[News] Middle East conflict

[GT49er]

What utter biased garbage. The vast majority in the rest recognize Hamas as a terrorist organisation and their attack on the 7th as barbaric and cowardly. They also recognize the right for Palestinians to exist in a separate state. I would also suggest the vast majority recognize yhe right of Israel to do something about Hamas but not the wholesale slaughter of innocents which I guess you're quite happy to condone. We know Hamas use civilians as shields but to you, what ratio of dead innocents are acceptable for each Hamas death? 1:1, 10:1, 100:1, 1000:1? Tell us what you think is acceptable?

Isn't that for Hamas to decide? - certainly not anybody on NSC.

(The answer should be zero of course, because it shouldn't happen, but while neither side out there is willing to consider meaningful peace talks ..................)

 

[borat]

Amazing turnout in London on Saturday. Attendance figures quoted vary from lowest at 300,000 to higher end at 800,000 +

Can question the effectiveness of it all but heartening to see that so many people will make the effort to speak up against the horrors that Israel is currently and has historically perpetrated.

 

[Krafty]

But what I am seeing is a movement by more and more people who really aren't considering the bigger picture but are fixated by the bombing and by freeing Palestine in a way which can only mean the destruction of Israel.

I disagree. What I see is a collective of people showing solidarity and support for the people of Palestine, not Hamas. They want peace for the innocent Palestinians, and the Israelis too, but this vision has been crushed by Hamas and the Israeli authorities.

 

[drew]

Isn't that for Hamas to decide? - certainly not anybody on NSC.

(The answer should be zero of course, because it shouldn't happen, but while neither side out there is willing to consider meaningful peace talks ..................)

No, it's for Israel to decide. Also,I wasn't asking Wardy to decide, I was asking for his opinion. Thought that was obvious.

 

[aolstudios]

I use the word 'mass' not sizeable and I am wrong for not quantifying better but I can't . But what I am seeing is a movement by more and more people who really aren't considering the bigger picture but are fixated by the bombing and by freeing Palestine in a way which can only mean the destruction of Israel. I am also commenting on the fact that you don't see same level of support for people being killed in many other places.

Yep, way more killed in Syria & by the Saudis. Myanmar & the Uighur in China barely registering a peep. More vileness in Iran right now than I have time to type.
But hey, no Jews, no news

 

[AlexBH]

 

[Zeberdi]

I think there is a lot of political naivety being shown, whether people like it or not this is just another version of the 'west v the rest' being played out by proxies at a number of levels so our government and opposition parties cannot really criticise one of their main allies in the area and in same way as they don't criticise Saudi Arabia.

On the contrary, you are articulating something that is painfully clear to the majority of NSCers and beyond (and somehow making it sound enlightening while you say it! ) - you only have to look at the Ukraine thread to realise just how much that is understood, or look at the earlier posts on this thread.

I don't believe Israel should have responded militarily, not because they weren't justified , but because this mess was predictable . The 1400 hundred dead and 250 hostages are now forgotten or ignored by a mass of people in the west whose apparent agenda is to get rid of Israel. That's what the chant means.

You keep repeating this same argument so I am now compelled to give you the same answers and repeat myself too to counter some misrepresentation and misleading comments

The victims of the October attack

• Have not been forgotten
• Are not being ignored
• And certainly not by a ‘mass’ of people who want to ‘get rid of Israel’ (I’m assuming you are referring to the demonstrators? Rather than buy into the far-right rhetoric of Suella Braverman, perhaps watch the video @borat has just put up - yes, the victims of the attack on Israel is not the main narrative- the march is for ceasefire, peace and an end to the occupation
• Again, I explained up thread, that the chant pre-dates the creation of the State of Israel, so literally does not in itself propose the ‘destruction of Israel’ - it has been appropriated by Hamas and the small minority of demonstrators who support Hamas, but is also used by thousands of Palestinian peace marchers as general siren call for freedom and the end of occupation.

