Merged Gaza just launched an unprovoked attack on Israel

[Loren Pechtel]

The really ironic thing is that I’m extremely anti-Hamas.

As far as I can tell, both sides are indefensibly in the wrong.

You believe you oppose Hamas, but you do exactly what they manipulate you into doing.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Allegations of collective punishment: Note the lack of proof--because there isn't any.

Segregating Palestinians into Gaza is collective punishment.

You realize you're arguing for Holocaust 2.0?

And they segregated themselves--thought they would return victorious but they lost and wouldn't swear to not continue fighting so they were not allowed to return.

 

[Toni]

The really ironic thing is that I’m extremely anti-Hamas.

As far as I can tell, both sides are indefensibly in the wrong.

You believe you oppose Hamas, but you do exactly what they manipulate you into doing.

Oh fuck all the way off Loren.

You have no memory of posts I’ve written. You can live in your own delusions but I’m not joining you.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The really ironic thing is that I’m extremely anti-Hamas.

As far as I can tell, both sides are indefensibly in the wrong.

You believe you oppose Hamas, but you do exactly what they manipulate you into doing.

Questioning an endless blank check of a military response regarding the atrocities of October 7th?

Fuck Hamas are good at their manipulation.

Allegations of collective punishment: Note the lack of proof--because there isn't any.

Segregating Palestinians into Gaza is collective punishment.

You realize you're arguing for Holocaust 2.0?

You realize you are abusing the heck out of hyperbole, right?

Israel used siege tactics, which is collective punishment. They isolated Gaza from food/water/supplies. There is no other way to label it. Worse yet, it did dick all to get the remaining hostages back.

I don't envy the IDF having to manage the viable threat that is Hamas. But that doesn't mean whatever IDF does is justified. For me, what is the goal, what is the cost, what is the likely collateral damage. Everything done by Israel in the last 12 months didn't appear to achieve any actual goal. It likely stopped dozens of rockets from being flung harmlessly into Israel, but that would seem to be it.

And they segregated themselves--thought they would return victorious but they lost and wouldn't swear to not continue fighting so they were not allowed to return.

It isn't that simple. And these days, the teenagers there have only known segregation. I get you don't understand other points of view, but that is going to be a big problem for Israel in the near future. For the teens, it doesn't matter why it is that way it is, because those teens only know what they grew up in. They are being galvanized into militia and terrorists. Palestine is becoming less a thing to make a peace deal and more a bomb that needs to be diffused. And as I noted, it doesn't matter nearly as much as to 'who is to blame" as that we are here now and need to fix it.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Since most Gazans are not Hamas, one would think it is up to the IDF to show that Mr Hayek was a terrorist.

The point is some MSF people are terrorists. Thus showing that someone is MSF doesn't show they aren't a terrorist.

Note that he was a local employee, thus almost certainly at least cooperated with the terrorists.

That is not addressing the point. You have no evidence to show he was a terrorist.

I don't know if he was. I know that as a local employee he has to do the bidding of the terrorists.

You don’t know that. So it is disingenuous to insinuate he was a terrorist.

Please quit moving the goalposts.

I'm saying he had to be cooperating with them as he was a local. Doesn't mean he was actually a member, but if Hamas wants something, you do it.

We have Hamas claims of this, doesn't make it true.

We have reports in reputable news media. You have kneejerk denial of reality.

No. Almost always news media will choose to report stuff they know is not trustworthy vs not having access to report anything.

Any report from the ground in Gaza should be assumed to be from Hamas. The only things remotely credible are intercepts and social media.

Those are convenient assumptions but I see no reason to take them as reasonable.

We have seen far too many examples of where they are proven deception and the reporters had to be in on it. Doesn't matter if they sometimes get it right, a source that's frequently wrong is worthless.

Why in the world should I think this case is any different than what's gone before?

I object to the IDF telling people to move to “safe zones” and then attackjng the safe zones. So please stop misrepresenting my thoughts.

