What should Israel do?

[untermensche]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

 

[Togo]

It may help Sam Harris' argument to white wash an entire population this way and appeal to emotion, but it's not really partaking in honest discourse unless he can cite his numbers.

It's the same arguement that was used by the supporters of apartheid against the blacks in South Africa. Inherently violent as an ethnic group, therefore can't have peace with them, therefore oppression is a-ok.

It relies on being racist to start with, and then even then it doesn't work logically, as there is no connection between claiming someone is evil and somehow making it right to oppress them.

 

[Samhain]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

And let's just be clear that Israeli civilians aren't generally the victims of resistance from Palestinians anymore with Iron Dome tech. The only civilians suffering in this conflict are the Palestinians who are being attacked with airstrikes in a city with one of the highest population densities in the world. The Israeli apologists wave their hand at this by pointing out that Hamas launches rockets from populous areas, but this is merely a smokescreen. In a city with a population density of Gaza it becomes nearly impossible to resist from areas without civilian populations nearby.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

What we are seeing now is still the attempts to stop them from throwing off their oppressors. Thus by your own logic the rules should apply to the Palestinians, not the Israelis.

- - - Updated - - -

It may help Sam Harris' argument to white wash an entire population this way and appeal to emotion, but it's not really partaking in honest discourse unless he can cite his numbers.

It's the same arguement that was used by the supporters of apartheid against the blacks in South Africa. Inherently violent as an ethnic group, therefore can't have peace with them, therefore oppression is a-ok.

It relies on being racist to start with, and then even then it doesn't work logically, as there is no connection between claiming someone is evil and somehow making it right to oppress them.

It's not an ethnic group that's the problem.

It's a religious group: Fundamentalist Islam.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

And let's just be clear that Israeli civilians aren't generally the victims of resistance from Palestinians anymore with Iron Dome tech. The only civilians suffering in this conflict are the Palestinians who are being attacked with airstrikes in a city with one of the highest population densities in the world. The Israeli apologists wave their hand at this by pointing out that Hamas launches rockets from populous areas, but this is merely a smokescreen. In a city with a population density of Gaza it becomes nearly impossible to resist from areas without civilian populations nearby.

Iron Dome isn't 100%:

1) The system can't engage sufficiently short ranged stuff. It's a vertical launch system and such systems inherently have minimum engagement times. This is only a problem for the places near Gaza. (Note: They're pretty much evacuated during the wars.)

2) No rocket is perfect. There will be leakers. People still have to get to shelter, it's just the risk to those who don't is less.

3) The system can be saturated. A while back I posted a video of an engagement with 15 rockets. The launcher holds 15 missiles--in other words they shot their ready load. Were there really only 15 inbounds? Or did they just engage the 15 most threatening inbounds.

4) They do not expend rockets on low threat inbounds. Low threat does not mean zero threat.

 

[untermensche]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

What we are seeing now is still the attempts to stop them from throwing off their oppressors. Thus by your own logic the rules should apply to the Palestinians, not the Israelis.

This is what it takes to defend the actions of Israel. One must turn reality on it's head.

And make the laughable claim that it is the Palestinians oppressing poor defenseless Israel.

It's a simply formulation. You oppress you put your own civilians at risk. Oppression comes with costs to the oppressor. To not recognize that is to have a fractured sense of justice.

 

[Samhain]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

And let's just be clear that Israeli civilians aren't generally the victims of resistance from Palestinians anymore with Iron Dome tech. The only civilians suffering in this conflict are the Palestinians who are being attacked with airstrikes in a city with one of the highest population densities in the world. The Israeli apologists wave their hand at this by pointing out that Hamas launches rockets from populous areas, but this is merely a smokescreen. In a city with a population density of Gaza it becomes nearly impossible to resist from areas without civilian populations nearby.

Iron Dome isn't 100%:

1) The system can't engage sufficiently short ranged stuff. It's a vertical launch system and such systems inherently have minimum engagement times. This is only a problem for the places near Gaza. (Note: They're pretty much evacuated during the wars.)

2) No rocket is perfect. There will be leakers. People still have to get to shelter, it's just the risk to those who don't is less.

