Israel-Gaza war

[Vosem]

https://twitter.com/OzKaterji/status/1711658990491271218

It's still suspicious that an Iranian spy ring was broken up earlier this week and then this happened, but the attack does not really fit the pattern of having been deliberately orchestrated by Iran. Not only is it the case that Iranian proxies were not ready to respond, but it seems like fairly senior individuals within the Gazan government hierarchy didn't know about it. (This maybe makes Bibi's failure to take the threat seriously more understandable -- if not forgivable.)

A possible alternative is that it was a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency plan from the Iranians and trusted underlings in Gaza to poison cooperation between Israel and Saudi Arabia, but that they did not consider the main Gazan leaders, or anyone in the Hezbollah government, as sufficiently certainly not-compromised as being worthy of receiving information about it. But the simplest explanation is that some group within Gaza went rogue and was much more successful than they expected to be, and the Iran stuff is a coincidence of timing. Hell of a coincidence, though.

[Middle-aged Europe]

So, what happens if Hezbollah decides to launch a massive attack of their own while Israel is busy trying to destroy Hamas? Or the West Bank erupts to the extent that the PA’s security forces are completely overwhelmed?

It’s pretty clear that Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and their sponsors in Tehran are far better at sophisticated, well-coordinated operations than the Arab armies of the 20th century who tried and failed to destroy Israel by waging war on multiple fronts. I suppose that’s the advantage of highly motivated networks of non-state actors (with plenty of crucial support from a highly motivated state actor in the Islamic Republic, of course) with basically the same goals, as opposed to the corrupt and incompetent regular armies of a bunch of rival dictators. In any event, I’m genuinely worried about multiple fronts here.

At the end of the day, Israel is still a nuclear power, while Hamas/Hezbollah/Iran ain't. Guess what happens if Israel's existence were really threatened in a conventional warfare scenario.

[Bacon King]

it seems like fairly senior individuals within the Gazan government hierarchy didn't know about it.

this actually fits with standard Hamas MO: the militant wing operates more-or-less autonomously from the political wing at all but the very highest levels of the organization (none of whom reside in Gaza) - one could even describe the two wings as distinct parallel organizations with a shared label and joint leadership. Operational secrecy is paramount so members of the political side are only ever informed on a very strict need-to-know basis

somewhat reminiscent of, in Russian history, the distinction between the SRs and the SR Combat Organization

[Pericles]

Israel should be more careful with their language. I think he just means taking out Hamas but I can see how this would be interpreted as encouraging war crimes against civilians.

[Vosem]

it seems like fairly senior individuals within the Gazan government hierarchy didn't know about it.

this actually fits with standard Hamas MO: the militant wing operates more-or-less autonomously from the political wing at all but the very highest levels of the organization (none of whom reside in Gaza) - one could even describe the two wings as distinct parallel organizations with a shared label and joint leadership. Operational secrecy is paramount so members of the political side are only ever informed on a very strict need-to-know basis

somewhat reminiscent of, in Russian history, the distinction between the SRs and the SR Combat Organization

Von Plehwe paying for his own assassination really echoing through the centuries, huh

[Bacon King]

Israel should be more careful with their language. I think he just means taking out Hamas but I can see how this would be interpreted as encouraging war crimes against civilians.

Yoav Gallant is like going out of his way to say stuff like this every time he opens his mouth

ffs this quote was literally just yesterday:

"There will be no electricity, no food, no water, no fuel. Everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly."

[DavidB.]

Israel should be more careful with their language. I think he just means taking out Hamas but I can see how this would be interpreted as encouraging war crimes against civilians.

This is a speech to Israeli troops who have learned about the news of 40 babies of their people decapitated, who have seen the videos of the women all bloody because they were raped, who have seen the video of the grandmother being driven around by sickos in this golf cart.

The "international community" always wants Jewish restraint because it always embraces Jewish victims but it hates Jewish victors.

Israeli society, on the other hand, wants to be freed from the snakes that have attacked ordinary good people. This has not happened yet. They have Hamas' war crimes on their minds 24/7. Hamas has not been eradicated yet. Please think of this before you start tone policing the army. Thanks.

