hospital, they need to release all of the available video footage from before, during and after the explosion so the public can see for themselves just what did or did not happen.

And they'd better do it now, before POTUS arrives and they have an opportunity to tank our international standing along with theirs.

This is not a good look.

Biden should cancel the trip.

[pppolitics]

It's clear this is becoming an inflection point in international sentiment. Over a decade of diplomacy with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States has been incinerated. The West Bank has become a powder keg.

If Israel did not bomb the hospital, they need to release all of the available video footage from before, during and after the explosion so the public can see for themselves just what did or did not happen.

And they'd better do it now, before POTUS arrives and they have an opportunity to tank our international standing along with theirs.

This is not a good look.

Biden should cancel the trip.

I agree, if I’m him I turn the plane around.

He won't do it. While his rhetoric is a bit less pro Israel than his predecessors, I just don't see this happening. He will meet with Bibi and make a speech about "full commitment to Israel" that no one under age 45 will like other than GMac.

He is just adding fuel to the fire.

Let's be honest: absolutely nobody believes that the US can be an honest broker (in this case).

Everyone knows that the US is covering Israel's ass.

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/ME_Observer_/status/1714335552252653989

That thread I posted earlier notwithstanding, one thing that I haven't found a satisfactory explanation for is why there's this whistling noise before the hospital gets hit. It sure seems like something that's moving faster than terminal velocity, and other videos I've found of Israeli airstrikes have remarkably similar whistles. Again, not an expert, and I think I'm still leaning towards the PIJ missile theory, but (it seems to me) a warhead detached from its missile wouldn't be accelerating like this.

A lot of users on Twitter are claiming the sound is "proof" that the attack was caused by a JDAM.

[pppolitics]

This is a great description of the coverage of this conflict.



I say this as an atheist who has zero connection to either the Israelis or the Palestinians.

"So I quoted a cartoon by a Holocaust denier"

LIES!

C.L.: The artwork with which I won second place was a depiction of an elderly Palestinian man wearing a Nazi concentration camp uniform, and some people said that I was “denying the Holocaust”! That was completely stupid, since I’m affirming the Holocaust with that illustration. Believe me, no matter what I draw and where I publish, there will be always someone who will point a finger and say it’s antisemitic.

https://forward.com/culture/14745/latuff-cartoonist-in-conversation-02995/

[pppolitics]

Whoever made it it's an utterly stupid cartoon too. This conflict is the most covered in recent media history, and we see regular false pro-Palestinian reports like the recent "israel blew up a hospital' saga. The Tigray conflict, or Syria since 2016 is an actual example of a conflict with zero media coverage.

Okay, near the hospital.

An Israeli airstrike hit near the entrance of Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on Friday, killing multiple people, according to Gazan and Israeli officials, just as Palestinians said a convoy of ambulances was preparing to leave the hospital carrying wounded people to the Gaza border, to cross into Egypt for treatment.

Happy now?

[pppolitics]

This is a great description of the coverage of this conflict.



I say this as an atheist who has zero connection to either the Israelis or the Palestinians.

If Hamas was targeting their attacks at the Israeli military and police forces, I would consider them to be a legitimate resistance movement, like the MK under Mandela.

Of course, they're very obviously not that and never have been. Civilians have always been their primary target, and that makes them a morally reprehensible group.

And I say that as someone who is horrified by how Israel is conducting this war.

It would be a mistake to presume that I sympathize with Hamas.

[pppolitics]

This is a great description of the coverage of this conflict.



I say this as an atheist who has zero connection to either the Israelis or the Palestinians.

I mean, yeah, I would totally expect someone who has absolutely no religious beliefs to turn a blind eye to biblical texts that clearly define Israel as Jewish land, but go off.

Being unshackled from "biblical texts" gives me an objective view of the world.

You should try it sometimes.

[pppolitics]

As Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza escalates, the Biden administration finds itself in a precarious position: Administration officials say Israel’s counterattack against Hamas has been too severe, too costly in civilian casualties, and lacking a coherent endgame, but they are unable to exert significant influence on America’s closest ally in the Middle East to change its course.

