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Merged Gaza just launched an unprovoked attack on Israel

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And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.

I blame both sides and have done so consistently from the beginning. Like others who oppose Israel's cruel policy of killing thousands of innocent Palestinians to get at the guilty ones, I blame Hamas, and I blame the Israeli government. I also blame the US government for opposing a ceasefire for so long and supplying Israel with the means to conduct its brutal revenge policy.

I think that the message is finally getting through to Netanyahu. We can only hope.

In reversal, Netanyahu sending delegation to White House for Rafah talks

 

And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.
And you feel Israel must oblige their hateful terrorist enemy because......?
 
Throw these religious idiots into battle and give them something to pray about.

And accommodate their religious nuttery? Would they need a special helmet with a tefillah port? It seems like these folks would be more trouble then they're worth.
Then again, the Haredi make up over 13% of Israel's population and they're quite fond of making babies (average 7.2 babies per) so the complaints for military service are understandable.
They started out as a group of 400. Now they are over 13% of the population. I don't think the Torah is their main focus of study.
 

And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.
And you feel Israel must oblige their hateful terrorist enemy because......?
And you feel the Jews should simply allow themselves to be slaughtered because.....? Because you've never provided any viable alternative, nor has anyone else who knows what they're talking about.
 

Someone actually tried to do some statistical checking on Gaza deaths--and the Hamas data does not add up. Looks like 18,000 would be a better figure--which makes sense if Hamas is counting all combatants as civilians.
 

And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.
And you feel Israel must oblige their hateful terrorist enemy because......?
And you feel the Jews should simply allow themselves to be slaughtered because.....? Because you've never provided any viable alternative, nor has anyone else who knows what they're talking about.
Yeah, I don't get it.

And it's not really just about Hamas/Palestine. It's about the Arab nations doing everything they can to wipe the Israelis from the face of the earth for the past 76 years. If any nation can be justified in "overreacting" it's Israel.

My youngest daughter brought this topic up at dinner a few weeks back. Bless her heart that she has so many empathetic beliefs, but good god does Reddit and Tiktok do the kids a grave disservice. Anyway, I gave her a mini history lesson about what's gone down in that region of the world since 1948 (while also including the Holocaust as backdrop) and she was mystified. She'd never heard any of it.

What's presented is a childish argument of "They did it for no reason!" It's like something I would've said as a 5 year old after my older brother kicked my ass for stealing his GI Joe. "Mom, he hit me for no reason!" And what's happening is that it's creating one issue voters out of young people who will vote third party or not vote all, thereby potentially swinging states in Trump's direction come November.

Anyway, Hamas is responsible for this as are the Arab nations backing them. A nation has the right to defend itself and take measures to diminish future threats.
 
My youngest daughter brought this topic up at dinner a few weeks back. Bless her heart that she has so many empathetic beliefs, but good god does Reddit and Tiktok do the kids a grave disservice. Anyway, I gave her a mini history lesson about what's gone down in that region of the world since 1948 (while also including the Holocaust as backdrop) and she was mystified. She'd never heard any of it.

What's presented is a childish argument of "They did it for no reason!" It's like something I would've said as a 5 year old after my older brother kicked my ass for stealing his GI Joe. "Mom, he hit me for no reason!" And what's happening is that it's creating one issue voters out of young people who will vote third party or not vote all, thereby potentially swinging states in Trump's direction come November.
I can easily understand people not knowing the history that lead to it, but I don't understand why so many people refuse to look at the facts when they're presented.
 

And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.
And you feel Israel must oblige their hateful terrorist enemy because......?
And you feel the Jews should simply allow themselves to be slaughtered because.....?
Your stupid straw man is not a rebuttal.
Your response is based on the excluded middle fallacy: Israel’s only two policy choices are massive death and destruction in pursuit of eradicating Hamas or sit back, do nothing and get slaughtered.


Loren Pechtel said:
Because you've never provided any viable alternative, nor has anyone else who knows what they're talking about.
Repetition a falsehood does make it true. It makes you look like Trump.
That is an evasion, not a rebuttal.

