Merged Gaza just launched an unprovoked attack on Israel

[lpetrich]

Besides, Hamas is grabbing most of what drops.

Evidence: {}

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Biden announces US will build pier on Gaza shore for large-scale aid delivery | Israel-Gaza war | The Guardian - "President lays out plans in State of the Union speech while senior US official says ‘we are not waiting on the Israelis’"

He promised “no US boots will be on the ground”, and said: “This temporary pier would enable a massive increase in the amount of humanitarian assistance getting into Gaza every day.”

But Biden warned Israel that it “must also do its part.”

“To the leadership of Israel I say this,” he said. “Humanitarian assistance cannot be a secondary consideration or a bargaining chip. Protecting and saving innocent lives has to be a priority.”

The White House made clear that the decision to open a sea route for aid into Gaza had come with frustration of what is seen in Washington as Israeli obstruction of road deliveries on a substantial scale.

“We are not waiting on the Israelis. This is a moment for American leadership,” a senior official said.

The scheme will take several weeks to put into action, however, carrying the risk of supplying too little relief, too late.

Several weeks? Is that necessary? Aid ships could drop anchor off the coast and small boats could go the rest of the way. I'm concerned that aid ships and boats and this temporary pier could get USS-Libertied by Israel.

And give Hamas more hostages?

Besides, in the big picture a dock is a horrible idea. The real objective is to provide a transshipment point for weapons for Hamas. Hamas has already rejected the possibility of bringing supplies in by sea from Cyprus because it could allow their human shields to escape. You fail to understand that Hamas does not want the problem solved! And they get a veto.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What narrative? "Voting for Hamas equates to supporting terrorism" isn't a narrative; it's just an obvious fact. The people who voted for Hamas knew they were voting for the murder-the-Jews party. What of it? Most of the people in Gaza never voted for Hamas, and collective punishment wouldn't be just even if they had, and nobody is advocating or defending collective punishment, and injustice per se isn't an argument for changing policy anyway when no alternative policy even exists that's both just and feasible. If you think you're refuting a "Voting for Hamas equates to supporting terrorism and therefore it's just to punish Palestinians collectively and that's what Israel is doing" narrative, point out a post where you saw that narrative.

Quit poking holes in their fantasy!

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It seems there's a misconception that Muslim countries inherently oppose Jewish people, suggesting that a unified state would jeopardize Jewish existence. However, this overlooks the reality of existing peaceful relations between Israel & neighboring Muslim countries. And yes I'm aware that relations weren't always peaceful. Which nation has truly attained peace, perhaps only offering a semblance of tranquility to its citizens?

Misconception? Pretty much all of Israel's enemies have ethnically cleansed or genocided their Jews.

You seem to think two wolves and a sheep can be expected to reasonably decide what's for dinner and that the sheep is completely safe in submitting this to a vote.

My ideas may seem unconventional or even flawed to experts, and it's fair for them to be critiqued as such. However, they are merely proposals for consideration, not advocacies for harm against any group. To construe them as such is to engage with me in a discussion in a way that lacks sincerity and integrity.

You are expecting us to accept a completely unreasonable premise as a starting point.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The real trouble is that there is a vastly larger number of mouths and stomachs in Gaza than the few trucks allowed to enter through Kerem Shalom every day can feed. So famine is another method of killing innocent Palestinians, and I doubt that those who control the number of trucks going in are unaware of that. It will take about a month for the US to get its temporary aid port built, so it would be appropriate to stop all arms shipments to Israel at least until we can get enough food into the area so that they can survive long enough to be killed and injured by the weapons we supply the Israelis with.

Kerem Shalom is not saturated. And it's meaningless, anyway, because Hamas takes what comes through.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

This is a presumption that the actions being taken by the IDF are going to prevent another 10/7. They aren't, just like all the other security decisions by Netanyahu didn't actually stop 10/7. This is just the typical response from people that love to punish. It doesn't matter if it is counterproductive, they got a rage boner, and god darn it, they gonna love the rage.

Israel perfectly well knows it can't prevent all attacks. Their goal is minimizing. The more damage they do to Hamas the fewer Israelis will be killed by Hamas.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Even beside the fact that many of its employees are Hamas

This is the first time I've ever heard less than 0.5% being described as "many".

Reality check time:

Less than 0.5% of adult Gazans are members of Hamas. A UN organization that was 0.5% Hamas would be worse than the population at large.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Gazans would also be safer and have more access to aid in refugee facilities in Ashkelon. Heck, they'd be safer and have more access to aid right there in Gaza if Israel stopped bombing and shelling the part of the Strip where it told them to go to seek safety.

Sorry if reality intrudes again but no they won't.

It doesn't matter how much you want Israel to take responsibility for the disaster brought about by violent Islamic terrorists. They are not going to do it because it would be tantamount to social suicide. It would be helping the Islamicists achieve their goals of genocide and destruction of Israelis.