U.S. efforts to get Israel to scale back its counterattack in response to the Oct. 7 killings by Hamas that left at least 1,400 Israelis dead have failed or fallen short. The Biden administration urged Israel against a ground invasion, privately asked it to consider proportionality in its attacks, advocated a higher priority on avoiding civilian deaths, and called for a humanitarian pause — only for Israeli officials to dismiss or reject all those suggestions.

[...]

In recent days, they said, the administration has become deeply uncomfortable with some of Israel’s tactics. Last week, Israel bombed the densely packed Jabalya refugee camp two days in a row, an attack that Israel said killed a Hamas leader but that also killed dozens of civilians. On Friday, an Israeli airstrike hit near the entrance of Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, a strike the Israeli military said was aimed at an ambulance “being used by a Hamas terrorist cell.” And Israeli authorities recently expelled thousands of Palestinians who had been in Israel for work, sending them back into Gaza even as it continues to bomb the enclave.

Shortly after the Oct. 7 attacks, Israel urged more than 1 million people in northern Gaza to evacuate to the south within 24 hours, a task the United Nations called impossible, and the country cut off food, fuel, medicine, water and electricity. Many people who have fled to the southern part of Gaza have been killed or injured in Israeli airstrikes, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

[...]

Critics of the Biden administration, including many Arab and Muslim Americans, argue that the United States has enormous financial leverage over Israel and could impose far more pressure if it chose.

Washington is Israel’s largest military backer, and the White House has asked Congress for an additional $14 billion in aid for Israel in the wake of the Hamas attacks. But administration officials and advisers say the levers the United States theoretically has over Israel, such as conditioning military aid on making the military campaign more targeted, are nonstarters, partly because they would be so politically unpopular in any administration and partly because, aides say, Biden himself has a personal attachment to Israel.

[...]

While still a minority in the party, a growing number of Democrats are calling for a cease-fire, and some progressives are questioning U.S. military support of Israel more broadly.

“Of course the United States has leverage — we provide Israel with $4 billion a year in grant aid,” said Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who worked on Middle East issues in the Clinton administration. “But every American administration, going back to the 1970s, has been loath to use that leverage because it would be highly unpopular.”

[...]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/11/05/white-house-resigned-israel-onslaught-gaza/

[pppolitics]

It's ridiculous that the Biden Administration says that it is "unable to exert significant influence on" while refusing to use the "$4 billion a year in grant aid" as leverage.

[pppolitics]

Aww they're frustrated. Maybe they'll send an angry, private text in response.

Exactly.

The $4 billion annual aid is a huge leverage, yet the Biden administration refuses to use it.

[pppolitics]

Correct, there are no alternatives that do not commit US forces to the conflict, and Israel stopping is not an option.

That is an alternative.

It's called "Stop Giving Israel a free pass".

In fact, $4 billion annually is a lot more than a free pass.

[pppolitics]

Israel could nuke, eradicate, and cleanse Gaza and many of its supporters would simply say it was necessary to prevent Holocaust 2...

One side has actually demonstrated in horrific detail that it will attempt to kill every member of the other side the second they get the chance, including babies, but yes, let's make up hypotheticals to demonize the Jews.

So you mean like this...

[pppolitics]

CNN — News organizations are assuming a more aggressive posture toward Israel Defense Forces as it escalates its military operations in the Gaza Strip.

While civilian deaths mount and the humanitarian crisis grows more severe in the Palestinian territory, spokespersons for Israel’s military are being confronted by anchors on live television, pressed to answer for the deaths of innocent families caught in the heavy crossfire.

The more critical stance has been particularly pronounced over the last 24 hours, following two blasts at the densely populated Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza, which was established in 1948 when Palestinians fled what is now the current state of Israel.

The IDF said it was responsible for both blasts, having targeted a senior Hamas commander and dozens of other militants.

The killing of civilians — accompanied by horrifying stories and images from the ground — has prompted global outcry, and television news networks noticeably adjusting their demeanor in kind, putting the IDF in the hot seat during interviews that have taken place after the explosions.

[...]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/02/media/news-critical-idf-civilian-deaths/index.html

[pppolitics]

The more critical stance has been particularly pronounced over the last 24 hours, following two blasts at the densely populated Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza, which was established in 1948 when Palestinians fled what is now the current state of Israel.

The mainstream media has only decided in the last 24 hours that Palestinian lives have value.