Israel-Gaza war

[Meclazine for Israel]

Support for Israel is big in Oceania.

PNG Dance for Israel

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C1VcIOGJ7Ap/

[CumbrianLefty]

Is that how it is here?  Fine, I can play that game too:

Judging by the trajectory of anti-Vietnam War protests, it is only a matter of time before you all will be waving Hamas flags in the streets during your protests and demonstrations alongside your Palestinian flags, chanting 'we are all Hamas!'.  How soon will it be before some of you will be openly wishing the Nazis had 'finished the job' in news interviews, assuming you aren't doing so already?  No one outside your movement actually likes you. Have you ever wondered about that?  

Just want to say that I believe Horus is Jewish and I am too. So please apologize and enough with your disgusting assumptions based on nothing

For what?  You make claims I support genocide, and now that I insult you back, you act offended?  Spare me your fake outrage.  

The problem is making a vague, feelgood vibes statement like "destroy Hamas".

The only sure fire 100% guaranteed way of achieving this is killing or expelling every last Palestinian in Gaza - this is what some in Israel (including in the government) openly call for. And even someone relatively respected like the Israeli president says that there are "no innocent Palestinians".

So, accepting that you do not actually want this, *how* exactly is Hamas going to be "destroyed"?

[Comrade Funk]

Is that how it is here?  Fine, I can play that game too:

Judging by the trajectory of anti-Vietnam War protests, it is only a matter of time before you all will be waving Hamas flags in the streets during your protests and demonstrations alongside your Palestinian flags, chanting 'we are all Hamas!'.  How soon will it be before some of you will be openly wishing the Nazis had 'finished the job' in news interviews, assuming you aren't doing so already?  No one outside your movement actually likes you. Have you ever wondered about that?   

Just want to say that I believe Horus is Jewish and I am too. So please apologize and enough with your disgusting assumptions based on nothing

For what?  You make claims I support genocide, and now that I insult you back, you act offended?  Spare me your fake outrage. 

You accused two Jews of becoming Nazi-sympathizers so yeah, I stick by my demand. As far as the "genocide" claim, I'll refer to the comment above me as it sums up the gist of how I feel on your "destroy Hamas" by any means policy.

[Birdish]

It does feel like these talks next week in Cairo are do or die for a ceasefire happening anytime soon.

Bill Burns will be there. Israel is actually sending delegates this time too.

Egypt is also warning Hamas that they have two weeks before Israel actually invades Rafah.

To be a fly on the wall for the Biden-Netanyahu phone call today...

[Frodo]

Is that how it is here?  Fine, I can play that game too:

Judging by the trajectory of anti-Vietnam War protests, it is only a matter of time before you all will be waving Hamas flags in the streets during your protests and demonstrations alongside your Palestinian flags, chanting 'we are all Hamas!'.  How soon will it be before some of you will be openly wishing the Nazis had 'finished the job' in news interviews, assuming you aren't doing so already?  No one outside your movement actually likes you. Have you ever wondered about that?  

Just want to say that I believe Horus is Jewish and I am too. So please apologize and enough with your disgusting assumptions based on nothing

For what?  You make claims I support genocide, and now that I insult you back, you act offended?  Spare me your fake outrage.  

The problem is making a vague, feelgood vibes statement like "destroy Hamas".

The only sure fire 100% guaranteed way of achieving this is killing or expelling every last Palestinian in Gaza - this is what some in Israel (including in the government) openly call for. And even someone
relatively respected like the Israeli president says that there are "no innocent Palestinians".

So, accepting that you do not actually want this, *how* exactly is Hamas going to be "destroyed"?

As I mentioned earlier in this megathread (it's in there, somewhere...), my personal preference on how I would have wanted this war to be conducted was for Israel to make its full massive offensive along the Gaza-Egypt border (instead of Gaza City), capturing Rafah and adjacent territory, and permanently annexing the territory in question to Israel to prevent any further infusion of weapons to Hamas by underground tunnels.  With Hamas cut off from the outside world, Israel would conduct more precise and surgical attacks to the north by Mossad and other special forces units, with a hearts-and-minds strategy (this is assuming civilians in Gaza are victims of Hamas too), destroying Hamas units, capturing or killing their leadership, and reclaiming the hostages with civilian intel.  With the twin missions accomplished, Gaza's independence would then be restored to it under Israel's watchful eye, albeit shorn of its territory along the border with Egypt.  And all without the genocide of the Gazan population -that option was there.  Clearly Netanyahu and his government had other ideas...  