I saw one comment that Israel is not a democracy , depends on how you use the term but it is and stands out as a dimmed beacon of democracy in an area of autocrats and violence.

Israel is not a democracy in the Western sense (and I know you recognise that of course) but because of the generic nature of the term, it’s serves no real purpose to use it when talking about Israel IMO - And she has been typified by violence since the day she was conceived- While founded on principles of liberal democracy, Israel has always been a ‘Democratic Jewish State’ - a Liberal Zionistic concept, where only Jews have ever received full civil liberties (a test of ‘democracy’) and where over 22% of the population of Israel are living under apartheid conditions where protest is met with deadly force by the Israeli authorities (another litmus of the measure of ‘democracy’) - since October 7, over 1,500 Palestinian ‘citizens’ of Israel have been rounded up and being detained without habeas corpus (a fundamental human right that is central to the notion of ‘democracy’). (see Amnesty and Lawdictionary links below)

Israel’s government has swung so far right in recent years by Religious Zionist ideology and Netanyahu’s erosion of the checks on the balance of power, she is unrecognisable as a ‘social or liberal democratic’ State. Not only is Israel now closer to a Theocracy than a ‘democracy’ under nearly 13 years of Netanyahu’s Premiership but it could be argued that Israel’s political governance has more in common with Russia’s authoritarian autocracy than it does with the Western ideas of democratic governance now - although with far-right ideology becoming more central in European politics those differences are rapidly diminishing..

The war on Israeli democracy

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has attacked the foundations of democracy. If he wins his 2020 reelection bid, things could get a lot worse.

www.vox.com

So call out that the bombing is wrong (military action is ) but make sure you call out Hamas for their part in provoking the attack and their part in putting arms supplies with civilian areas and also callout for a proper solution not the destruction of the Jewish state and the people therein.

I guess my anti-war ideological outlook on the world became tempered with age and pragmatism but I do empathise with your views, I just don’t think they are grounded in much reality sadly

So, again, to this point you raise, any proposal for peace has to be egalitarian and realistic - asking one State not to have a military response to being invaded by terrorists is unreasonable and unrealistic regardless of how bloody obvious to the rest of us, violence only begets more violence. Neither Hamas nor Netanyahu want peace - they want hostilities to continue - Netanyahu to justify blocking a 2 state solution, Hamas to perpetuate the ideology enshrined in their charter which is also inconsistent with a 2 state solution.

As I said to you when you suggested this previously, any ceasefire proposals has to be bilateral otherwise it is not a ceasefire and there is no way one party to a conflict that has been going on for 70 years will agree to a unilaterally non-military response - a State has to protect her citizens. More importantly, in this situation, Israel not taking military action would not have resulted in a cessation of rocket attacks by Hamas.

As for ‘calling out’ Hamas - It’s unfair to criticise posters for not talking about the Hamas attack when we have moved on in temporal events - everyone on this thread has absolutely condemned Hamas’s atrocities 5 weeks ago and often since but to keep proposing they should do so repeatedly as a pre-condition of criticising the ongoing genocidal campaign is whataboutery and comes across as an attempt to silence criticism of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in Gaza, Israel and the rest of the OPT. It is possible to maintain both a position of condemning the Hamas attacks and condemning the atrocities happening now as I think probably just about all contributors have said - @Bozza summed it up perfectly when he said:

You know what? I think it's OK to talk about atrocities without listing every other prior atrocity first, in order to pre-emptively cover off any whataboutery coming back.

Again to repeat, if Hamas are undistinguishable from the population, then Isreal is bound by international law, specifically the Geneva Convention, to avoid a specific action or make every effort to avoid civilian casualties by ensuring they are evacuated - that means opening the borders, humanitarian safe passages - it also means temporary ceasefires to evacuate people who are immobile (like babies in incubators) and to get aid in. It means restoring fuel supplies to hospitals and medical centres so Gazans can look after their critically injured civilians. Taking care to avoid civilian casualties does not mean firing rockets onto convoys of civilians who are trying to evacuate or bombing areas you have asked thousands of people to evacuate to!