Tom

I take it you're in the 'Palestinians are inherently evil and would poison our blood' camp.

it's true that Israel would cease to be a Jewish State if it were to accept non-Jews as full citizens and respect the Right of Return and the Rights of refugees. But the State of Israel won't cease to exist if Gazan orphans and mothers with young children move into refugee camps in the Ashkelon area. Israel is pretty darn proud of its ability to take in waves of immigrants and provide housing for them. And it's not like Israel would be footing the bill, either.

So racism and religious bigotry aside, what's the problem?

1) Letting them move into refugee camps in Ashkelon would mean writing off the city. I don't think it's current occupants would approve of your approach. It's not poisoning the blood, it's the booby traps they would leave behind.

2) Letting them move into refugee camps anywhere in Israel would mean they would become permanent refugees. Hamas would kill them if they tried to return Gaza.

3) Hamas would not allow their human shields to leave.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

That Gazan civilians would be far better off in a safer place than Gaza.

How about the US then? They could easily gain refugee status.

You want to let Hamas into the US? Because that's what you would be doing. There's no way we could screen them out.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Obama would have been better advised to take out Iranian nuclear weapons sites than to agree to the rotten deal that only made them stronger through sanctions relief.

You're very pro war.

You're very pro-appeasement. Kicking the can usually just makes the resulting war worse.

 

[pood]

So Israel has killed one percent of the Gazan population. In five months.
I wonder how the U.S. would feel if a foreign invader came here and killed 3.4 million people in five months. None too happy, I’d think.

Classic "reverse victim and offender". You are forgetting (or ignoring) that Gaza started this war by invading Israel and murdering >1,200 people and kidnaping 100s of others. To paraphrase Gov. Hochul, had Canada done that to us, there'd be no more Canada.

No, GAZA did nothing of the kind. HAMAS did. The Canada parallel would be if some crazed Canadian fantatics, CLAIMING to speak on behalf of all Canadians, crossed the border and killed more than 1,200 Americans and kidnapped others. To then turn around, per Hochul, and make Canada “no more” would be an insane overreaction and a war crime, like the one Israel is currently committing in Gaza.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I know of only two organized attacks on Jews in the Levant after it came under Ottoman control: the 1660 attack in Safed and the 1834 massacre (some call it a pogrom), also in Safed after it came under Egyptian control in 1831 (the Ottomans got it back in 1840). In both cases Jews were attacked by Druze during a larger rebellion against the government. The government responded by moving to both quell the uprising and to protect Jewish citizens. If you read the reports from the 1834 attacks you will see that many Jews were sheltered by their Muslim neighbors.

I am sticking with my contention that things were quiet under Ottoman rule. I acknowledge that it was not a perfect place (not even Dulac is that). Yes, there had been murderers, thieves, land swindlers, corrupt officials, violent racist bigoted assholes, organized crime, and many other unsavory types living there, but for four centuries the society was as peaceful as we human beings can usually manage. And there had been quite a lot of marriages between Muslims, Christians, Jews, and yes, even Druze. The myth that Palestinian Jews were a hated, oppressed minority is rooted in the experience of Europeans, not the Palestinians themselves.

Keyword: "organized".

Most pogroms aren't organized. They're just somebody blames a Jew for something and a bunch of people listen and go after Jews.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It's not all Palestinians, but Hamas are Palestinians.

A big part of the problem is how many people refuse to accept that:

1) Hamas is a subset of Gazans.
2) Gazans are a subset of Palestinians.
3) Palestinians are a subset of Muslims.
4) Muslims are a subset of violently anti -Jewish bigots.

That's just how it is.
Tom

Disagree on #4. Not all are anti-Jewish bigots. The ones that aren't know better than to speak up, though.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Is it possible for you to either provide evidence for your claim or even to address the actual content of a post instead of imputing motives on the part of the poster?

By Hamas' own data the kill rate of terrorists is 20x the kill rate of civilians. That's an undisputed low value for the ratio. Reality is probably something like 40x but I don't think anyone knows for sure.

That is not providing evidence, it is irrelevant testimkny.

So this is a game of pigeon chess? You have no answer so you pretend there's no question? ….

Honestly, I think neither of us knows what you are going on about.

So it's a game of pigeon chess. Keep bringing up irrelevancies until the original discussion is lost. I note that once again you selectively quoted so as to remove the actual discussion.

 

[pood]

I see the problem as you using mathematical precision to dodge the messier reality of the human situation.
So liberally sprinkle the qualifier "dominant majority" if it helps you understand the human reality. ...

... I would take issue with your new claim that the “dominant majority” of Palestinians — I take it, by “dominant majority,” you are referring to Palestinians, or specifically residents of Gaza — are “violently anti-Jewish bigots.” ... I see no evidence whatever that this majority consists of “anti-Jewish bigots,” either. Anti-ISRAEL, maybe, but that’s not the same as “anti-Jewish bigotry,” ...