I still want Hamas destroyed, though.  No amount of shaming would persuade me otherwise. To do any less would be a disservice to the victims of October 7th.  

 

[GeneralMacArthur]

I remember 20 years ago when people said it was going to be impossible to defeat al-Qaeda because every time you killed some terrorist jackass, all his friends and family and children would decide to join al-Qaeda.  The old "each bomb kills one bad guy and creates three more" trope.  But guess what?  After the invasion of Afghanistan, we did defeat al-Qaeda's ground forces.  Then they went into hiding and tried to conduct operations against us via proxy terror cells in Iraq, Jordan and Pakistan, and we killed all of those too.  We killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.  Then we killed Osama bin Laden.  By the time we killed Ayman al-Zawahiri hardly anyone cared anymore because al-Qaeda had long since ceased to be relevant.

The unfortunate thing is that these movements survive no by virtue of any organic phenomenon but because of committed state support.

The Taliban continues to exist and rule Afghanistan not because "for everyone Taliban fighter America kills, three more take its place" but because the nuclear-armed sovereign state of Pakistan backs the Taliban, trains and arms its fighters, and allows them to seek refuge inside its borders.  America is unwilling to declare war on Pakistan, so it is impossible to fully eradicate the Taliban.  The Taliban survives because it's backed by Pakistan.  al-Qaeda wasn't backed by anyone so they're totally vanquished.

ISIS was born out of the chaos of the Syrian Civil War.  The United States would dearly love to do exactly what we did in Iraq -- depose the Ba'ath party, kill Assad, and install a new regime that has nominally acceptable relations with the West -- or at least, do what we did in Libya and allow the opposition forces to form a new government.  But we can't do that because the nuclear-armed sovereign state of Russia backs the Assad regime.  With that said, we haven't seen any evidence of "kill one ISIS member, create three more."  We drove ISIS out of Mosul, out of Raqqa, out of Eastern Syria, and today ISIS has virtually no territory, no forces, and no real ability to project power in the Middle East.  There hasn't been any indication that any family, friends or descendants of the people we killed in Iraq/Syria are itching to rebuild ISIS.  It's just over.  Assad survives because he's backed by Russia.  ISIS isn't backed by anyone so they're totally vanquished.

So what does this mean for Palestine?  It means it's entirely possible for Israel to defeat Hamas on the battlefield, and if that were the sole challenge, Hamas could cease to exist within a couple years and be forgotten within a generation.  I don't buy for a second the notion that for every bomb Israel drops, one Hamas fighter dies and three more are born.  I don't buy the notion that Israel's war against Hamas will breed so much civilian resentment that it makes a new Hamas inevitable.  al-Qaeda was defeated in Iraq, Jordan and Afghanistan, ISIS was defeated in Iraq and Syria, and Hamas can be defeated in Gaza.

The question is, to what extent are major power players willing to stake their own militaries on Hamas.  Is there a Russia-equivalent who's willing to say "if you get close to truly threatening Hamas, we will intervene militarily"?  Is there a Pakistan-equivalent who's willing to say "we will protect, train, and arm Hamas, and you'll have to declare war on us to stop it"?  So far I haven't seen it.  None of Iran, Qatar, or Egypt have shown a willingness to directly intervene to rescue Hamas.  And I think this is because of 10/7 -- the attack was so brutal that it drew the attention of the entire world and it made it impossible for those power players to covertly prop up Hamas without facing massive widespread condemnation and consequences.

[GoTfan]

Now Vosem's just straight up accusing people of being Nazi sympathisers. I suppose it was only a matter of time.

My question is why does Vosem get away with accusing people of supporting slavery and being Nazi sympathisers?

[PSOL]

It’s all projection after all.

[Vosem]

Being reported that an operation in Rafah rescued two hostages.

Now Vosem's just straight up accusing people of being Nazi sympathisers. I suppose it was only a matter of time.

I swear there's very little more annoying than getting the "now Vosem's saying this!" treatment and it's literally always something I've been saying for like a decade. The Houthis literally using the Nazi salute makes it much harder to deny now than it was 10 years ago, I think.

It’s all projection after all.

As if the real anti-Nazis didn't sing songs about celebrating their enemies' funeral processions with their rocket launchers.

[GoTfan]

Being reported that an operation in Rafah rescued two hostages.

Now Vosem's just straight up accusing people of being Nazi sympathisers. I suppose it was only a matter of time.

