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I don't want to start another top-level thread on this topic, as it is contentious enough already - but just as an aside, the UN General Assembly just passed a

by xg15 3y ago

I don't want to start another top-level thread on this topic, as it is contentious enough already - but just as an aside, the UN General Assembly just passed a (symbolic) resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire with 153 to 10, an even stronger majority than the last resolution. Of course UN votes are always subject to all kinds of political considerations and power dynamics and the saying "nations have no friends, only interests" still applies, but when such a wide range of countries from completely different geopolitical alignments vote for this (e.g. pro-palestinian but strongly anti-Hamas Egypt together with hosts of Hamas Turkey, Qatar and Iran, together with pro-Israel western countries such as France and Switzerland), this does give a strong hint how the world opinion on the matter seems to be. News bulletin: https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/12/1144717 https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/12/1144717 Votes by nation: https://twitter.com/UN_News_Centre/status/1734686801699491975/photo/1 https://twitter.com/UN_News_Centre/status/173468680169949197...

nvm0n2 3y ago
[flagged]
- xg15 3y ago
  > The UN doesn't speak for the world, regardless of what they may claim. That might be true for Guterres but not for the GA. The delegations that voted were not directed by the UN but by their respective countries. No one forced them to vote for this. Israel itself gets its legitimacy from the UN resolution in 1949. > But why would anyone ask them to cease fire against an enemy that won't return the favour? My understanding of the term "ceasefire" is that it always applies to both sides - so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well.
  - ashirusnw 3y ago
    > so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well During which Hamas would regroup, recover, and then be impossible to defeat and then would go on to commit another October 7th What should in fact happen is another humanitarian pause allowing more hostages to be released but relief for civilians in conflict. Hamas is now demanding all Palestinian prisoners, i.e. those who have committed attrocities in the past to be released which will never happen as it would incentivize further attacks against Israelis
    - qwertthrowway 3y ago
      [flagged]
  - nvm0n2 3y ago
    > so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well. But it is an absurd request, like calling for a ceasefire between Britain and Germany at the height of World War 2. Like "legitimacy" and "international law", the concept makes no sense when thought about clearly. It is war. Wars end with a believable long term peace, most commonly due to the absolute destruction of one side's ability to fight. A peace is meant to be lasting, which means people have to believe in its durability. But there is no way to believe it in the case of Hamas short of a complete Israeli victory (i.e. occupation and total disarmament), because they have demonstrated that they are always engaged in preparation for the next attack. Any pause in the fighting would obviously only be temporary and adopted for military advantage.
    - ignoramous 3y ago
      > But it is an absurd request, like calling for a ceasefire between Britain and Germany at the height of World War 2. Except, al-Qassam is not a regular military with weapons of mass destruction at its disposal. An overwhelming casualties have been civilians. > A peace is meant to be lasting, which means people have to believe in its durability. Just now I see Israelis calling for a war on Qatar, Iran, and Lebanon. Where does one find solution for this obsession with violence, if not in Tel Aviv? By dismantling the settlements in the West Bank and immediately moving to secure a state for the Palestinians?
  - neonsunset 3y ago
    "Ceasefire" only applies to civilized parties than can actually uphold agreements, to which Hamas do not belong. Either way, for the parent post being flagged, it is absolutely correct in its assessment and its flagged status is just a small glimpse on why the collective west faces the existential threat and does as much work at dismantling itself as its enemies (which too do so in the open). The actual winning move would be strengthening sanctions against Iran and its proxies, quick eradication of any actual and perceived threats in the middle east and the lift of unofficial ban by the West to Ukraine to conduct military operations on the territory of ruskieland as well as supply of all long-range standoff munitions that are scheduled for a decommission in the next three to five years so that we can actually save money for US by being more efficient at doing so with immediate and second-order strategic benefits to everyone involved.
- reducesuffering 3y ago
  I'm reminded of US Secretary of Defense, McNamara's lessons he learned from being involved in that quagmire. 'Even though the United States is the strongest nation in the world, it should never use that power unilaterally: "if we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we better reexamine our reasoning.' He was talking about our mistake applying unilateral policy in Vietnam. We didn't apply his advice to Iraq and look where it got us. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War
  - networkchad 3y ago
    [dead]
refurb 3y ago
It doesn’t really say anything. Why? Because the cost of voting is zero. The UN is toothless. In fact, you’ll see many countries who are actively benefiting from the conflict through arms sales voting for a ceasefire. In fact, the UN often nicely provides political cover for countries. It lets them do whatever they want behind the scenes then vote for peace and then trumpet it in their domestic media.
- xg15 3y ago
  > In fact, you’ll see many countries who are actively benefiting from the conflict through arms sales voting for a ceasefire. Which ones specifically do you mean here? This would be a really interesting information in this whole topic.
mvdtnz 3y ago
There was a ceasefire. IDF ended it because Hamas fired rockets and didn't hold up their end of the hostage release bargain. There was a ceasefire before that, which Hamas broke by invading Israel and torturing, raping and murdering over a thousand innocent civilians.
- huytersd 3y ago
  [flagged]
- keefle 3y ago
  Thats not completely true. By the time Hamas fired that rocket the time has already ended of the truce (7:00 am of that day), and Hamas was clear that it could not meet the extension criteria (brining out 10 more hostages from the category being exchanged (children and women)), it even proposed moving to another criteria (elderly), but Israel refused Again watch your language and only claim what has been proved (rape has not). I do agree atrocities were committed tho, but to stay partial and critical in this assessment we must be clear with ourselves on what has been proven to have happened, and what didn't. For instance we know Israel is also responsible for a portion of the killing of Israeli civilians on the 7th of October. Many burned bodies for instance turned out to be Hamas operatives hit with hellfire missiles. So let's be careful
  - egisspegis 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - xg15 3y ago
      What does this have to do with the question of who broke the ceasefire?
      - egisspegis 3y ago
        Nothing, because I was not replying to that. I was replying to the statement that "rape has not been proved" and everyone stating otherwise should "watch their language".