Ref:

Israel's apartheid against Palestinians

Palestinians are systematically subjected to home demolitions and forced evictions, and live in constant fear of losing their homes. For more than 73 years, Israel has been forcibly displacing entire Palestinian communities. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians’ homes have been demolished...

www.amnesty.org

4 Essential Things to Know About Habeas Corpus

A writ of habeas corpus is widely considered one of the most basic protections citizens have against unchecked state power, its meaning and importance is not always widely understood

thelawdictionary.org

Edit - ‘Time for football’ said @Zeberdi

 

[tedebear]

This news around the hopsitals (mostly Al Shifa and these 37 babies) is so hard to decipher, you get sound bites yesterday on BBC news with doctors saying Israel fired on civilians fleeing the hospital from the fighting, then other doctors on twitter on videos saying Hamas have stolen all their generator fuel, today you have the Telegrah reporting Hamas have used the hospitals as bases, Aljazeera reporting the Palestinian minister of health saying Israel are forceibly evicting injured...and Netanyahu has offered (and been denied) fuel for Al Shifa. This is as much a war of owning the narrative as it is firepower.

 

[Zeberdi]

This news around the hopsitals (mostly Al Shifa and these 37 babies) is so hard to decipher, you get sound bites yesterday on BBC news with doctors saying Israel fired on civilians fleeing the hospital from the fighting, then other doctors on twitter on videos saying Hamas have stolen all their generator fuel, today you have the Telegrah reporting Hamas have used the hospitals as bases, Aljazeera reporting the Palestinian minister of health saying Israel are forceibly evicting injured...and Netanyahu has offered (and been denied) fuel for Al Shifa. This is as much a war of owning the narrative as it is firepower.

Agree completely - it’s often said that ‘the first casualty of war is truth’ but I think sometimes it is more a case of there being ‘lies, damned lies and statistics‘. I think I’m more inclined to believe the UN agencies, NGOs and Médecins Sans Frontières though, than Hamas or the Israeli Government- Al Jazeera I have found reliable over the years but of course has an Arab slant - The Telegraph will be very pro-Israel with a strong right-wing, pro-Tory slant - The BBC is probably the most reliably neutral of the MSM.

For me, it’s the UN aid organisations on the ground and NGOs who risk their lives to get out the reports that provide the most reliable updates of the situation - we don’t need to understand what is happening or know who or what was responsible to see its impacts:

Lives of one million children ‘hanging by a thread,’ as child health services almost collapse across the Gaza Strip

www.unicef.org

“Over the past 24 hours, hospitals in Gaza have been under relentless bombardment. Al-Shifa hospital complex, the biggest health facility where MSF staff are still working, has been hit several times, including the maternity and outpatient departments, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries. The hostilities around the hospital have not stopped. MSF teams and hundreds of patients are still inside Al-Shifa hospital. MSF urgently reiterates its calls to stop the attacks against hospitals, for an immediate ceasefire and for the protection of medical facilities, medical staff and patients.”

Gaza: Patients and medical staff trapped in hospitals under fire | MSF

Hospitals in Gaza, including Al-Shifa hopsital where MSF has staff, have been under relentless bombardment for the last 24 hours. We urgently reiterate our calls to stop the attacks against hospitals, and for an immediate ceasefire.

www.msf.org

 

[tedebear]

For me, it’s the UN aid organisations on the ground and NGOs who risk their lives to get out the reports that provide the most reliable updates of the situation - we don’t need to understand what is happening or know who or what was responsible to see its impacts:

Agree. I also have two colleagues in neighbouring countries, hugely interesting to hear their views and what they believe as the truth.

 

[Wardy's twin]

I disagree. What I see is a collective of people showing solidarity and support for the people of Palestine, not Hamas. They want peace for the innocent Palestinians, and the Israelis too, but this vision has been crushed by Hamas and the Israeli authorities.

