13 ms·

The story behind the photograph of a starving Gaza baby [video]

29 points by belter 1y ago

xchip 1y ago
Hulk Hogan death's post in HN has 81 upvotes and 96 comments. I'm curious to see what happens to this one.
- phantompeace 1y ago
  Some of the people at the top of YC (e.g Garry Tan) are staunch Zionists. Surprisingly, and refreshingly, it seems PG himself sees through all of the bullshit and consistently asks questions to understand why people have become ok with the murders of innocent children. Although I have spoke about this a couple of times in the past, that too is weighing on myself - have I actually done enough? What use are a few social media comments in the grand scheme of things?
  - jfengel 1y ago
    It's actually not too hard to understand. For many Israelis, the October 7 massacre was the final straw after decades of rocket attacks and other forms of terrorism. As TFA says, Israel blames Hamas. They consider removing Hamas an existential matter, and Hamas is holding the Gazans hostage. I'm not trying to excuse, merely explain. It is not mere bloodthirst. It is a sincere (if possibly incorrect) belief that Gaza as a whole poses a sufficiently significant threat that civilian deaths -- even babies -- are an acceptable part of waging war. CAVEAT: the current Israeli government, and a significant fraction of the public, may in fact be that bloodthirsty. Despite everything I just said, many people also hold some kind of religious belief that this land is their destiny, and that they are justified in claiming it by means I can only describe as "Old Testament". That is not all Israelis; it is likely not a majority. (Elections are next year.) But even Israelis who bitterly oppose this government are sufficiently fearful of Hamas as to justify brutal suppression of all of Gaza.
    - dttze 1y ago
      Cool, now explain what they are doing in the West Bank right now, with overwhelming support from the Israeli population.
      - Sabinus 1y ago
        Slowly taking land, because if they can't have security through a negotiated peace they'll have it by taking more land. It's cynical and harms the negotiated peace process, but the hope for a peace deal is low and falling after the multiple failed deals and good offers.
        NomDePlum 1y ago
        Under international law (specifically the Fourth Geneva Convention), an occupying power is prohibited from: - Transferring its own population into occupied territory. - Destroying property or forcibly displacing residents unless absolutely necessary for military operations. A more accurate term than "taking" would be "annexed" or even "ethnic cleansing" as they are dispossessing those on the land.
        tastyface 1y ago
        These short term “solutions” will only lead to more violence and war later on down the line. And Israel will lose the remaining allies it has left.
    - phantompeace 1y ago
      I specifically didn’t mention Israelis or Jews. I’m sure there are plenty of good people in those camps that oppose Netanyahu. I speak about Zionists. And let’s not pretend history started on October 7th, that region has been in turmoil for almost a century now, so trying to excuse the sniping of children in the head, mass starvation, subjugation of a whole population, straight up ethnic cleansing in this day and age is indefensible no matter what happened. You say you’re not excusing but only explaining but I don’t want to hear any explanation that equates babies as threats that are okay to kill in war. Hamas could’ve dropped a nuke on Tel Aviv and it still wouldn’t excuse sniping innocent children in the head. Did it become okay to liquidate the ghettoised Jews because they struggled for their freedom? They tried to rise up too? They weren’t prepared to lay down without a fight. And where is the outrage against the Israeli government for firing on their own citizens at the festival?
  - mandmandam 1y ago
    > Surprisingly, and refreshingly, it seems PG himself sees through all of the bullshit and consistently asks questions to understand why people have become ok with the murders of innocent children. He does, and that was decent. Still, PG was all aboard with the DOGE machete hacking up government databases to free up tax cuts for the wealthy (and god knows what else). His Twitter has had some truly awful takes lately.
NomDePlum 1y ago
Horrifying how a country can deliberately and systematically manufacture the conditions required for this to happen across a population of millions. Meanwhile the world watches on pretty much in silence.
dttze 1y ago
[flagged]
- slashdev 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - thrance 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - slashdev 1y ago
      There is a number. If the casualties were above 200,000 it would certainly make the case for a genocide much stronger. That's a high civilian to combatant casualty ratio. Hamas has an estimated 30-40K fighters. Numbers like that would mean a 10:1 civilian to combatant ratio which is high for a modern war. Higher than WWII[1], Vietnam, Iraq[2], etc. I'd at least have to admit Israel is prosecuting the war in a very cavalier way in regards to the lives of civilians. The Iraq war, for example, had a roughly 3:1 ratio of civilians to combatants killed.[2] If we take the Gazan Health Ministry numbers of 60k casualties of which Israel claims about 23K were Hamas fighters (neither number can be trusted at face value, but it gives us a starting point) then we see a ratio of 2:1. Which is pretty normal for war. Given how densely populated and urban Gaza is, how Hamas uses civilians as human shields, it's actually miraculously low. Not downplaying how horrible it is that so many people have died, but it could be much worse. You could say the Hamas-run Gazan Health Ministry is understating the numbers, but it'd be hard to make a case for more than 80K[3]. You could say Israel has over stated how many Hamas fighters it has killed, but independant intelligence assessments estimate about 15K. If you take the absolute worst case estimate, it's 5:1, which is about the same as Myanamr, worse than Iraq, but better than Chechnya. There's no way to twist that into a case for genocide. It doesn't fit. Lets look at what civilian to combatant ratio looks like in genocides: Rwandan Genocide - 80 : 1 Armenian Genocide - 1000 : 1 Bosnian Genocide - 50 : 1 Yazidi Genocide by ISIS - 1000 : 1 Holocaust - 1000 : 1 It's clearly a war, not a genocide. - [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties - [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War - [3] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-02009-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-02009-8