The IDF had people move away from the objects they wished to strike. That did not preclude Hamas using the crowds to strike from. And it doesn't even mean that people that died during the evacuation were killed by Israel. Supposedly Israel struck vehicles in the evacuation--but strangely the images never show a vehicle that's taken a hit from a modern weapon, nor do we see a crater. All we see is shrapnel damage--which says it was a roadside bomb, not a weapon from the sky.

We have reports of the IDF bombkng “safe” zones.

That doesn't address the point.

IDF declared zones where there wasn't infrastructure they planned to target. Hamas of course set up in the middle so Gazans would get killed.

Again and again and again Hamas rigs it so civilians die and you blindly blame Israel. Thus they do it again.

First you deny bombing of safe zones. Now justify it. All in the same post. Are you posting drunk?

It would help if you wouldn't make up fabricated claims.

Your false accusations are disgraceful.

Then show they are false.

I never said the IDF didn't bomb safe zones. I said they didn't bomb infrastructure in safe zones. Doesn't mean they didn't bomb Hamas.

You responded to my objection to bombing safe zones with “explanations” to deflect the reality. The IDF sends people to safe zones and then bombs them. I object to that deceptive practice. Your apologia does not alter the fact it was deceptive.

And you failed to even try to show they were false.

The problem here is that the situation changes. IDF said they weren't going to bomb infrastructure in those areas so of course Hamas proceeded to set up there. The IDF didn't say they wouldn't bomb attackers in the area, they said they wouldn't bomb the area itself. You are adding an element to the claim that did not exist and then blaming them for breaking something they never said in the first place.

 

[laughing dog]

Ignoring the massive irony of your accusation, produce one post from Toni that blindly accepts Hamas’s propaganda. There are three criteria for your proof to meet to be valid
1) the post is from Toni,
2) the post has an actual acceptance of a Hamas statement, and
3) the “propaganda” is actually false.

If you cannot meet all 3 criteria, you should apologize to Toni because your accusation was uncalled for.

You're moving goalposts with condition #2.

I said "Hamas propaganda", not "Hamas statement". The propaganda does not appear to come from Hamas.

Your pedantic evasion failed to deflect you didn’t bother to address criteria 1 and 3. Fucking pathetic.

There was no reason to address them as your conditions were clearly false.

No, they weren’t. Your refusal to substantiate your claim about Toni is disgraceful. Doubly so for a moderator.

 

[laughing dog]

The point is some MSF people are terrorists. Thus showing that someone is MSF doesn't show they aren't a terrorist.

Note that he was a local employee, thus almost certainly at least cooperated with the terrorists.

Cooperated or was adjacent enough that MSF could do their jobs? I'm certain MSF has contacts with a lot of bad groups, just so that they can get in safely and render aid. MSF is in some ugly areas and security is critical.

To do your job in Gaza you must do what Hamas wants of you.

So what? Using your criterion, everyone in Gaza is a legitimate target.

That doesn't address the point.

IDF declared zones where there wasn't infrastructure they planned to target. Hamas of course set up in the middle so Gazans would get killed.

If one is going to kill civilians as collateral damage to a military strike, the strike better damn well be worth it. Was it?

And we have no way of evaluating any given military strike. We can see that overall Israel does better than anyone else. Thus the reasonable assumption is that it was worth it.

Why is it a reasonable assumption?

Quit pretending you don't understand.

Why are you so afraid to substantiate or explain yourself?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What's going on is we find your demand that people not defend themselves unacceptable.

If you could quote me making that demand, or apologise to me and withdraw your claim that I did, I would be most grateful.

You do not approve of civilian use of deadly force against attackers.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Pity Hamas did not really consider that starting a war of agression next door to Gaza might spill over into Gaza itself.

What makes you think that Hamas cared at all about the consequences for Gaza?

So Hamas should be permitted to kill Jews with impunity because they threaten Gazan civilians?

How the fuck do you get from what I said, to what follows the word "So" in your response?

Seriously, we should have a forum rule that any response beginning with "So..." will be deleted. They are almost invariably nonsensical.

You don't like the consequences of your positions.

I'm not going to hunt it down but there's a cartoon I posted quite some time back, a Hamas soldier with a baby in their plate carrier. While obviously there are sometimes workarounds for the specific case it's meant to be a more general thing. And I have yet to see someone on the left provide a non-derailing response other than those who say they would die rather than defend themselves.