Luckily for you and I we are in a place to have our own opinions.

On October 7th parts of the Palestinian population were out celebrating what had been done to Israel, 5%, 20% who knows but to say there is a clear distinction people the Palestinians and HAMAS is crazy. Hamas is made up of Palestinians and they were apparently voted in power by the majority. Hamas as a military entity become civilians when they want to and vice versa.

I happen to disagree with your comment because what I see is a lot of people who still believe in the ' river to the sea' stuff. What see are lots of Palestinian flags, what I don't see is people supporting both groups on the same march. Really would love to be proved wrong on this .

 

[TomandJerry]

Newborns are placed in a bed after being taken off incubators in Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital after fuel ran out.

They will most likely all die.

Absolutely horrific scenes.

 

[Zeberdi]

Hamas is made up of Palestinians and they were apparently voted in power by the majority. Hamas as a military entity become civilians when they want to and vice versa.

FACT CHECK

• Hamas has not had the mandate to govern since 2006 - there have been no elections since then -
• Hamas have tortured Gazans who collaborate with IDF and Israelis
• Hamas overthrew the only political alternative in a bloody takeover.
• HAMAS has a variety of leadership bodies that carry out a variety of functions including political, social and paramilitary
• Hamas‘s overall policies are overseen by a consultative body that works outside Gaza
• Hamas’ military wing is distinct from its administrative/political bodies and Social Service wing ( Dawah) and is formed of highly trained paramilitary brigades (the Izz ad-Din al-Qasdam Brigades ) that resemble state armies.
• The Brigades maintain an independent level of decision making from the Hamas organisation.
• It is this ‘plausible deniability’ between the terrorist wing of Hamas and the political wing in the structure of Hamas that could possibly leave a door open for negotiations ( as it did with Sinn Fein and the IRA)

I happen to disagree with your comment because what I see is a lot of people who still believe in the ' river to the sea' stuff. What see are lots of Palestinian flags, what I don't see is people supporting both groups on the same march. Really would love to be proved wrong on this .

FACT CHECK

• One can not possibly know what 300,000 people believe without asking them
• The chant has origins prior to Israel, has several different interpretations. and has been used by Hamas and protestors in different ways.

Why would people who are marching against oppression be waving flags in support of their oppressor? - or who would carry a banner calling for Israel to ‘stop the genocide’ whilst also marching to support them while they commit it? That’s non-sensical.

Sorry but some of your arguments and how you characterise the situation in Gaza seems to have little basis in logic or reality at times to me.

 

[GT49er]

No, it's for Israel to decide. Also,I wasn't asking Wardy to decide, I was asking for his opinion. Thought that was obvious.

No, Hamas. They decide how many people are on top of the targets. The rest? - no comment.


Anyway, the sooner someone starts knocking heads together the better - trouble is both sides too stupid and stubborn to take any notice.

 

[Krafty]

I happen to disagree with your comment because what I see is a lot of people who still believe in the 'river to the sea' stuff. What see are lots of Palestinian flags, what I don't see is people supporting both groups on the same march. Really would love to be proved wrong on this.

Do you think the protests are 'hate marches'?
In my opinion, I don't think the majority of protesters are anti-Semitic. However, I do recognise that there have been a few stories about a small minority of people who want Israel to be completely destroyed. I think you have read these stories and therefore have made the interpretation that most of these protesters want Israel to be destroyed, instead of wanting peace for Palestinians and Israelis - but I think that interpretation is wrong.
Like I have said, I think the Palestinian flags/protests are to show support and solidarity to the innocent civilians of Palestine, not Hamas. And just because they are not also waving Israeli flags around, does not mean these people do not want peace and security for the innocent civilians of Israel too.

 

[drew]

No, Hamas. They decide how many people are on top of the targets. The rest? - no comment.