Moreover, your response is based on an
false dichotomy: invade and destroy Gaza or do nothing and Jews will be slaughtered.[/QUOTE]
 
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And Netanyahu has other reasons for not wanting the resolution to work. However, the resolution doesn't hurt, and its real value is the dash of cold water it splashes in Netanyahu's face. He is racing to pull off his Rafah attack, and everyone is warning him that it will just make the humanitarian catastrophe worse.
Hamas wants the humanitarian catastrophe. Blame them.
And you feel Israel must oblige their hateful terrorist enemy because......?
And you feel the Jews should simply allow themselves to be slaughtered because.....? Because you've never provided any viable alternative, nor has anyone else who knows what they're talking about.
What makes you think at this point in time the Jews would be "slaughtered"? Gaza is basically destroyed. The tunnel system is pretty much destroyed. I cannot see Hamas have any sort of large weapons caches left. I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
 
I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
That's what the goal was.

It wasn't making friends with the violent Islamic terrorists who run Gaza, or the rest of the Muslim world.

Apparently it worked.

Too bad the Islamicists forced Israel to go to such lengths. But they did. So here we are.

Violent Islamic terrorists required this, not giving Israel any other feasible choice for security. Too bad for the innocent Gazan victims.
Tom
 
I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
That's what the goal was.

It wasn't making friends with the violent Islamic terrorists who run Gaza, or the rest of the Muslim world.

Apparently it worked.

Too bad the Islamicists forced Israel to go to such lengths. But they did. So here we are.

Violent Islamic terrorists required this, not giving Israel any other feasible choice for security. Too bad for the innocent Gazan victims.
Tom
I seriously doubt you or I or anyone who posts here has a real clue what were the reasons for Hamas’s attack on October 7.


The gov’t of Israel had plenty of feasible choices - there have many reports over the disagreements within the Israeli gov’t over the appropriate course of action.

Stop denying the agency of the gov’t of Israel.
 
I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
That's what the goal was.

It wasn't making friends with the violent Islamic terrorists who run Gaza, or the rest of the Muslim world.

Apparently it worked.

Too bad the Islamicists forced Israel to go to such lengths. But they did. So here we are.

Violent Islamic terrorists required this, not giving Israel any other feasible choice for security. Too bad for the innocent Gazan victims.
Tom
Israel's other feasible choices are

1) a Two State solution with enough land and resources for each to ensure both Israel and the Palestinian State are viable, with mutually beneficial security arrangements and freedoms for citizens of both States,

2) a One State solution where civilians are equally respected and protected, where suspected criminals are pursued and arrested, and where justice is served in equal measure regardless of race, sex, gender, religious creed, or any other factor bigoted assholes think should determine the outcome, and

3) something other than more ethnic cleansing and wanton killing of tens of thousands of non-Jews in an enclave where half of the people living there are children, the details of which to be worked out between representatives of Israel and Palestine, and put to a vote by the Israeli and Palestinian people.
 
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I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
That's what the goal was.

It wasn't making friends with the violent Islamic terrorists who run Gaza, or the rest of the Muslim world.

Apparently it worked.

Too bad the Islamicists forced Israel to go to such lengths. But they did. So here we are.

Violent Islamic terrorists required this, not giving Israel any other feasible choice for security. Too bad for the innocent Gazan victims.
Tom
Israel's other feasible choices are

1) a Two State solution with enough land and resources for each to ensure both Israel and the Palestinian State are viable, with mutually beneficial security arrangements and freedoms for citizens of both States,

Except that this has been tried and didn't work out. The Palestinians seem hellbent on Jewish destruction

2) a One State solution where civilians are equally respected and protected, where suspected criminals are pursued and arrested, and where justice is served in equal measure regardless of race, sex, gender, religious creed, or any other factor bigoted assholes think should determine the outcome, and

Jews don’t like to explode. So this one is out. The Palestinians just need to be controlled. Its for the best, for both parties.

Until we figure out how to talk the Palestinians in stopping with wanting to kill all Jews.

3) something other than more ethnic cleansing and wanton killing of tens of thousands of non-Jews in an enclave where half of the people living there are children, the details of which to be worked out between representatives of Israel and Palestine, and put to a vote by the Israeli and Palestinian people.

The only side who wants ethnic cleansing is the Palestinian side. So if we leave Israel in charge it'll all work out
 
I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
That's what the goal was.

