Israel-Gaza war

[Progressive Pessimist]

I must say that I'm very pleased I did not ever comment on the "hospital bombing" because it seems like every person who did just ended up looking like a fool.

And as far as the media's negligence in that goes...yikes.

Same, I stayed out of it until we knew the details, but I was very skeptical of Hamas' story nonetheless.

[Pericles]

Source


Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory. Secondly-shrink how? Gaza is small enough as is.

[Senator Incitatus]

Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory.

Under what law?

[Meclazine for Israel]

All this would be very interesting if there was in fact a leveled hospital, instead of a damaging rocket strike in a parking lot with plenty of casualties in the overcrowded area. The fully revealed true level of damage is perfectly in line with a Hamas failed missile strike.

Yeah this was all somewhat mysterious last night but now that it’s clear that the “blown up hospital” and 500-800 dead claims were despicable Hamas lies, there’s no real mystery to what happened anymore.

What makes this more bizarre is that Israel never disputed any of this - they just disputed who was responsible for that.

In fact they did.

Lt Col. Jonathan Conricus said yesterday on Australian TV that they are analysing overhead footage to monitor the body count.

He said in passing that the IDF will research all available data to make sure Hamas are not exaggerating the numbers.

The reason they don't argue this point straight up first is that legally, it is a fail.

"You bombed my hospital and killed 500 people".

"No. Only 200 people died."

That appears that you admit to the bombing and are seeking to minimise the effect of your guilty actions.

As for The New York Times, they published 500 casualties which Hamas came up with after 2 mins. Israel said it will take at least a week to determine the number of casualties.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Source


Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory. Secondly-shrink how? Gaza is small enough as is.

It is not illegal for Israel to invade Gaza

[Comrade Funk]

Source


Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory. Secondly-shrink how? Gaza is small enough as is.

It is not illegal for Israel to invade Gaza

Way to ignore the word "conquest"

[lfromnj]

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/foreign-minister-at-wars-end-not-only-will-hamas-be-gone-but-gazas-territory-will-shrink/
Pericles posted the wrong link.

Foreign Minister Eli Cohen tells Army Radio, “At the end of this war, not only will Hamas no longer be in Gaza, but the territory of Gaza will also decrease.”

The line is an indication of the speculation from some analysts that the IDF will try and create a buffer zone inside Gaza to better protect Israel’s southern border towns so that they are no

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory.

Under what law?

If Israel is planning outright annexation (and I wouldn't expect them to do so before annexing parts of the West Bank), Chapter I of the United Nations charter.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Source


Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory. Secondly-shrink how? Gaza is small enough as is.

It is not illegal for Israel to invade Gaza

Way to ignore the word "conquest"

Yes , they will need to conquer Gaza and occupy it for a few years to "denazify" it.

[Pericles]

Source


Firstly, this is illegal conquest of territory. Secondly-shrink how? Gaza is small enough as is.

It is not illegal for Israel to invade Gaza

I agree that they should eliminate the threat of Hamas, but a basic fundamental principle of international law is that territory is not to be acquired by conquest. Israel has no right to just take bits of the Gaza Strip, the territory may be occupied eg like how Iraq was but all of Gaza is part of Palestine and not Israel. This would just be one of a long line of violations of international law by Israel, just like its official and de-facto annexations in the West Bank and settlement building.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Israeli community organisation to help bring back the 199 people kidnapped by Hamas.

Bring Them Home Now has a social media presence to bring to light the kidnap victims.

It follows the families of the kidnap victims as they search for answers from within Gaza.

Avihai Brodutch Whole Family Kidnapped

https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cyinav4NPMh

Just tragic.

[Vosem]

Under normal international law the area would belong to Israel anyway. Conquering Gaza is no more (...also no less, I guess) illegal than establishing settlements in the West Bank.

[Indy Texas]

So, it appears today that the hospital strike was essentially made up and literal fake news. Most of my speculation yesterday (about what could have caused an explosion of that size, and so forth) was incorrect.

That said, my point that the media is horrendously biased in favor of the Palestinian parties is obviously true, since they made the whole thing up. (In fact, if you read the early articles closely, you'll note that there was never even a Hamas statement -- they literally just quoted some guy in the Gaza Health Ministry.) If you simply assume that any story reported in mainstream Western news outlets about Israeli atrocities is scandalously and blatantly false, and don't give it serious consideration, you'll be much closer to an accurate view of the world. (True for everyone reading this, even if you consider yourself a pro-Israel partisan. You too, lurkers.)

This is not to say that Israel doesn't sometimes do bad things, or that you should trust IDF press releases (lol). It is simply to say that more-or-less all accounts of Israeli atrocities in Western media are lies, and you should dismiss them off-handedly. When you do this, your model of the world will be closer to reality.

https://twitter.com/spengjr/status/1714413067990134967

This may just be what war looks like now when it's a war that a critical mass of Online people care enough about to take the first tweet they see and run with it.