[ProudModerate2]

Seeing all the continued video and photos of all the death is incredible.
Video on the streets, where the terrorists just killed people beside their car, then the camera continues down the road, and more bodies, and then more, and more.

People dead near bus stops, in homes, outside homes and businesses, even tossing of grenades into small bunkers packed with people hiding who were blown to pieces (literally).

Israel is now amassing huge amounts of armor, military vehicles and soldiers to go into Gaza. It's going to get really ugly, and unfortunately there is going to be many more innocent deaths, but this time it will be innocent Palestinian women, children and elderly that are in the path of the IDF. Hopefully most of them will evacuate areas that are most in danger.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Gallant can use as much harsh language as he likes, as he long as he doesn't actually commit atrocities in real life IMO. He proved to be a reasonable authority figure during the whole judicial reforms boondoggle, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being.

[Pericles]

Gallant can use as much harsh language as he likes, as he long as he doesn't actually commit atrocities in real life IMO. He proved to be a reasonable authority figure during the whole judicial reforms boondoggle, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being.

It's in Israel's interests not to come across as criminals, or to use rhetoric that increases resistance in Gaza and elsewhere. Obviously it's worse if he actually commits crimes, but getting the words right is part of his job.

[DavidB.]

I certainly hope the beheaded babies story is atrocity propaganda, considering the alternative of it being, you know, real.

Crudely worded - but everybody knows the essence of this is true.

[Vosem]

Gallant can use as much harsh language as he likes, as he long as he doesn't actually commit atrocities in real life IMO. He proved to be a reasonable authority figure during the whole judicial reforms boondoggle, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being.

Interesting fact about Yoav Gallant's background: during the 1948 war, his father, a Holocaust survivor, was the first Israeli soldier to enter the Egyptian fort at Iraq Suwaydan (contemporary Sde Yoav) over the course of Operation Yoav, the southern advance which more-or-less established the contemporary boundary between Israel and the Gaza Strip. Yoav Gallant, born after the war, was named after the operation.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Gallant can use as much harsh language as he likes, as he long as he doesn't actually commit atrocities in real life IMO. He proved to be a reasonable authority figure during the whole judicial reforms boondoggle, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being.

It's in Israel's interests not to come across as criminals, or to use rhetoric that increases resistance in Gaza and elsewhere. Obviously it's worse if he actually commits crimes, but getting the words right is part of his job.

The man saw 1,000 of his countrymen slaughtered less than half a week ago, so I'm willing to grant him some leeway... for now.

[Aurelius2]

The "international community" always wants Jewish restraint because it always embraces Jewish victims but it hates Jewish victors.

This is a key point and I'm going to be a little bit deliberately provocative to drive it home. To steal the title of a book written on a very similar topic (though I have not read it), people love dead Jews.

Back in Roman days, the Jews were arguably the most rebellious of all the peoples under the empire's rule. There were three major revolts; they did impressively well, considering what they were up against, but all failed. After the third one (Bar Kochba's revolt), I've seen it said that the Jewish psyche changed dramatically - became less assertive, more melancholic, more passive and accepting of a seemingly inescapable fate. For 1800 years as we faced a near-constant barrage of persecutions, from the Romans, then the Christians, then the Muslims, then the Christians again, many Jews were surprisingly nonresistant to these horrors, and when resistance did come it was often too little too late. Many Jews even believed that they had earned this awful fate through their ancestors' sins which had led to the toppling of the Temple and through their continued iniquities. In the form of a few sects like Satmar I'd argue this attitude survives today.

In the last couple hundred years, this started slowly changing, but only in fits and starts, and not without resistance from other parts of the Jewish community. I'd argue that Zionism was one of various expressions of this. But this was only a start: it was the Holocaust that really destroyed this inferiority complex once and for all. Jews resisted valiantly at times, but often it was too little too late, sadly (not that it would have changed anything, mind you - don't get the idea that I am blaming Jews for the Holocaust, that is not what I am saying at all).