You either accept that civilians will die in the war, or you do not permit war and Hamas attacks Israel with impunity.

 

[laughing dog]

Since most Gazans are not Hamas, one would think it is up to the IDF to show that Mr Hayek was a terrorist.

The point is some MSF people are terrorists. Thus showing that someone is MSF doesn't show they aren't a terrorist.

Note that he was a local employee, thus almost certainly at least cooperated with the terrorists.

That is not addressing the point. You have no evidence to show he was a terrorist.

I don't know if he was. I know that as a local employee he has to do the bidding of the terrorists.

You don’t know that. So it is disingenuous to insinuate he was a terrorist.

Please quit moving the goalposts.

I'm saying he had to be cooperating with them as he was a local. Doesn't mean he was actually a member, but if Hamas wants something, you do it.

If being a member of MNF doesn’t mean he was a terrorist, why did you imply he was?

We have Hamas claims of this, doesn't make it true.

We have reports in reputable news media. You have kneejerk denial of reality.

No. Almost always news media will choose to report stuff they know is not trustworthy vs not having access to report anything.

Any report from the ground in Gaza should be assumed to be from Hamas. The only things remotely credible are intercepts and social media.

Those are convenient assumptions but I see no reason to take them as reasonable.

We have seen far too many examples of where they are proven deception and the reporters had to be in on it. Doesn't matter if they sometimes get it right, a source that's frequently wrong is worthless.

You believe everything the IDF says and they are frequently wrong.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You still aren't addressing the basic issue: showing that there are unlawful cases doesn't make all cases unlawful.

Nobody is suggesting that all cases are unlawful.

You said "Killing in war generally isn't unlawful"; And that statement is false, even though there are many cases that are lawful.

As I already explained:

Killing enemy combatants, when the Rules of Engagement permit it, isn't unlawful, but killing anyone else most certainly is.

You can't lawfully kill civillians, reporters, or even combatants who are on your own side. Even enemy combatants cannot be lawfully killed if your RoE and/or lawful orders prohibit their killing in the given circumstances - for example if they are hors de combat.

Killing in war is not always unlawful. But it is generally unlawful, so your claim that it is not is simply wrong.

This whole thing sounds an awful lot like 1984.

Most killing in war is legal. Citing a variety of edge cases that generally do not happen does not change this.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The point is some MSF people are terrorists. Thus showing that someone is MSF doesn't show they aren't a terrorist.

Note that he was a local employee, thus almost certainly at least cooperated with the terrorists.

Cooperated or was adjacent enough that MSF could do their jobs? I'm certain MSF has contacts with a lot of bad groups, just so that they can get in safely and render aid. MSF is in some ugly areas and security is critical.

To do your job in Gaza you must do what Hamas wants of you.

Careful, Dr. Z might call you an anti-Semite.

That doesn't address the point.

IDF declared zones where there wasn't infrastructure they planned to target. Hamas of course set up in the middle so Gazans would get killed.

If one is going to kill civilians as collateral damage to a military strike, the strike better damn well be worth it. Was it?

And we have no way of evaluating any given military strike. We can see that overall Israel does better than anyone else. Thus the reasonable assumption is that it was worth it.

That mentality isn't how we turned things around in Iraq. Granted, this isn't exactly on the same terms, but you have a long history defaulting to presuming action was warranted, when the people you support took action. I'm not judging whether any particular strike was justified or not. But in the aggregate, seeing that Hamas is still around, the violence and destruction seemed to be the goal, not the defeat of Hamas, which everyone knows isn't possible militarily (or at least the people who are involved).

No, I'm saying we can't analyze individual actions but we can analyze the overall result. Even the most pessimistic evaluation of what the two sides are saying says Israel is better than anyone else. Bringing up individual actions is an attempt to create confusion where there is none.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Diplomacy involves Iran, not Hamas.

Exactly--but note that they have never even been willing to talk.