3) The system can be saturated. A while back I posted a video of an engagement with 15 rockets. The launcher holds 15 missiles--in other words they shot their ready load. Were there really only 15 inbounds? Or did they just engage the 15 most threatening inbounds.

4) They do not expend rockets on low threat inbounds. Low threat does not mean zero threat.

Again, this narrative ignores the facts on the ground. Iron Dome has been extremely effective, but what hasn't has been the Israeli "warnings" to Palestimian civilians. As has been noted in the other thread, Israel has launched attacks against UN sanctuaries housing children and has received relatively little condemnation over that. That seems to suggest to me that the war of propaganda is clearly on the side of Israel, especially considering their casualty rate is still in the double digits with nearly no civilian casualties while the Palestinian civilians are killed with attacks nearly every day.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

What we are seeing now is still the attempts to stop them from throwing off their oppressors. Thus by your own logic the rules should apply to the Palestinians, not the Israelis.

Are you saying that Jews are oppressed in Israel? How so? By Who?

 

[arkirk]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

I never understood why hundreds of children could be regarded merely as "collateral damage" while three Israeli civilians could be regarded as justification for massive attacks on Arab civilians. The proportionality of this thing is insane.

 

[Togo]

It may help Sam Harris' argument to white wash an entire population this way and appeal to emotion, but it's not really partaking in honest discourse unless he can cite his numbers.

It's the same arguement that was used by the supporters of apartheid against the blacks in South Africa. Inherently violent as an ethnic group, therefore can't have peace with them, therefore oppression is a-ok.

It relies on being racist to start with, and then even then it doesn't work logically, as there is no connection between claiming someone is evil and somehow making it right to oppress them.

It's not an ethnic group that's the problem.

It's a religious group: Fundamentalist Islam.

Doesn't change the basic flaw in the logic. Racism against blacks isn't a problem because some blacks are nice people, it's a problem because it's illogical and ignorant. Changing the target doesn't fix the logic.

 

[Jayjay]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

And let's just be clear that Israeli civilians aren't generally the victims of resistance from Palestinians anymore with Iron Dome tech. The only civilians suffering in this conflict are the Palestinians who are being attacked with airstrikes in a city with one of the highest population densities in the world. The Israeli apologists wave their hand at this by pointing out that Hamas launches rockets from populous areas, but this is merely a smokescreen. In a city with a population density of Gaza it becomes nearly impossible to resist from areas without civilian populations nearby.

Iron Dome isn't 100%:

1) The system can't engage sufficiently short ranged stuff. It's a vertical launch system and such systems inherently have minimum engagement times. This is only a problem for the places near Gaza. (Note: They're pretty much evacuated during the wars.)

2) No rocket is perfect. There will be leakers. People still have to get to shelter, it's just the risk to those who don't is less.

3) The system can be saturated. A while back I posted a video of an engagement with 15 rockets. The launcher holds 15 missiles--in other words they shot their ready load. Were there really only 15 inbounds? Or did they just engage the 15 most threatening inbounds.

4) They do not expend rockets on low threat inbounds. Low threat does not mean zero threat.

Also, Iron Dome is not a free lunch. Each interceptor costs about the price of a new car. Sure if you had a choice of having a rocket hit your house and kill your family, and a rocket merely destroy the car you parked on the driveway, you'd pick the latter but it doesn't mean it's better than not getting hit at all.

 

[Jayjay]

I never understood why hundreds of children could be regarded merely as "collateral damage" while three Israeli civilians could be regarded as justification for massive attacks on Arab civilians. The proportionality of this thing is insane.

Because the three Israeli civilians were thought to be kidnapped, and the massive operation was justified as part of the investigation. Had Hamas just shot them and left their bodies where they could easily be found, then you'd have a point.

Which is why the kidnapping tactics used by Hamas are not legitimate resistance. Right target, wrong methods.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Again, this narrative ignores the facts on the ground. Iron Dome has been extremely effective, but what hasn't has been the Israeli "warnings" to Palestimian civilians. As has been noted in the other thread, Israel has launched attacks against UN sanctuaries housing children and has received relatively little condemnation over that. That seems to suggest to me that the war of propaganda is clearly on the side of Israel, especially considering their casualty rate is still in the double digits with nearly no civilian casualties while the Palestinian civilians are killed with attacks nearly every day.