29 points by belter 1y ago

xchip 1y ago

Hulk Hogan death's post in HN has 81 upvotes and 96 comments. I'm curious to see what happens to this one.

phantompeace 1y ago
Some of the people at the top of YC (e.g Garry Tan) are staunch Zionists. Surprisingly, and refreshingly, it seems PG himself sees through all of the bullshit and consistently asks questions to understand why people have become ok with the murders of innocent children. Although I have spoke about this a couple of times in the past, that too is weighing on myself - have I actually done enough? What use are a few social media comments in the grand scheme of things?
- jfengel 1y ago
  It's actually not too hard to understand. For many Israelis, the October 7 massacre was the final straw after decades of rocket attacks and other forms of terrorism. As TFA says, Israel blames Hamas. They consider removing Hamas an existential matter, and Hamas is holding the Gazans hostage. I'm not trying to excuse, merely explain. It is not mere bloodthirst. It is a sincere (if possibly incorrect) belief that Gaza as a whole poses a sufficiently significant threat that civilian deaths -- even babies -- are an acceptable part of waging war. CAVEAT: the current Israeli government, and a significant fraction of the public, may in fact be that bloodthirsty. Despite everything I just said, many people also hold some kind of religious belief that this land is their destiny, and that they are justified in claiming it by means I can only describe as "Old Testament". That is not all Israelis; it is likely not a majority. (Elections are next year.) But even Israelis who bitterly oppose this government are sufficiently fearful of Hamas as to justify brutal suppression of all of Gaza.
  - dttze 1y ago
    Cool, now explain what they are doing in the West Bank right now, with overwhelming support from the Israeli population.
    - Sabinus 1y ago
      Slowly taking land, because if they can't have security through a negotiated peace they'll have it by taking more land. It's cynical and harms the negotiated peace process, but the hope for a peace deal is low and falling after the multiple failed deals and good offers.
      - NomDePlum 1y ago
        Under international law (specifically the Fourth Geneva Convention), an occupying power is prohibited from: - Transferring its own population into occupied territory. - Destroying property or forcibly displacing residents unless absolutely necessary for military operations. A more accurate term than "taking" would be "annexed" or even "ethnic cleansing" as they are dispossessing those on the land.
      - tastyface 1y ago
        These short term “solutions” will only lead to more violence and war later on down the line. And Israel will lose the remaining allies it has left.
  - phantompeace 1y ago
    I specifically didn’t mention Israelis or Jews. I’m sure there are plenty of good people in those camps that oppose Netanyahu. I speak about Zionists. And let’s not pretend history started on October 7th, that region has been in turmoil for almost a century now, so trying to excuse the sniping of children in the head, mass starvation, subjugation of a whole population, straight up ethnic cleansing in this day and age is indefensible no matter what happened. You say you’re not excusing but only explaining but I don’t want to hear any explanation that equates babies as threats that are okay to kill in war. Hamas could’ve dropped a nuke on Tel Aviv and it still wouldn’t excuse sniping innocent children in the head. Did it become okay to liquidate the ghettoised Jews because they struggled for their freedom? They tried to rise up too? They weren’t prepared to lay down without a fight. And where is the outrage against the Israeli government for firing on their own citizens at the festival?
- mandmandam 1y ago
  > Surprisingly, and refreshingly, it seems PG himself sees through all of the bullshit and consistently asks questions to understand why people have become ok with the murders of innocent children. He does, and that was decent. Still, PG was all aboard with the DOGE machete hacking up government databases to free up tax cuts for the wealthy (and god knows what else). His Twitter has had some truly awful takes lately.

NomDePlum 1y ago

Horrifying how a country can deliberately and systematically manufacture the conditions required for this to happen across a population of millions. Meanwhile the world watches on pretty much in silence.

dttze 1y ago

[flagged]

slashdev 1y ago
[flagged]
- thrance 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - slashdev 1y ago
    There is a number. If the casualties were above 200,000 it would certainly make the case for a genocide much stronger. That's a high civilian to combatant casualty ratio. Hamas has an estimated 30-40K fighters. Numbers like that would mean a 10:1 civilian to combatant ratio which is high for a modern war. Higher than WWII[1], Vietnam, Iraq[2], etc. I'd at least have to admit Israel is prosecuting the war in a very cavalier way in regards to the lives of civilians. The Iraq war, for example, had a roughly 3:1 ratio of civilians to combatants killed.[2] If we take the Gazan Health Ministry numbers of 60k casualties of which Israel claims about 23K were Hamas fighters (neither number can be trusted at face value, but it gives us a starting point) then we see a ratio of 2:1. Which is pretty normal for war. Given how densely populated and urban Gaza is, how Hamas uses civilians as human shields, it's actually miraculously low. Not downplaying how horrible it is that so many people have died, but it could be much worse. You could say the Hamas-run Gazan Health Ministry is understating the numbers, but it'd be hard to make a case for more than 80K[3]. You could say Israel has over stated how many Hamas fighters it has killed, but independant intelligence assessments estimate about 15K. If you take the absolute worst case estimate, it's 5:1, which is about the same as Myanamr, worse than Iraq, but better than Chechnya. There's no way to twist that into a case for genocide. It doesn't fit. Lets look at what civilian to combatant ratio looks like in genocides: Rwandan Genocide - 80 : 1 Armenian Genocide - 1000 : 1 Bosnian Genocide - 50 : 1 Yazidi Genocide by ISIS - 1000 : 1 Holocaust - 1000 : 1 It's clearly a war, not a genocide. - [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties - [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War - [3] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-02009-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-02009-8