After that horror, surviving Jews were shattered. Their loved ones had been murdered all around them, and it brought on a psychological reckoning and rethinking on a level that I would argue is really quite unprecedented. We all know the famous cry, "never again". But "never again" is deeper than a lot of gentiles, and even some liberal diaspora Jews, realize.

There are two layers to it. One is the one that everyone knows, the horrified whisper of the shattered victim whose loved ones have been slaughtered by monstrously evil forces on an industrial scale. The one who is forced to bear all the iniquities of the world and continue on to live another day. The one who bears witness to injustice and vows to fight it everywhere, that no one else should ever be forced to go through this ever again. On this level "never again" is a moral imperative, a historical testament.

But there's another layer to it, that I think is overlooked. On this level, "never again" is a call to action, to assert ourselves and never again let the world push us around like their despised plaything. Never again go meekly into the ovens like that all-too-common generalization of "lambs to the slaughter". Never again allow ourselves to descend so deep into self-loathing that we let our enemies keep doing this to us, as if we cannot allow ourselves to believe we deserve better for ourselves. Taken to a certain extreme, this could be described as "do unto others before they can do unto you". This is the new, much more self-assertive Jewishness that you see especially in Israel, where the Jews have been able to come into themselves as a people, finally having their own land, their own state, their own borders, no longer a despised remnant making up a few bare threads in a wider societal fabric that despises their continued presence.

In this sense, "never again" is a call to boldly assert ourselves in our march for a Jewish future far better than anything our ancestors could possibly imagine. It is the clarion call of a people who spent 1800 years being kicked around like dirt, then went to the metaphorical gym, bulked up, and boldly declared that nobody will ever treat them like that again. We live, and our posterity shall live, on and on until the day when finally the Mashiach shall come (may he come speedily in our times).

God commands us to do justice. To be able to do justice now and into the future we must first secure our continued survival, on our own terms. Never again will we submit to be judged by the moral frameworks of our tormentors - meekness and suffering are not virtues in Jewish thought. Never again will we sheepishly apologize for the "problems" caused by our existence, our refusal to perish.

[Comrade Funk]

The "international community" always wants Jewish restraint because it always embraces Jewish victims but it hates Jewish victors.

This is a key point and I'm going to be a little bit deliberately provocative to drive it home.

Back in Roman days, the Jews were arguably the most rebellious of all the peoples under the empire's rule. There were three major revolts; they did impressively well, considering what they were up against, but all failed. After the third one (Bar Kochba's revolt), I've seen it said that the Jewish psyche changed dramatically - became less assertive, more melancholic, more passive and accepting of a seemingly inescapable fate. For 1800 years as we faced a near-constant barrage of persecutions, from the Romans, then the Christians, then the Muslims, then the Christians again, many Jews were surprisingly nonresistant to these horrors, and when resistance did come it was often too little too late. Many Jews even believed that they had earned this awful fate through their ancestors' sins which had led to the toppling of the Temple and through their continued iniquities. In the form of a few sects like Satmar I'd argue this attitude survives today.

In the last couple hundred years, this started slowly changing, but only in fits and starts, and not without resistance from other parts of the Jewish community. I'd argue that Zionism was one of various expressions of this. But this was only a start: it was the Holocaust that really destroyed this inferiority complex once and for all. Jews resisted valiantly at times, but often it was too little too late, sadly (not that it would have changed anything, mind you - don't get the idea that I am blaming Jews for the Holocaust, that is not what I am saying at all).

After that horror, surviving Jews were shattered. Their loved ones had been murdered all around them, and it brought on a psychological reckoning and rethinking on a level that I would argue is really quite unprecedented. We all know the famous cry, "never again". But "never again" is deeper than a lot of gentiles, and even some liberal diaspora Jews, realize.

There are two layers to it. One is the one that everyone knows, the horrified whisper of the shattered victim whose loved ones have been slaughtered by monstrously evil forces on an industrial scale. The one who is forced to bear all the iniquities of the world and continue on to live another day. The one who bears witness to injustice and vows to fight it everywhere, that no one else should ever be forced to go through this ever again. On this level "never again" is a moral imperative, a historical testament.