I swear there's very little more annoying than getting the "now Vosem's saying this!" treatment and it's literally always something I've been saying for like a decade. The Houthis literally using the Nazi salute makes it much harder to deny now than it was 10 years ago, I think.

It’s all projection after all.

As if the real anti-Nazis didn't sing songs about celebrating their enemies' funeral processions with their rocket launchers.

I do not care. Accusing people of being Nazi sympathisers and supporting slavery is absolutely vile behaviour.

[Birdish]

The IDF just rescued two male hostages in an operation in Rafah. So If I were to guess, I imagine there are probably more hostages there. Which bodes poorly for Rafah, since that probably reinforces the idea that Israel needs to take it.

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

The IDF just rescued two male hostages in an operation in Rafah. So If I were to guess, I imagine there are probably more hostages there. Which bodes poorly for Rafah, since that probably reinforces the idea that Israel needs to take it.

Hamas and its apologists have displayed a massive lack of understanding of Israel's psychology from minute one.

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

The IDF just rescued two male hostages in an operation in Rafah. So If I were to guess, I imagine there are probably more hostages there. Which bodes poorly for Rafah, since that probably reinforces the idea that Israel needs to take it.

Hamas and its apologists have displayed a massive lack of understanding of Israel's psychology from minute one.

Sure, I've been accused of supporting slavery, being a Nazi sympathiser, an anti-Semite and now a Hamas apologist. Keep'em coming.

You REALLY need to step away and try to chill, because there was zero indication in my post that I was referring to you. I wouldn't describe you as a Hamas apologist, as opposed to a select few people, on this site - and I wasn't even referring to anyone on this site! My post was about the real world and how a fundamental lack of understanding of the Jewish psyche has made this conflict worse at every turn.

[Horus]

The IDF just rescued two male hostages in an operation in Rafah. So If I were to guess, I imagine there are probably more hostages there. Which bodes poorly for Rafah, since that probably reinforces the idea that Israel needs to take it.

Hamas and its apologists have displayed a massive lack of understanding of Israel's psychology from minute one.

Sure, I've been accused of supporting slavery, being a Nazi sympathiser, an anti-Semite and now a Hamas apologist. Keep'em coming.

You REALLY need to step away and try to chill, because there was zero indication in my post that I was referring to you. I wouldn't describe you as a Hamas apologist, as opposed to a select few people, on this site - and I wasn't even referring to anyone on this site! My post was about the real world and how a fundamental lack of understanding of the Jewish psyche has made this conflict worse at every turn.

Bizarre post. Define "Jewish psyche" and explain what makes it different please. Personally I don't think any such thing exists. Also for the 2,000th time Jewish and Israeli are not interchangeable, though you're never going to change this reductive mindset.

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

The IDF just rescued two male hostages in an operation in Rafah. So If I were to guess, I imagine there are probably more hostages there. Which bodes poorly for Rafah, since that probably reinforces the idea that Israel needs to take it.

Hamas and its apologists have displayed a massive lack of understanding of Israel's psychology from minute one.

Sure, I've been accused of supporting slavery, being a Nazi sympathiser, an anti-Semite and now a Hamas apologist. Keep'em coming.

You REALLY need to step away and try to chill, because there was zero indication in my post that I was referring to you. I wouldn't describe you as a Hamas apologist, as opposed to a select few people, on this site - and I wasn't even referring to anyone on this site! My post was about the real world and how a fundamental lack of understanding of the Jewish psyche has made this conflict worse at every turn.

So, I'm not not a Hamas supporter, just a slavery supporter and a Nazi. Thanks.

I have not seen you called either of those things, nor would I say you are. Again, this is about the real world - the people like Francesca Albanese who thought the Jews could easily be driven to despair and surrender. Everything since has proven how very wrong they are.

[Lief 🗽]

Between the heroic rescue of two hostages from “off limits” Rafah and Israel apparently buying a super bowl commercial last night, the Hamas supporters are melting down all over the internet today. Sad to see.

[CumbrianLefty]

Well they also bombed a Rafah police station, but I get that you might not want to mention that.

[GeneralMacArthur]

The rescue of two hostages feels like it could really end up being a pivotal event that marks the beginning of the end for this war.

Hamas is cornered.  They're hemmed in inside Gaza, and Israel's already wiped them out of the border areas, Gaza City, Khan Younis, and now they're trapped in Rafah with nowhere left to go.  Where do you take the hostages now?  Once Israel defeats Hamas in Rafah there will be nowhere left to hide.