It's going to be even worse as we get to a point where people can use AI to create believable videos of events that didn't happen, involving people who are completely fabricated. By the time it gets debunked, a riot may have already resulted in people getting killed or someone in a position of authority may have rang a bell that can't be un-rung.

This has already been an issue - ex. people posting pictures/videos of explosions, damage or dead bodies from previous conflicts or misidentifying the location/identity of the events - and I don't know what you do about it when the overwhelming majority of people who tweet are not professional journalists and aren't bound by any journalistic ethics or best practices.

I was listening to some journalist interviewing people at a protest in Jordan and it was very disheartening to see this guy literally show a woman photos of the hospital and have her simply refuse to acknowledge them. She continued to insist it happened because, ultimately, she already emotionally invested herself in it happening and when you're surrounded by people who also think it happened, there is no off ramp or permission structure to change your mind based on additional information. You just have to deny the validity or existence of the information.

And we have no business, as Americans, judging them for that when plenty of people in our own country who "ought to know better" will continue to insist to their dying day that the 2020 election was stolen, people who died of COVID did not actually die of COVID, and every major city in America was subject to Sherman's March to Sea levels of destruction at the hands of George Floyd protestors in 2020.

[NOVA Green]

It can be the case that Israel will target known hospitals, is targeting hospitals, will cover up or obfuscate the targeting of hospitals but at the same time, didn't target the hospital yesterday.

It should also be noted that this same hospital was hit on Saturday by shelling of which the origins have not yet been determined, but may well have influenced media narratives after the event yesterday.

On Wednesday, the Anglican archbishop who oversees the hospital said that the Israeli military had called and texted the hospital managers at least three times since Saturday, asking its patients and staff to leave the hospital compound, along with the displaced Gazans who had crowded onto the grounds because they considered it relatively safe from aerial bombardment.

Archbishop Naoum said the warnings were particular to the hospital, and not part of Israel’s wider push to encourage civilians to leave northern Gaza for the territory’s south.

“There were specific warnings to get out of the building,” the archbishop said.

The archbishop said the warnings came after a smaller strike at the hospital on Saturday that had damaged its diagnostic center, and its ultrasound and mammography units.

Video posted after the Saturday attack — and verified by The New York Times — showed damage inside the hospital. The footage also showed the remnants of an artillery shell amid the debris.

Palestinian armed groups have typically relied on long-range artillery rockets to strike inside Israel and have not been recorded using howitzers that fire shells of this type. But Israel commonly uses howitzers to strike inside Palestinian areas.

Colonel Shefler denied the Israel Defense Forces were responsible for the strike on Saturday. In general, he said, the hospital “was not in any way a target.”

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/10/18/world/israel-hamas-war-biden-gaza

[NOVA Green]

Escalations on the Northern border... Israeli civilian dies in cross-border shelling. Lebanese soldiers clash with protestors for a second day running.

In an early morning update, IDF spokesman Jonathan Conricus said Hezbollah fired “numerous antitank missiles” toward Israel, killing a civilian, and appeared to issue a warning to Lebanon. “Our question is to the state of Lebanon,” he said. “Do you really want to jeopardize what is left of your prosperity and well being for the sake of terrorists in Gaza?”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/18/israel-hamas-war-news-gaza-update/

Hezbollah says eight of its fighters in the border region have been killed in Israeli strikes since Tuesday. An elderly couple was killed in a rural Lebanese town. An Israeli shell is believed to have killed a Reuters videographer covering the fighting there last week. The Israel Defense Forces said it was investigating the incident, which injured six other journalists.

The IDF says at least five Israelis have been killed, including three soldiers in a shootout with a Hezbollah gunman who infiltrated the area. The lone civilian fatality, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, was hit Sunday while working at a construction site in this hilltop town just yards from the border fence.

That anger surged after a deadly strike at a hospital in Gaza late Monday, a blast the IDF and Palestinian militants blamed on each other. The American intelligence assessment was that Israel was “not responsible” for the blast. But that has done nothing to contain the outrage in Lebanon, where mistrust of the United States runs deep. Soldiers clashed with protesters for a second day in Beirut on Wednesday.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/18/israel-lebanon-hezbollah-gaza-war/

[AtorBoltox]

People need to be fired at the BBC and Reuters. Synagogues and embassies across the Middle East are being attacked because of their fake reporting.

[NOVA Green]

People need to be fired at the BBC and Reuters. Synagogues and embassies across the Middle East are being attacked because of their fake reporting.

Well tbf for pretty much all journalistic agencies it is really hard to get the kind of real time reporting, boots on the ground, etc... from Gaza.

1.) The main Communications Tower in Gaza was taken down on Day 1 by an Israeli airstrike after the horrific Hamas assault on overwhelmingly civilian targets in Southern Israel.

2.) The main power plant ran out of Diesel which would run through Israel into Gaza, so electricity is extremely lacking, although granted battery power can last for short term for journalists covering events on the ground in Gaza.