You're carefully distinguishing between Jews on the one hand and Israel on the other. Good for you -- that's the right thing to do. But what made you do it? How did you learn that it was the right thing to do? Pretty much all of us in the west have learned to make that sort of distinction by growing up in a culture steeped in liberalism. Whether we're individually liberals or not, we've all been heavily exposed to liberal ideas, and we can generally tell they're mostly good ideas -- reality has a liberal bias. Carefully distinguishing between Jews and Israel is just part and parcel with carefully distinguishing between sets and individuals. We can do that sort of mental gymnastics in our sleep. It's baked into our culture.

But if you are proposing that the dominant majority of residents of Gaza make the same sort of mental distinction between Jews and Israel that you make, how do you propose that they learned to do that? Doing that sort of mental gymnastics is not baked into their culture. They grew up in a culture that tells them the right thing to do is throw gays off buildings. It's not a culture steeped in liberalism. As for the specific matter of distinguishing Jews from Israel, we already know how middle-eastern Muslim cultures have historically viewed that distinction: when Israel was set up in 1948, the nearby countries reacted by expelling their own native Jewish populations. The Arab and Iranian street appears to have been dominated by anti-Jewish bigots at that time. That includes the part of Palestine that remained under Arab control, i.e., Jordan, which is one of the countries that expelled its Jews. So, since you're challenging Tom for evidence, do you see any evidence whatever that Palestinian culture has grown substantially more liberal since that time?

First, I do not think that the vast majority of Muslims in the world, and let’s recall that there are vast numbers of them, have any interest whatsoever in throwing gays off of buildings. In fact, I think the vast majority of them want the same things you and I probably want, and most people want, which is live in peace, be productive at some enterprise, have good relations with others, and raise their kids if they have kids. Second, I do not think that any Muslims, including Hamas, are actually anti-Jewish bigots as in being anti-Jewish per se. What they are, are anti-people who come in and take over our land. And so if Hindus had occupied Palestinian lands illegally in 1948 and expelled resident Palestinians, you would find today from groups like Hamas plenty of anti-Hindu rhetoric.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The only side that wants dead civilians is Hamas. But they're quite effective at ensuring some die if Israel defends itself.

Some? For a side that allegedly does not want dead civilians, the IDF manages to kill and injure magnitudes more than Hamas.

And you continue to stick your head in the sand and see that those civilian deaths are Hamas putting them in harm's way.

Is it possible for you to either provide evidence for your claim or even to address the actual content of a post instead of imputing motives on the part of the poster?

By Hamas' own data the kill rate of terrorists is 20x the kill rate of civilians. That's an undisputed low value for the ratio. Reality is probably something like 40x but I don't think anyone knows for sure.

Could you please cite Hamas source that says it is 20+x to 1? That number seems remarkably impossible. Areas would need to be void of civilians to manage that. I mean, it is possible we were talking 100 dead Hamas over a period of 1 year, but 10k to 15k in several months... and but a pittance is civilian casualties?

Please read more carefully.

I'm saying that by Hamas numbers Israel has killed 20% of the terrorists (6,000 of 30,000) but 1% of the population (30,000 of a bit over 3M) as a whole. That's being very selective and clearly refutes the "indiscriminate" claim.

You realize your numbers are saying that for every Hamas terrorists killed, 4 civilians are killed. So according to your ghoulish metrics, since the IDF is only 1/5 of the way towards eliminating Hamas, about 5% of the civilian population of Gaza will be eliminated.

Note that I am using Hamas data here, giving your side the benefit of the doubt in demonstrating that it was not indiscriminate. I do not think the numbers are accurate.

And I don't think the % that ends up dead is a relevant metric. This is a defensive war. The objective of a defensive war is to stop your opponent from doing something. How many of your opponents end up dead does not measure success or failure. You are using a false yardstick that inherently favors the immoral side.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

By Hamas' own data the kill rate of terrorists is 20x the kill rate of civilians. That's an undisputed low value for the ratio. Reality is probably something like 40x but I don't think anyone knows for sure.

Could you please cite Hamas source that says it is 20+x to 1? That number seems remarkably impossible. Areas would need to be void of civilians to manage that. I mean, it is possible we were talking 100 dead Hamas over a period of 1 year, but 10k to 15k in several months... and but a pittance is civilian casualties?

Please read more carefully.

I'm saying that by Hamas numbers Israel has killed 20% of the terrorists (6,000 of 30,000) but 1% of the population (30,000 of a bit over 3M) as a whole. That's being very selective and clearly refutes the "indiscriminate" claim.

That wasn't clear at all. It is also a bizarre metric to be comparing. It'd be like saying well, 300,000 Gazans were killed, but that is half of the rate of Hamas that was killed. It is a meaningless metric designed to mask quantities.