They can't flee back into Khan Younis or Gaza City because Israel is already systematically sweeping those cities and demolishing the tunnels and infrastructure.  They can't flee across the border because Egypt is guarding it.  It's impossible to escape by air or sea without getting blown up by Israel.  Hiding inside hospitals, refugee camps, and civilian houses isn't working anymore; with a smaller and smaller area to work with it's just going to get easier and easier for Israel to figure out where they're hiding and kill them.

[Horus]

Well they also bombed a Rafah police station, but I get that you might not want to mention that.

They finally rescued a couple hostages. They will get to go home to their families, unlike the three young men a few months ago who were waving a white flag. Israel killed them anyways. When the war is over I'll be interested to see how many hostages were killed by IDF bombs.

[GeneralMacArthur]

Between the heroic rescue of two hostages from “off limits” Rafah and Israel apparently buying a super bowl commercial last night, the Hamas supporters are melting down all over the internet today. Sad to see.

Oh yeah, Twitter has been totally unhinged.  Lots of people firing on all cylinders against anyone who dares to tweet about the Superbowl (especially Biden) -- hope you had fun watching sportsball while Israel carpet-bombed millions of children in their ghoulish genocidal zionist massacre homicidal war crime.  Rafah is the last Hamas stronghold, the fall of Rafah will mean the end of Hamas.  We're in a last, desperate moment here.

[Vosem]

Well they also bombed a Rafah police station, but I get that you might not want to mention that.

They finally rescued a couple hostages. They will get to go home to their families, unlike the three young men a few months ago who were waving a white flag. Israel killed them anyways. When the war is over I'll be interested to see how many hostages were killed by IDF bombs.

Would that make the war unjustified in your mind?

[Vosem]

Is that how it is here?  Fine, I can play that game too:

Judging by the trajectory of anti-Vietnam War protests, it is only a matter of time before you all will be waving Hamas flags in the streets during your protests and demonstrations alongside your Palestinian flags, chanting 'we are all Hamas!'.  How soon will it be before some of you will be openly wishing the Nazis had 'finished the job' in news interviews, assuming you aren't doing so already?  No one outside your movement actually likes you. Have you ever wondered about that?  

Just want to say that I believe Horus is Jewish and I am too. So please apologize and enough with your disgusting assumptions based on nothing

For what?  You make claims I support genocide, and now that I insult you back, you act offended?  Spare me your fake outrage.  

The problem is making a vague, feelgood vibes statement like "destroy Hamas".

The only sure fire 100% guaranteed way of achieving this is killing or expelling every last Palestinian in Gaza - this is what some in Israel (including in the government) openly call for. And even someone relatively respected like the Israeli president says that there are "no innocent Palestinians".

So, accepting that you do not actually want this, *how* exactly is Hamas going to be "destroyed"?

Why is this a vague or feel-good statement? What is the essential difference between the LTTE and Hamas which would allow for the LTTE to be destroyed but not Hamas? The LTTE controlled a larger territory, both in terms of population and area, and Sri Lanka is not as wealthy a state as Israel.

In the Sri Lankan case, there was ultimately a surrender, with those who committed serious crimes undergoing legal proceedings, but those judged to have been non-combatants or human shields generally released and provided job training so long as they agreed to give information to collaborating police networks in perpetuity. You could do something like this.

Hamas will be destroyed when they unconditionally surrender and agree to help enforce the Israeli occupation, which will happen once enough of them fear for their lives. (Unfortunately, as aid continues entering Gaza, this has not happened yet; organizations and individuals who have sent aid should be punished severely.) In a just world, Israeli strikes on individuals like Arouri could be accompanied by global street celebrations, if the world refuses to join in the bombing of Gaza.

You continue to insist that this is some impossible task, but it's one that governments much weaker than Israel's have prosecuted successfully. The idea that "Hamas cannot be destroyed" is a cope. (In extremis, it is absolutely possible, even when an organization flees your territory, to destroy it by continuing to kill all of its members, even if this takes decades. All of these things have been done before and will be done again.)

The problem with the assertion that you can't destroy terrorist organizations through bombing because of some countervailing rise of local popular sentiment in their favor is that it's historically illiterate. Of course you can. In no way is it "feel-good", or an unprecedented or strange goal to have. Plenty have succeeded. Hamas seems like it's on its way to join the LTTE, though it will probably only really fall once Doha falls (and Palestinian liberationism, as a whole, only once Manhattan does).

[GeneralMacArthur]

If you are Israel, every single soldier must behave in a manner 100% ethical and mistake-free 100% of the time or else the entire war is wicked and unjustified.