It wasn't making friends with the violent Islamic terrorists who run Gaza, or the rest of the Muslim world.

Apparently it worked.

Too bad the Islamicists forced Israel to go to such lengths. But they did. So here we are.

Violent Islamic terrorists required this, not giving Israel any other feasible choice for security. Too bad for the innocent Gazan victims.
Tom
Israel's other feasible choices are

1) a Two State solution with enough land and resources for each to ensure both Israel and the Palestinian State are viable, with mutually beneficial security arrangements and freedoms for citizens of both States,

Except that this has been tried and didn't work out.

When?

Be specific.

In what year was it tried, and under which government?

The Palestinians seem hellbent on Jewish destruction.

Bullshit.

"The Palestinians" include peace activists, people with Jewish grandmothers, babies, and people who wouldn't give you two knobs of goat shit to find out what version of god you believe in because they don't fucking care.

You are engaging in very racist thinking, attributing to all the character traits of some, in order to pass judgement on an entire ethnicity.

2) a One State solution where civilians are equally respected and protected, where suspected criminals are pursued and arrested, and where justice is served in equal measure regardless of race, sex, gender, religious creed, or any other factor bigoted assholes think should determine the outcome, and
Jews don’t like to explode. So this one is out. The Palestinians just need to be controlled. Its for the best, for both parties.

Until we figure out how to talk the Palestinians in stopping with wanting to kill all Jews.

No one likes to explode. No one like it when their kids are killed in their own front yards, or walking to school, or playing soccer with their friends. No one likes it when assholes shoot at them, or firebomb their houses, or bulldoze their homes and property, or force them out of their communities to make way for other assholes and people willing to look the other way when injustices and atrocities are committed.

As to your assertion that the Palestinians want to kill all Jews, what evidence do you have to support it? Is it just the figments of your own imagination or do you have something that justifies this utterly racist claim?


3) something other than more ethnic cleansing and wanton killing of tens of thousands of non-Jews in an enclave where half of the people living there are children, the details of which to be worked out between representatives of Israel and Palestine, and put to a vote by the Israeli and Palestinian people.

The only side who wants ethnic cleansing is the Palestinian side. So if we leave Israel in charge it'll all work out

Enjoy your bliss.
 
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The only side who wants ethnic cleansing is the Palestinian side.
Yeah, that's bollocks. We are witnessing ethnic cleansing by a non-Palestinian side, right now.

There's plenty of earlier history of elements in the Israeli state calling for ethnic cleansing too.

No "side" has a monopoly on genocidal nutters. Indeed, it is doubtful that any sizable polity in human history has not included a vocal subset in favour of what is today called "ethnic cleansing".
 
I left enough of your response to show the literal great lengths you go to avoid actually addressing a question the second time. I apologize for upsetting you.

I see no point in engaging further.
And once again you delete the relevant quote so it's not obvious that you're just running in circles to avoid reality.
No, I didn't. But you did. So your response is epically ironic.
Of course you did. Not sure whether LP was referring to "Dead is dead. Intent means nothing to the dead.", or to "If the IDF literally killed every single Gazan civilian in their attempts to eliminate Hamas, according to your reasoning, that extirpation of Gazans is ok because it was "unintentional".", or to "Do you realize that the justification of lack of targeting applies to situation of the the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas? A simple yes or no is sufficient.", but they're all relevant, and you deleted them all.
 
Have you stopped beating your wife yet? A simple yes or no is sufficient.

Like the wife-beating question, your question assumes facts not in evidence: you are taking for granted that I was offering a justification for killing civilians. I was not, and I already corrected you on that point -- see above about your repeating yourself and refusing to think about opposing arguments. I was explaining the reason for the outcry, because that's what you'd asked for. If you wanted to debate justifications for killing civilians, you could have asked for one of those instead.

"Lack of targeting" is not a justification for killing; it's one element of such a justification. A whole complete justification will necessarily have several elements. "The complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas" would clearly satisfy the "lack of targeting" element, but it would just as clearly fail to satisfy one or more of the other elements. This is not rocket science.