by xg15 3y ago

nvm0n2 3y ago

[flagged]

xg15 3y ago
> The UN doesn't speak for the world, regardless of what they may claim. That might be true for Guterres but not for the GA. The delegations that voted were not directed by the UN but by their respective countries. No one forced them to vote for this. Israel itself gets its legitimacy from the UN resolution in 1949. > But why would anyone ask them to cease fire against an enemy that won't return the favour? My understanding of the term "ceasefire" is that it always applies to both sides - so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well.
- ashirusnw 3y ago
  > so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well During which Hamas would regroup, recover, and then be impossible to defeat and then would go on to commit another October 7th What should in fact happen is another humanitarian pause allowing more hostages to be released but relief for civilians in conflict. Hamas is now demanding all Palestinian prisoners, i.e. those who have committed attrocities in the past to be released which will never happen as it would incentivize further attacks against Israelis
  - qwertthrowway 3y ago
    [flagged]
- nvm0n2 3y ago
  > so of course during such a ceasefire Hamas would have to stop the rocket attacks as well. But it is an absurd request, like calling for a ceasefire between Britain and Germany at the height of World War 2. Like "legitimacy" and "international law", the concept makes no sense when thought about clearly. It is war. Wars end with a believable long term peace, most commonly due to the absolute destruction of one side's ability to fight. A peace is meant to be lasting, which means people have to believe in its durability. But there is no way to believe it in the case of Hamas short of a complete Israeli victory (i.e. occupation and total disarmament), because they have demonstrated that they are always engaged in preparation for the next attack. Any pause in the fighting would obviously only be temporary and adopted for military advantage.
  - ignoramous 3y ago
    > But it is an absurd request, like calling for a ceasefire between Britain and Germany at the height of World War 2. Except, al-Qassam is not a regular military with weapons of mass destruction at its disposal. An overwhelming casualties have been civilians. > A peace is meant to be lasting, which means people have to believe in its durability. Just now I see Israelis calling for a war on Qatar, Iran, and Lebanon. Where does one find solution for this obsession with violence, if not in Tel Aviv? By dismantling the settlements in the West Bank and immediately moving to secure a state for the Palestinians?
- neonsunset 3y ago
  "Ceasefire" only applies to civilized parties than can actually uphold agreements, to which Hamas do not belong. Either way, for the parent post being flagged, it is absolutely correct in its assessment and its flagged status is just a small glimpse on why the collective west faces the existential threat and does as much work at dismantling itself as its enemies (which too do so in the open). The actual winning move would be strengthening sanctions against Iran and its proxies, quick eradication of any actual and perceived threats in the middle east and the lift of unofficial ban by the West to Ukraine to conduct military operations on the territory of ruskieland as well as supply of all long-range standoff munitions that are scheduled for a decommission in the next three to five years so that we can actually save money for US by being more efficient at doing so with immediate and second-order strategic benefits to everyone involved.
reducesuffering 3y ago
I'm reminded of US Secretary of Defense, McNamara's lessons he learned from being involved in that quagmire. 'Even though the United States is the strongest nation in the world, it should never use that power unilaterally: "if we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we better reexamine our reasoning.' He was talking about our mistake applying unilateral policy in Vietnam. We didn't apply his advice to Iraq and look where it got us. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War
- networkchad 3y ago
  [dead]

refurb 3y ago

It doesn’t really say anything. Why? Because the cost of voting is zero. The UN is toothless. In fact, you’ll see many countries who are actively benefiting from the conflict through arms sales voting for a ceasefire. In fact, the UN often nicely provides political cover for countries. It lets them do whatever they want behind the scenes then vote for peace and then trumpet it in their domestic media.

xg15 3y ago
> In fact, you’ll see many countries who are actively benefiting from the conflict through arms sales voting for a ceasefire. Which ones specifically do you mean here? This would be a really interesting information in this whole topic.

mvdtnz 3y ago

There was a ceasefire. IDF ended it because Hamas fired rockets and didn't hold up their end of the hostage release bargain. There was a ceasefire before that, which Hamas broke by invading Israel and torturing, raping and murdering over a thousand innocent civilians.

huytersd 3y ago
[flagged]
keefle 3y ago
Thats not completely true. By the time Hamas fired that rocket the time has already ended of the truce (7:00 am of that day), and Hamas was clear that it could not meet the extension criteria (brining out 10 more hostages from the category being exchanged (children and women)), it even proposed moving to another criteria (elderly), but Israel refused Again watch your language and only claim what has been proved (rape has not). I do agree atrocities were committed tho, but to stay partial and critical in this assessment we must be clear with ourselves on what has been proven to have happened, and what didn't. For instance we know Israel is also responsible for a portion of the killing of Israeli civilians on the 7th of October. Many burned bodies for instance turned out to be Hamas operatives hit with hellfire missiles. So let's be careful
- egisspegis 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - xg15 3y ago
    What does this have to do with the question of who broke the ceasefire?
    - egisspegis 3y ago
      Nothing, because I was not replying to that. I was replying to the statement that "rape has not been proved" and everyone stating otherwise should "watch their language".