But there's another layer to it, that I think is overlooked. On this level, "never again" is a call to action, to assert ourselves and never again let the world push us around like their despised plaything. Never again go meekly into the ovens like that all-too-common generalization of "lambs to the slaughter". Never again allow ourselves to descend so deep into self-loathing that we let our enemies keep doing this to us, as if we cannot allow ourselves to believe we deserve better for ourselves. Taken to a certain extreme, this could be described as "do unto others before they can do unto you". This is the new, much more self-assertive Jewishness that you see especially in Israel, where the Jews have been able to come into themselves as a people, finally having their own land, their own state, their own borders, no longer a despised remnant making up a few bare threads in a wider societal fabric that despises their continued presence.

In this sense, "never again" is a call to boldly assert ourselves in our march for a Jewish future far better than anything our ancestors could possibly imagine. It is the clarion call of a people who spent 1800 years being kicked around like dirt, then went to the metaphorical gym, bulked up, and boldly declared that nobody will ever treat them like that again. We live, and our posterity shall live, on and on until the day when finally the Mashiach shall come (may he come speedily in our times).

God commands us to do justice. To be able to do justice now and into the future we must first secure our continued survival, on our own terms. Never again will we sheepishly apologize for the "problems" caused by our existence, our refusal to perish.

Stop speaking for an entire ethnicity.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Where are the condemnations from Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul?
https://twitter.com/dancohen3000/status/1711869282097729617?t=zdnEpc1Nfphbruzj3x...

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Entire family wiped out.
https://twitter.com/ytirawi/status/1711816527979196810?t=o0XwDh_Ps_KzKftF4Vy7EQ&...

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Sad but inevitable that these flare-ups turn into orgies of hatred-displaying.
Humanity at among its very worst.

[Aurelius2]

Israeli death toll has risen to 1,200. Source: https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/israel-hamas-war-gaza/card/israeli-death-toll-rises-to-1-200-rxnP5pV3GiISzb9bkWrn

[ProudModerate2]

I'm sure Israel has some sophisticated (spy) satellites above them. I would imagine they could pin-point down to the almost (if not) the exact home/backyard/area, where these missiles are being launched from.

I don't understand why they don't retaliate against these targets immediately and strongly, at the very moment they are launching.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

I'm sure Israel has some sophisticated (spy) satellites above them. I would imagine they could pin-point down to the almost (if not) the exact home/backyard/area, where these missiles are being launched from.

I don't understand why they don't retaliate against these targets immediately and strongly, at the very moment they are launching.

Because OODA loops/kill-chains are non-trivially hard, the IDF isn't particularly large (especially when it comes to trained and experienced personnel) and has an immense amount of responsibility, and Israeli PR has over-sold its competence. (I'm not saying that the IDF isn't good by the standard of a modern military, just that it gets presented like they're all hyper-competent, one step short of being superheroes, which isn't true of any military, ever.)

[HillGoose]

the atrocities they have spoken about today are absolutely inhuman, just like when Saddam's goons were pulling babies out of incubators, it looks like it's a good time for a Coalition of the Willing

[emailking]

Israeli death toll has risen to 1,200. Source: https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/israel-hamas-war-gaza/card/israeli-death-toll-rises-to-1-200-rxnP5pV3GiISzb9bkWrn

Is this all from the first day and the official toll is still rising or they're losing another 300 people every day?

[Meclazine for Israel]

Israeli death toll has risen to 1,200. Source: https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/israel-hamas-war-gaza/card/israeli-death-toll-rises-to-1-200-rxnP5pV3GiISzb9bkWrn

Is this all from the first day and the official toll is still rising or they're losing another 300 people every day?

99% from the first day. The Israeli's have continually found bodies in fields, on roads, in cars, in bushes, in houses.


A view of a junction in the Sderot area of southern Israel October 7, 2023. (REUTERS/Ammar Awad)


It's a civilian massacre akin to the 2nd century.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Why doesn't mossad launch an operation eichmann style raid to grab the hamas top brass in qatar? Seems kind of ridiculous that gaza is being obliterated ostensibly to wipe hamas out while these fat corrupt creeps live in luxury?