Please pay attention, I explained why I was saying it. Is this another case of being unable to comprehend blasphemy?

You claimed the bombardment was indiscriminate. If it were indiscriminate the expected result would be at most the same percent of Hamas killed as civilians and in practice the percent of Hamas killed would be far lower due to their tunnels. The fact that the ratio is skewed 20:1 (by Hamas data, more like 50:1 by Israeli data) is a clear rebuttal to it being indiscriminate.

One thing that occurred to me that would be another reason Netanyahu doesn't want to stop the attacks is that if the fighting stops, Gazans can try and return home.

You're blinded by your faith. Israel doesn't want war, Israel wants not to be attacked. The only way they can get relative peace is to smash Hamas' ability to attack.

 

[JohnG]

I've been a 2 state solution guy for a long time. I'm leaning towards a no state solution these days. Neither has shown the ability to govern itself.

And how is Israel not governing itself?

Admittedly I pretty angry with Israel. They have been going in a bad direction politically since the mid 90s. I said to myself when Netanyahu got it the last time that this could be it for Israel.

I can’t remember the name of the military tactic where you do a guerrilla strike and the response draws global sympathy for your side - it’s been done successfully before.

An analogy would be if the US votes in Trump again and again and they do something horrible (which would be no surprise at that point)

Hamas specifically wanted to see mass casualties for a glabal anti-Israel reaction and Netanyahu was dumb enough to play into that. Both parties shouldn’t be in charge of anyone.

 

[Arctish]

Gazans would also be safer and have more access to aid in refugee facilities in Ashkelon. Heck, they'd be safer and have more access to aid right there in Gaza if Israel stopped bombing and shelling the part of the Strip where it told them to go to seek safety.

Sorry if reality intrudes again but no they won't.

It doesn't matter how much you want Israel to take responsibility for the disaster brought about by violent Islamic terrorists. They are not going to do it because it would be tantamount to social suicide. It would be helping the Islamicists achieve their goals of genocide and destruction of Israelis.

Tom

I take it you're in the 'Palestinians are inherently evil and would poison our blood' camp.

it's true that Israel would cease to be a Jewish State if it were to accept non-Jews as full citizens and respect the Right of Return and the Rights of refugees. But the State of Israel won't cease to exist if Gazan orphans and mothers with young children move into refugee camps in the Ashkelon area. Israel is pretty darn proud of its ability to take in waves of immigrants and provide housing for them. And it's not like Israel would be footing the bill, either.

So racism and religious bigotry aside, what's the problem?

1) Letting them move into refugee camps in Ashkelon would mean writing off the city. I don't think it's current occupants would approve of your approach. It's not poisoning the blood, it's the booby traps they would leave behind.

2) Letting them move into refugee camps anywhere in Israel would mean they would become permanent refugees. Hamas would kill them if they tried to return Gaza.

3) Hamas would not allow their human shields to leave.

I said "Racism and bigotry aside, what's the problem?".

That does not mean "add a side of racism and bigotry to what you are serving".

If all you have to offer is racism and bigotry, then don't respond to questions that specifically call for answers that don't have that content. But if you do have something else, then post it and support your claims.

Also, are there two different classes of Israelis? Your posts indicate some Israelis should not, for reasons having to do with their safety, have Palestinians living nearby, while the other kind of Israeli can move into newly built settlements in Palestinian towns and villages in the West Bank, and you're perfectly fine with that. What's with the double standards?

 

[Arctish]

I know of only two organized attacks on Jews in the Levant after it came under Ottoman control: the 1660 attack in Safed and the 1834 massacre (some call it a pogrom), also in Safed after it came under Egyptian control in 1831 (the Ottomans got it back in 1840). In both cases Jews were attacked by Druze during a larger rebellion against the government. The government responded by moving to both quell the uprising and to protect Jewish citizens. If you read the reports from the 1834 attacks you will see that many Jews were sheltered by their Muslim neighbors.

I am sticking with my contention that things were quiet under Ottoman rule. I acknowledge that it was not a perfect place (not even Dulac is that). Yes, there had been murderers, thieves, land swindlers, corrupt officials, violent racist bigoted assholes, organized crime, and many other unsavory types living there, but for four centuries the society was as peaceful as we human beings can usually manage. And there had been quite a lot of marriages between Muslims, Christians, Jews, and yes, even Druze. The myth that Palestinian Jews were a hated, oppressed minority is rooted in the experience of Europeans, not the Palestinians themselves.

Keyword: "organized".

Most pogroms aren't organized. They're just somebody blames a Jew for something and a bunch of people listen and go after Jews.

You are supposed to use the acronym 'IMO' when you post your personal opinion.

If you want people to think you are posting facts, you need to cite sources that support your claims.