Anyway, the sooner someone starts knocking heads together the better - trouble is both sides too stupid and stubborn to take any notice.

Pretty clear you don't give a damn. Innocent people used as shield are worthy targets. Shame some of them are just kids but hey, who cares!!

 

[drew]

FACT CHECK

• Hamas has not had the mandate to govern since 2006 - there have been no elections since then -
• Hamas have tortured Gazans who collaborate with IDF and Israelis
• Hamas overthrew the only political alternative in a bloody takeover.
• HAMAS has a variety of leadership bodies that carry out a variety of functions including political, social and paramilitary
• Hamas‘s overall policies are overseen by a consultative body that works outside Gaza
• Hamas’ military wing is distinct from its administrative/political bodies and Social Service wing ( Dawah) and is formed of highly trained paramilitary brigades (the Izz ad-Din al-Qasdam Brigades ) that resemble state armies.
• The Brigades maintain an independent level of decision making from the Hamas organisation.
• It is this ‘plausible deniability’ between the terrorist wing of Hamas and the political wing in the structure of Hamas that could possibly leave a door open for negotiations ( as it did with Sinn Fein and the IRA)

FACT CHECK

• One can not possibly know what 300,000 people believe without asking them
• The chant has origins prior to Israel, has several different interpretations. and has been used by Hamas and protestors in different ways.

Why would people who are marching against oppression be waving flags in support of their oppressor? - or who would carry a banner calling for Israel to ‘stop the genocide’ whilst also marching to support them while they commit it? That’s non-sensical.

Sorry but some of your arguments and how you characterise the situation in Gaza seems to have little basis in logic or reality at times to me.

Unfortunately, those arguments fall on deaf ears.

 

[A1X]

The 1400 hundred dead and 250 hostages are now forgotten or ignored by a mass of people in the west whose apparent agenda is to get rid of Israel. That's what the chant means.

Out of interest, when the North stand routinely chants “go get your father’s gone and shoot the Palace scum”, do you believe everyone who chants it is actively advocating for the mass slaughter of fans of Crystal Palace FC, or is it just a chant that people like singing?

I confess, I’m not one, but I also don’t like the “river to the sea” chant.

 

[GT49er]

Out of interest, when the North stand routinely chants “go get your father’s gone and shoot the Palace scum”, do you believe everyone who chants it is actively advocating for the mass slaughter of fans of Crystal Palace FC, or is it just a chant that people like singing?

No, they aren't (unpleasant though the chant is). Other, more malevolent chants, are available (sadly).

 

[Zeberdi]

For me, it’s the UN aid organisations on the ground and NGOs who risk their lives to get out the reports that provide the most reliable updates of the situation:

Lives of one million children ‘hanging by a thread,’ as child health services almost collapse across the Gaza Strip

www.unicef.org

“Over the past 24 hours, hospitals in Gaza have been under relentless bombardment. Al-Shifa hospital complex, the biggest health facility where MSF staff are still working, has been hit several times, including the maternity and outpatient departments, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries. The hostilities around the hospital have not stopped. MSF teams and hundreds of patients are still inside Al-Shifa hospital. MSF urgently reiterates its calls to stop the attacks against hospitals, for an immediate ceasefire and for the protection of medical facilities, medical staff and patients.”

Gaza: Patients and medical staff trapped in hospitals under fire | MSF

Hospitals in Gaza, including Al-Shifa hopsital where MSF has staff, have been under relentless bombardment for the last 24 hours. We urgently reiterate our calls to stop the attacks against hospitals, and for an immediate ceasefire.

www.msf.org

Just adding WHO to the list of organisations in addition to the above that can provide a more accurate account of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza

Communications largely lost at the Al Shifa Hospital (Gaza’s largest hospital) which is no longer functioning after being reported earlier to be surrounded by tanks - Staff are desperately trying to save newborn babies but it sounds like they are running out of time - so desperately sad

WHO loses communication with contacts in Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza amid reports of attacks

www.emro.who.int