8 ms·
I'm actually kind of surprised it's that high. That's what asymmetric warfare means: you can't tell the fighters from the civilians. If Hamas put on uniforms,
by jfengel 1y ago
I'm actually kind of surprised it's that high. That's what asymmetric warfare means: you can't tell the fighters from the civilians.
If Hamas put on uniforms, the number would be much higher. The war would also have ended a long time ago -- and not in their favor.
That does not excuse Israel's own war crimes, which are indeed egregious. Israel has obligations, both moral and under treaty, that it is violating.
But I think it's important to consider the framing of this article. The implication is that Israel detaining exclusively "fighters" is easy, but in fact it's not possible.
I'd love to see a convention on asymmetric warfare, parallel to the Geneva Conventions. What are the obligations of a first-world country fighting a much smaller force who is not bound by the existing conventions? Obviously more than Israel is engaging, but I don't think most people would agree to fight solely along Geneva Convention lines, either, when faced with such an opponent.
- sporkxrocket 1y agoIsrael would still be committing genocide regardless of how the resistance dresses. They’re literally ethnically cleansing the West Bank and that has nothing to do with Hamas. They ethically cleansed all of Palestine during the Nakba and Hamas didn’t exist for another 50 years.
- jfengel 1y agoHamas is carrying on the activities of the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The PLO renounced those tactics and is now (more or less) successfully running the West Bank as the Palestinian Authority. Which Israel is screwing up by building more and more settlements, making a two-state solution impossible. It isn't ethnic cleansing, but it is certainly a bad idea and probably a crime.
- sporkxrocket 1y agoIsrael is annexing the West Bank so it's safe to say the PLO made the wrong call. It's 100% ethnic cleansing. That's all Israel is, ethnically cleansed Palestine, since Nakba.
- jfengel 1y agoYou could potentially meet me where I am, trying to cover the entire range of events, considering both sets of people who have done good and bad things. Or you could continue to spout nationalist propaganda. Your call.
- sporkxrocket 1y agoBeing against ethnic cleansing and land theft isn't "nationalist propaganda". Let's stick to historical facts, starting with Nakba and the Balfour Declaration, both of which were egregious human rights violations.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago> Let's stick to historical facts, starting with Nakba What's the logic for starting with the Nakba versus something earlier or later? Part of what I think makes this conflict intractable is everyone has a litany of historical grievances they can readily pull up to justify just about any claim.
- blitzar 1y agoEveryone wants the cutoff to be when their grievances begin - where they were wronged unprovoked and unwaranted - as we must start from that point and ignore all priors.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago> Everyone wants the cutoff to be when their grievances begin Not everyone. Plenty of nations across history forgave, or at least tolerated and moved on. (America, Germany and Japan. Hell, America and Britain. India and Britain. Pretty much every member of the EU.) The ones that don't, the ones that hold onto multigenerational gripes, tend to be consumed by them. (I'm not arguing that the Israelis or Palestinians or Armenians should give up because it's more peaceful. These are complicated fractures. But I'll stand by this feature, alone, making their conflicts intractable. Particularly by outsiders. The best you can do is permanent stalemate.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_trading_partners_of_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_trading_partne...