We are talking about this because Israel has extirpated 1% of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating 20% of Hamas. In the pursuit of whatever it is you're trying to prove about that, you tried (clumsily) to apply my arguments to the counterfactual situation where it's 100% instead of 1%. Well, sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander, so let's turn your hypothetical around. Let's suppose it was 1 person instead of 1%. Are you of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable -- that Israel would not be justified even in blowing up a building containing 20% of the Hamas terrorists who perpetrated the 10/7 massacre if those terrorists were trying to protect themselves from attack by holding one innocent Gazan human shield in the building?
I left enough of your response to show the literal great lengths you go to avoid actually addressing a question the second time. I apologize for upsetting you.
Of course I addressed it. Explaining why it's a "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" question counts as addressing it, and if you thought my explanation was wrong you were free to explain why and you chose not to. But fine, we can do it your way and see where that takes us...

Do you realize that the justification of lack of targeting applies to situation of the the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas?
No.

Likewise, I do not realize that Santa Claus giving Yasser Arafat coal in his Christmas stocking applies to the situation of the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Israel in the pursuit of eliminating Zionism. I do not "realize" any not-even-wrong failed attempt at constructing a meaningful proposition. "Realizing" is not something one can do to nonsense. Just like "Santa Claus giving Yasser Arafat coal in his Christmas stocking", "the justification of lack of targeting" is not a thing. Those are both noun phrases that do not refer to any phenomenon in the real world. They are fictional constructs.

I see no point in engaging further.
Wise choice. Submitting to being cross-examined on your views was never going to end well for you. Since you are refusing to answer my question, I'll answer it for you. Here's how the discussion would have gone if you hadn't ducked the question.

Option A:
Yes, you are of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing, and whenever the evil take hostages who can't be rescued by force it is always the duty of good men to do nothing.​

Option B:
No, you are not of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable. Israel would be justified in blowing up a building containing 20% of the Hamas terrorists who perpetrated the 10/7 massacre, even if those terrorists were trying to protect themselves from attack by holding one innocent Gazan human shield in the building.

Follow-up question, from me to you: Would Israel be justified in tracking down the five-year-old son of the man who ordered the 10/7 attack, capturing him, tying the boy to a chair in the center of a stadium, and blowing him up, as a deterrent to all Hamas leaders who might ever again order the murder of Israeli noncombatants?

Follow-up answer, from you to me: No. That would not be justified.

Follow-up to follow-up, from me to you. So it turns out you know damn well that intent matters. What a surprise. So give your "Dead is dead. Intent means nothing to the dead." sophistry a rest.
 
Of course you did. Not sure whether LP was referring to "Dead is dead. Intent means nothing to the dead.", or to "If the IDF literally killed every single Gazan civilian in their attempts to eliminate Hamas, according to your reasoning, that extirpation of Gazans is ok because it was "unintentional".", or to "Do you realize that the justification of lack of targeting applies to situation of the the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas? A simple yes or no is sufficient.", but they're all relevant, and you deleted them all.
We disagree about the relevancy. It is interesting that the reason you are not sure what LP was referring to is due to his engaging in the very thing to which he accused me.
Have you stopped beating your wife yet? A simple yes or no is sufficient.

Like the wife-beating question, your question assumes facts not in evidence: you are taking for granted that I was offering a justification for killing civilians. I was not, and I already corrected you on that point -- see above about your repeating yourself and refusing to think about opposing arguments. I was explaining the reason for the outcry, because that's what you'd asked for. If you wanted to debate justifications for killing civilians, you could have asked for one of those instead.

"Lack of targeting" is not a justification for killing; it's one element of such a justification. A whole complete justification will necessarily have several elements. "The complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas" would clearly satisfy the "lack of targeting" element, but it would just as clearly fail to satisfy one or more of the other elements. This is not rocket science.

We are talking about this because Israel has extirpated 1% of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating 20% of Hamas. In the pursuit of whatever it is you're trying to prove about that, you tried (clumsily) to apply my arguments to the counterfactual situation where it's 100% instead of 1%. Well, sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander, so let's turn your hypothetical around. Let's suppose it was 1 person instead of 1%. Are you of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable -- that Israel would not be justified even in blowing up a building containing 20% of the Hamas terrorists who perpetrated the 10/7 massacre if those terrorists were trying to protect themselves from attack by holding one innocent Gazan human shield in the building?
I left enough of your response to show the literal great lengths you go to avoid actually addressing a question the second time. I apologize for upsetting you.
Of course I addressed it. Explaining why it's a "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" question counts as addressing it, and if you thought my explanation was wrong you were free to explain why and you chose not to. But fine, we can do it your way and see where that takes us...