Obama was able to squeeze an arrangement out of them. He managed to get an arrangement without giving Iran too much in the deal, all the while providing the US a camel nose opportunity. And in a process of trying to resolve Iran and the US's baggage with the nation, it was a viable first step. Trump and the GOP fucked that up, because it is easier to have Iran the enemy than Iran, the working on diplomatic ties to try and help out Israel in the long-term.

He made the standard leftist mistake of thinking a bad deal is better than no deal. And note that the Iran deal did nothing about the Gaza situation.

That's why there is no diplomatic solution and thus why blaming Israel for not finding a diplomatic solution is nonsense.

Carter got a deal with Israel, Egypt, and Jordan. It required shrewdness, it required some underhanded dealing, it required a good deal of money. But Israel stopped needing to worry about those portions of the border and that deal has stuck for several decades.

You can possibly get deals with all but one player. You won't be able to get a working deal with the last one because the terror money will overwhelm it. The only real solution is to remove the terror money and we can't do that short of taking down Iran.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Do you expect a news organization to not publish such statements?
Sounds like you do not want a news organization, you want a propaganda machine.

I expect them to not just parrot statements made by Hamas uncritically.

I expect news outlets to report what people say, not what their readers and listeners prefer to read and hear.

That would be good. Unfortunately, it has little connection to reality anymore. A news organization that actually did this would alienate too many readers and soon be out of business.

So you want journalists to be propagandists for your side but complain up and down when you feel journalists are being propagandists for the other side. And you don't see the double standard.

It's not what I want. It's what's actually happening--they are propagandists for Hamas. I want them to be honest.

What was dishonest about the quote?

I expect them to make it much clearer that it's just what Hamas said. The article acts like it's presenting facts. It's one of the standard ways reporters are dishonest. The statement is "true" in that it's being correctly attributed to some individual or organization. But that is very different than what is depicted being true.

 

[Arctish]

Pity Hamas did not really consider that starting a war of agression next door to Gaza might spill over into Gaza itself.

What makes you think that Hamas cared at all about the consequences for Gaza?

So Hamas should be permitted to kill Jews with impunity because they threaten Gazan civilians?

How the fuck do you get from what I said, to what follows the word "So" in your response?

Seriously, we should have a forum rule that any response beginning with "So..." will be deleted. They are almost invariably nonsensical.

You don't like the consequences of your positions.

I'm not going to hunt it down but there's a cartoon I posted quite some time back, a Hamas soldier with a baby in their plate carrier. While obviously there are sometimes workarounds for the specific case it's meant to be a more general thing. And I have yet to see someone on the left provide a non-derailing response other than those who say they would die rather than defend themselves.

Just a head's up here. If you hunt down that cartoon and re-post it, I will post links to all the good-faith non-derailing replies you have already received that will prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you are bullshitting about the responses you got.

You either accept that civilians will die in the war, or you do not permit war and Hamas attacks Israel with impunity.

And I will follow that up with links to replies you have already gotten to your inane Excluded Middle Fallacy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You think, you think, you think.

What makes you think your thoughts are better founded in reality than the organizations listed? What makes you think you don't have a political agenda?

Agenda? I went through the list of the primary reasons why they are claiming it is genocide and all are garbage.

 

[ZiprHead]

Do you expect a news organization to not publish such statements?
Sounds like you do not want a news organization, you want a propaganda machine.

I expect them to not just parrot statements made by Hamas uncritically.

I expect news outlets to report what people say, not what their readers and listeners prefer to read and hear.

That would be good. Unfortunately, it has little connection to reality anymore. A news organization that actually did this would alienate too many readers and soon be out of business.

So you want journalists to be propagandists for your side but complain up and down when you feel journalists are being propagandists for the other side. And you don't see the double standard.

It's not what I want. It's what's actually happening--they are propagandists for Hamas. I want them to be honest.

What was dishonest about the quote?

I expect them to make it much clearer that it's just what Hamas said. The article acts like it's presenting facts. It's one of the standard ways reporters are dishonest. The statement is "true" in that it's being correctly attributed to some individual or organization. But that is very different than what is depicted being true.