3.) Getting international journalists into Gaza itself is virtually impossible...

I can't imagine any coming from the Israeli border, unless they are embeds with the mooted Israeli large-scale invasion consisting of (1-2) armored brigades and then (2-3) other brigades in the North, (1-2) other brigades in South.

The only way for a foreign journalist to get into Gaza today would be from the Egyptian side of the border, which I don't see either, unless it comes with a Humanitarian Aid Convoy.

4.) Media outlets are extremely limited in terms of their resources in Gaza, even likely lacking local "stringers" at the current time of the growing Humanitarian crisis, so difficult to get any time of the "usual sources" one might experience.

5.) Hence news outlets are instead forced to initially rely on "official statements", and then the most reputable attempt to verify in the cold light of day with a greater range of sources.

Blaming the journalists from a couple Western media outlets for attacks on Jewish targets throughout the Middle East, while meanwhile many of the various authoritarian regimes in power are more than willing to harness the power of state run media in order to maintain a region which is generally lacking in anything considered a Democracy.

I would imagine that even independent media outlets such as Al-Jazeera were much more assertive on their programming topics of the day than the outlets you mentioned.

Lebanon and Turkey would stand out as countries within the region that are generally considered "democracies", regardless of the extreme warts and all.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

https://twitter.com/nkulw/status/1714797971601047983?t=RxXDMPlC7QwahJZxSk40Jg&am...
Most comprehensive analysis on the blast.

[NOVA Green]

https://twitter.com/nkulw/status/1714797971601047983?t=RxXDMPlC7QwahJZxSk40Jg&am...
Most comprehensive analysis on the blast.

Thanks for posting...

It is good to see journalists still willing to take difficult risks in what is after all an active war zone.

Channel 4 is obviously an interesting and unique UK Media Platform, although honestly no idea what their domestic nor international coverage is like.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Who bombed the Hospital car park?

PBS News Hour Story

https://youtu.be/Wi3xKXDeCn4?t=2010

Retired US General Mark Hertling says the evidence points towards a failed rocket from inside Gaza causing the hospital strike.

"Not a whole lotta' damage".

"It certainly was not a strike on the hospital itself".

US Retired Lt. General Mark Hertling

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THV_OuzC9jM

His claims were also backed by the IDF, President Joe Biden and the Pentagon.

The IDF are saying the same thing.

"It was impossible for Hamas to know what happened in the Hospital car park so quickly."

"There was no IDF fire from land, sea or air at the time of the explosion."

IDF Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYqlG3dKIFo

It appears a rocket originating in Gaza landed on the parking lot of the hospital.

[bilaps]

When Hezbollah trully enters the war, you'll see how many Israelis will leave the country. Palestinians don't have nowhere to go, you'll have to kill them all.

If Iran is dumb enough to commit Hezbollah to the war, you will get to see what a carrier group can do given complete air superiority...

If the latest wars in the 21st century have taught us anything is that superpowers and world powers are overestimated in the long run even though in short term it could look like they are allmighty.

[CumbrianLefty]

Under normal international law the area would belong to Israel anyway. Conquering Gaza is no more (...also no less, I guess) illegal than establishing settlements in the West Bank.

Well, the latter is also widely regarded as illegal.

[patzer]

Under normal international law the area would belong to Israel anyway. Conquering Gaza is no more (...also no less, I guess) illegal than establishing settlements in the West Bank.

Right- Egypt and Jordan have dropped all claims to Gaza/WB, and there has never been any internationally recognized sovereign Palestinian state, so surely Israel would be the only country with any rights to the area.

[CumbrianLefty]

People need to be fired at the BBC and Reuters. Synagogues and embassies across the Middle East are being attacked because of their fake reporting.

Well tbf for pretty much all journalistic agencies it is really hard to get the kind of real time reporting, boots on the ground, etc... from Gaza.

Well yes obviously, which arguably makes caution more than less important.

The fact is that several reputable media outlets (BBC, Reuters, NYT) ran straightforward headlines of the "ISRAELI AIRSTRIKE FLATTENS HOSPITAL AND KILLS HUNDREDS" variety. Yes they then added the almost invisible qualification of "according to Palestinian sources" but leaving aside who precisely those "sources" are, who is actually going to take notice of such a feeble caveat?

To 99% of those seeing them, the message was simple and unequivocal - Israel did it.

The ensuing consequences were entirely predictable, and showed it up as irresponsible journalism.

[strangerinthealps]

When Hezbollah trully enters the war, you'll see how many Israelis will leave the country. Palestinians don't have nowhere to go, you'll have to kill them all.

If Iran is dumb enough to commit Hezbollah to the war, you will get to see what a carrier group can do given complete air superiority...

If the latest wars in the 21st century have taught us anything is that superpowers and world powers are overestimated in the long run even though in short term it could look like they are allmighty.

To try and occupy them would be dumb.

However, to entirely remove the capability to make war, there's nothing like air power.