Do you realize that the justification of lack of targeting applies to situation of the the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Gaza in the pursuit of eliminating Hamas?
No.

Likewise, I do not realize that Santa Claus giving Yasser Arafat coal in his Christmas stocking applies to the situation of the complete extirpation of the civilian population of Israel in the pursuit of eliminating Zionism. I do not "realize" any not-even-wrong failed attempt at constructing a meaningful proposition. "Realizing" is not something one can do to nonsense. Just like "Santa Claus giving Yasser Arafat coal in his Christmas stocking", "the justification of lack of targeting" is not a thing. Those are both noun phrases that do not refer to any phenomenon in the real world. They are fictional constructs.

I see no point in engaging further.
Wise choice. Submitting to being cross-examined on your views was never going to end well for you. Since you are refusing to answer my question, I'll answer it for you. Here's how the discussion would have gone if you hadn't ducked the question.

Option A:
Yes, you are of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing, and whenever the evil take hostages who can't be rescued by force it is always the duty of good men to do nothing.​

Option B:
No, you are not of the opinion that no level of lethal collateral damage is ever acceptable. Israel would be justified in blowing up a building containing 20% of the Hamas terrorists who perpetrated the 10/7 massacre, even if those terrorists were trying to protect themselves from attack by holding one innocent Gazan human shield in the building.

Follow-up question, from me to you: Would Israel be justified in tracking down the five-year-old son of the man who ordered the 10/7 attack, capturing him, tying the boy to a chair in a stadium, and blowing him up, as a deterrent to all Hamas leaders who might ever again order the murder of Israeli noncombatants?

Follow-up answer, from you to me: No. That would not be justified.

Follow-up to follow-up, from me to you. So it turns out you know damn well that intent matters. What a surprise. So give your "Dead is dead. Intent means nothing to the dead." sophistry a rest.
I succesively fought the urge to delete that word salad in order to avoid triggering another butt hurt response. I do appreciate the effort and imagination that went into those straw men - I hope the exercise was therapeutic. Otherwise, I think you are wasting your time and any that if any reader who attempts to stumble through it. Those pseudo options are silly straw men, unworthy of your time and effort if you are trying to construct a reasoned argument.

It is wrong to kill 5 years intentionally or not. So your conclusion from your imputed answer does not follow.

Of course I know intent matters. I also know actions matter.

But you do make a point. We cannot possibly know if intent doesn’t matter to the dead. Intent does matter to the living. And it is quite possible that the excuse “we weren’t aiming at your civilian family and friends that we killed because we are following a policy” is accepted by those who grieve, Because as we all can see, turning the other cheek is the option of choice in that region.
 
Your stupid straw man is not a rebuttal.
Your response is based on the excluded middle fallacy: Israel’s only two policy choices are massive death and destruction in pursuit of eradicating Hamas or sit back, do nothing and get slaughtered.
Before you claim excluded middle you need to show there is a middle that's being excluded.

And so far nobody has shown such a middle. I posted an article not too long ago talking about Israel's options--and nobody responded.
Loren Pechtel said:
Because you've never provided any viable alternative, nor has anyone else who knows what they're talking about.
Repetition a falsehood does make it true. It makes you look like Trump.
That is an evasion, not a rebuttal.
You're the one that's acting Republican--blaming me for your failure to have a plan.
Moreover, your response is based on an
false dichotomy: invade and destroy Gaza or do nothing and Jews will be slaughtered.
Repeating this doesn't make it true.

Hamas has explicitly said they intend to repeat 10/7 until Israel is destroyed.
 
What makes you think at this point in time the Jews would be "slaughtered"? Gaza is basically destroyed. The tunnel system is pretty much destroyed. I cannot see Hamas have any sort of large weapons caches left. I cannot see Hamas mounting another offensive attack anytime in the near or even in the somewhat far future.
The more of Hamas Israel destroys the longer it will be before they can repeat 10/7.
 
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