They said where it came from. It's not up to journalists who have no access to the source to question the source. The statement itself is news, therefore it is reportable.

 

[ZiprHead]

You think, you think, you think.

What makes you think your thoughts are better founded in reality than the organizations listed? What makes you think you don't have a political agenda?

Agenda? I went through the list of the primary reasons why they are claiming it is genocide and all are garbage.

Strange that they were all bullshit. But you do you.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The really ironic thing is that I’m extremely anti-Hamas.

As far as I can tell, both sides are indefensibly in the wrong.

You believe you oppose Hamas, but you do exactly what they manipulate you into doing.

Questioning an endless blank check of a military response regarding the atrocities of October 7th?

Fuck Hamas are good at their manipulation.

All terrorist groups are or they would soon wither.

Allegations of collective punishment: Note the lack of proof--because there isn't any.

Segregating Palestinians into Gaza is collective punishment.

You realize you're arguing for Holocaust 2.0?

You realize you are abusing the heck out of hyperbole, right?

No. If segregating them to Gaza is punishment then that means you want them in Israel. Israel is a democracy, Hamas wins the next election, the Jews are dead and now the world is facing nuclear-armed terrorists.

Israel used siege tactics, which is collective punishment. They isolated Gaza from food/water/supplies. There is no other way to label it. Worse yet, it did dick all to get the remaining hostages back.

Read something about the reality of war. It's not punishment. And why do you think it did dick? Hamas saw it's control slipping and had to deal. This is the result of the war! The Orange Shit just took credit for it.

I don't envy the IDF having to manage the viable threat that is Hamas. But that doesn't mean whatever IDF does is justified. For me, what is the goal, what is the cost, what is the likely collateral damage. Everything done by Israel in the last 12 months didn't appear to achieve any actual goal. It likely stopped dozens of rockets from being flung harmlessly into Israel, but that would seem to be it.

The war started with literally thousands of rockets being flung into Israel, not mere dozens. And they certainly aren't harmless. You usually do not hear about casualties because their civil defense is very good and most people get to shelters in time. But things get destroyed and while Iron Dome missiles are cheap by military standards they still cost tens of thousands of dollars each. A war of attrition is unacceptable.

And what we saw was 2 years of pounding did bring home the hostages. Hamas isn't going to admit that but it's what happened--the Israeli occupation was degrading Hamas control of Gaza.

And they segregated themselves--thought they would return victorious but they lost and wouldn't swear to not continue fighting so they were not allowed to return.

It isn't that simple. And these days, the teenagers there have only known segregation. I get you don't understand other points of view, but that is going to be a big problem for Israel in the near future. For the teens, it doesn't matter why it is that way it is, because those teens only know what they grew up in. They are being galvanized into militia and terrorists. Palestine is becoming less a thing to make a peace deal and more a bomb that needs to be diffused. And as I noted, it doesn't matter nearly as much as to 'who is to blame" as that we are here now and need to fix it.

I'm not disagreeing with segregation, I am disagreeing about how it came about. They separated themselves from society and were not allowed to rejoin when they still intended to destroy it.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The point is some MSF people are terrorists. Thus showing that someone is MSF doesn't show they aren't a terrorist.

Note that he was a local employee, thus almost certainly at least cooperated with the terrorists.

Cooperated or was adjacent enough that MSF could do their jobs? I'm certain MSF has contacts with a lot of bad groups, just so that they can get in safely and render aid. MSF is in some ugly areas and security is critical.

To do your job in Gaza you must do what Hamas wants of you.

So what? Using your criterion, everyone in Gaza is a legitimate target.

That doesn't address the point.

IDF declared zones where there wasn't infrastructure they planned to target. Hamas of course set up in the middle so Gazans would get killed.

If one is going to kill civilians as collateral damage to a military strike, the strike better damn well be worth it. Was it?

And we have no way of evaluating any given military strike. We can see that overall Israel does better than anyone else. Thus the reasonable assumption is that it was worth it.

Why is it a reasonable assumption?

Quit pretending you don't understand.

Why are you so afraid to substantiate or explain yourself?

Because you are simply derailing by pretending something is unclear.