If you are Hamas, any unethical act, or even intentional (not mistaken or unavoidable) infliction of cruelty and harm upon civilians is justified and good because it's fighting against Israel, who as already mentioned, are indefensibly wicked.

When we say "ethical and mistake-free" we are not referring to the typical rules of war, wherein the usage human shields and civilian population areas for military purposes incurs responsibility for harm/death upon the defending party, not the attacker, but rather wholly new rules of war that we invented specifically to apply solely to Israel, and will change on the fly  to match with whatever Israel just did.

BTW even if Israel somehow manages to follow our made-up rules we will simply lie about what Israel did, or totally make things up, or post pics/videos from Syria and say they're from Gaza, etc.

Long live the glorious struggle of Hamas the Palestinians against the disgusting, vile, wretched Jews Zionists!

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

If you are Israel, every single soldier must behave in a manner 100% ethical and mistake-free 100% of the time or else the entire war is wicked and unjustified.

If you are Hamas, any unethical act, or even intentional (not mistaken or unavoidable) infliction of cruelty and harm upon civilians is justified and good because it's fighting against Israel, who as already mentioned, are indefensibly wicked.

When we say "ethical and mistake-free" we are not referring to the typical rules of war, wherein the usage human shields and civilian population areas for military purposes incurs responsibility for harm/death upon the defending party, not the attacker, but rather wholly new rules of war that we invented specifically to apply solely to Israel, and will change on the fly  to match with whatever Israel just did.

BTW even if Israel somehow manages to follow our made-up rules we will simply lie about what Israel did, or totally make things up, or post pics/videos from Syria and say they're from Gaza, etc.

Long live the glorious struggle of Hamas the Palestinians against the disgusting, vile, wretched Jews Zionists!

There are Tiktok videos showing Israeli soldiers gleefully blowing up mosques. Are you suggesting they are being fabricated?

[GeneralMacArthur]

There are Tiktok videos showing Israeli soldiers gleefully blowing up mosques. Are you suggesting they are being fabricated?

Yes, I've seen that video of the one idiot soldier.  Is there any evidence that this is the official policy of the IDF?  Is there any evidence that what the soldier says in the video ("I'm going to blow up the mosque because they wouldn't let me say prayers in it") is the actual reason for the mosque being blown up as opposed to him just being a jackass or trying to joke around with his buddies?  Typically a random grunt flipping the switch on a demolition would not be the same guy who made the strategic decision to authorize the demolition, and would not have had any input on the actual reason for doing said demolition.

As far as I can tell literally the only thing we know about this incident is a TikTok video from some random grunt dicking around and making some stupid claim to impress his buddies.  This is exactly what I'm talking about.  We're asked to judge the entire Israeli war effort based on the dumbest TikTok videos posted by individual knucklehead soldiers.  I mean imagine how bad other wars would've been if every soldier was equipped with a camera they used to broadcast their day-to-day soldiering to the world.

You know that scene in Saving Private Ryan where the Germans run out of the bunker, try to surrender, and the American GIs say "what?  I don't speak German" and gun them down while laughing?  Imagine if they were videotaping that for their TikTok to try and get likes from their buddies, and then Al Jazeera reposted it and 100,000,000 people worldwide saw it and people started acting like it was reflective of the entire American war effort.  Saying vague things like "Americans are gunning down surrendering Germans, not taking any prisoners, it's a war crime, they are engaging in anti-German genocide" -- implying this is the official policy of the entire American army, rather than just two soldiers being idiots.  That would basically be the equivalent of how we're still talking about the "IDF soldier shoots three guys waving the white flag" story.  Is it official IDF policy to shoot anyone waving the white flag?  Or was this just one soldier being an idiot?  If the latter, is there literally any reason to talk about this incident other than to try and imply that it's reflective of the entire IDF?

I hate to break it to you but in every army throughout the world across the course of history, there have always been idiot soldiers.  Having a handful of idiots in your army does not make your entire army unethical or your war unjustified.  It does not make their actions reflective of military or state policy -- even if they can give that appearance by using TikTok to broadcast their dumbest moments to billions of people around the world, getting 100x as many likes/views/reposts as your official army press conferences.


P.S. and by the way -- needless to say -- if Hamas guys had TikTok and were going down in their tunnels abusing and raping their prisoners and posting it up on TikTok, this war would look very different.  Thank heavens we don't have to see Hamas in their lowest moments broadcast all across the world.  We got a little taste of that on 10/7 and it was one of the most vile things in human history.