3 ms·

This argument seems so counterproductive to me. Israel is obviously committing war crimes, attempting ethnic cleansing and any number of other horrible violatio

This argument seems so counterproductive to me. Israel is obviously committing war crimes, attempting ethnic cleansing and any number of other horrible violations of international law and common standards. But I don't see how it is committing genocide. They are not trying to destroy the people, the genus. There are 2+ mill people in Gaza and with all those bombs they killed 100k or less? Basically that is just what urban warfare looks like. This is like the Diddy trial, where you give the perp a way out by overprosecuting.

jakelazaroff 1y ago
Here's another comment I left in response to this same person (YZF) [1] with 13 examples of Israeli MKs and other government officials declaring their intent to kill civilians. Many of these are explicit calls for genocide. That was in December 2023, after two months, when the death toll was only around 17,000 [2]. It's now been 19 months of near constant siege; if you check Wikipedia, as of today the official count is around 58,000 people killed directly. That's likely to be a vast undercount of the total number of deaths: an estimated 64,620 had died from traumatic injury by June 2024 [3], and probably many thousands more from malnutrition and disease. There are also thousands of uncounted bodies buried under the rubble. Israel has (intentionally) destroyed almost every hospital in Gaza, damaged or destroyed at least 92% of residential buildings [4] and cut off all food and water at least twice (and repeatedly massacred civilians at aid sites). Do you really think fewer than 100k people have died as a result of this? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38576316 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38576316 [2] https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians-have-died-gaza-war-how-will-counting-continue-2023-12-06/ https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestini... [3] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)02678-3/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... [4] https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162491 https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162491
- Paradigma11 1y ago
  The point is that what you are describing is not genocide. "The legal term “genocide” refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group." Israel does not do that. Russia does do that to the Ukrainians. Putin thinks Ukraine is not a real nation and he thinks the Ukrainians are not a separate genus. That is why Ukrainian children are getting indoctrinated in the occupied territories and the Ukrainian language getting suppressed. Does that mean that Ukrainian civilians are worse off than Palestinians? No, obviously not. Israel is guilty of many crimes and many of them are worse than some forms of genocide. Words have meaning and you are offering the Israeli apologetics an easy way out arguing semantics and the easy way is that they are right.
  - jakelazaroff 1y ago
    > "The legal term “genocide” refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group." Israel does not do that. Israel "does not do that" only if you ignore remarks by IDF members, MKs and the Prime Minister himself explicitly saying they are doing that.

jakelazaroff 1y ago

Here's another comment I left in response to this same person (YZF) [1] with 13 examples of Israeli MKs and other government officials declaring their intent to kill civilians. Many of these are explicit calls for genocide. That was in December 2023, after two months, when the death toll was only around 17,000 [2]. It's now been 19 months of near constant siege; if you check Wikipedia, as of today the official count is around 58,000 people killed directly. That's likely to be a vast undercount of the total number of deaths: an estimated 64,620 had died from traumatic injury by June 2024 [3], and probably many thousands more from malnutrition and disease. There are also thousands of uncounted bodies buried under the rubble. Israel has (intentionally) destroyed almost every hospital in Gaza, damaged or destroyed at least 92% of residential buildings [4] and cut off all food and water at least twice (and repeatedly massacred civilians at aid sites). Do you really think fewer than 100k people have died as a result of this? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38576316 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38576316 [2] https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians-have-died-gaza-war-how-will-counting-continue-2023-12-06/ https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestini... [3] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)02678-3/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... [4] https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162491 https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162491

Paradigma11 1y ago
The point is that what you are describing is not genocide. "The legal term “genocide” refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group." Israel does not do that. Russia does do that to the Ukrainians. Putin thinks Ukraine is not a real nation and he thinks the Ukrainians are not a separate genus. That is why Ukrainian children are getting indoctrinated in the occupied territories and the Ukrainian language getting suppressed. Does that mean that Ukrainian civilians are worse off than Palestinians? No, obviously not. Israel is guilty of many crimes and many of them are worse than some forms of genocide. Words have meaning and you are offering the Israeli apologetics an easy way out arguing semantics and the easy way is that they are right.
- jakelazaroff 1y ago
  > "The legal term “genocide” refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group." Israel does not do that. Israel "does not do that" only if you ignore remarks by IDF members, MKs and the Prime Minister himself explicitly saying they are doing that.