The Israeli warnings don't work very well when Hamas makes them stay put, or even brings them to ground zero.

And the lack of condemnation is because the reporters recognize that Israel was shooting at legitimate targets. The reporters on the scene have to report what Hamas wants, the ones outside don't toe the party line although they still slant things in the Palestinian direction.

- - - Updated - - -

What we are seeing now is still the attempts to stop them from throwing off their oppressors. Thus by your own logic the rules should apply to the Palestinians, not the Israelis.

Are you saying that Jews are oppressed in Israel? How so? By Who?

No. I'm saying that the continual attacks on Israel are part of the pre-48 oppression.

It's an ongoing conflict, I'm simply using his standards against him.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

I never understood why hundreds of children could be regarded merely as "collateral damage" while three Israeli civilians could be regarded as justification for massive attacks on Arab civilians. The proportionality of this thing is insane.

Your problem is that you don't understand intent.

The murder of the teens was a deliberate attack on civilians. Despite what you think that's murder, period.

Collateral damage is part of war. It is accepted that war will cause collateral damage. Israel is second to none at avoiding collateral damage but Hamas is good enough at causing it that we still see a roughly equal ratio of combatants to civilians. (That is if you count voluntary human shields as civilians. I do not.)

- - - Updated - - -

It may help Sam Harris' argument to white wash an entire population this way and appeal to emotion, but it's not really partaking in honest discourse unless he can cite his numbers.

It's the same arguement that was used by the supporters of apartheid against the blacks in South Africa. Inherently violent as an ethnic group, therefore can't have peace with them, therefore oppression is a-ok.

It relies on being racist to start with, and then even then it doesn't work logically, as there is no connection between claiming someone is evil and somehow making it right to oppress them.

It's not an ethnic group that's the problem.

It's a religious group: Fundamentalist Islam.

Doesn't change the basic flaw in the logic. Racism against blacks isn't a problem because some blacks are nice people, it's a problem because it's illogical and ignorant. Changing the target doesn't fix the logic.

I'm going on their self-chosen behavior, not what they look like.

Would it be racist to be opposed to muggers?

 

[untermensche]

I never understood why hundreds of children could be regarded merely as "collateral damage" while three Israeli civilians could be regarded as justification for massive attacks on Arab civilians. The proportionality of this thing is insane.

Because the three Israeli civilians were thought to be kidnapped, and the massive operation was justified as part of the investigation. Had Hamas just shot them and left their bodies where they could easily be found, then you'd have a point.

Which is why the kidnapping tactics used by Hamas are not legitimate resistance. Right target, wrong methods.

Bullshit. Israel knew they were dead and was pretty sure Hamas was not involved.

They deliberately hid these facts to launch an unjustified raid and carry out unjustified arrests without charges.

 

[Jayjay]

The pot calling the kettle black..... What else can I say. Realty eludes you...

Your strange brand of reality does.

Your brand says that if I am being brutally oppressed I must respect the rights of my oppressor.

Ok--the Jews were brutally oppressed in the time before 1948. I guess they don't need to respect Palestinian lives.

They had every right to throw off oppression. Just as the Palestinians have that right today.

What you don't seem to comprehend is that Israel has no right to oppress. It gives up rights when it oppresses. And one of those rights is the right to not have its civilians harmed by resistance.

I never understood why hundreds of children could be regarded merely as "collateral damage" while three Israeli civilians could be regarded as justification for massive attacks on Arab civilians. The proportionality of this thing is insane.

Your problem is that you don't understand intent.

The murder of the teens was a deliberate attack on civilians. Despite what you think that's murder, period.

That's where you are wrong. The teenagers were human shields. They were hitchiking on occupied territory to attend a religious school set up on stolen land. One of them lived on a settlement. They were just as justified targets as, say, civilians who Hamas orders to go to rooftops. Only thing that makes it a bad idea is the intent to kidnap and use them as hostages, instead of just killing them, because a kidnapping is basically an invitation for IDF to turn West Bank upside down searching for the victims.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Because the three Israeli civilians were thought to be kidnapped, and the massive operation was justified as part of the investigation. Had Hamas just shot them and left their bodies where they could easily be found, then you'd have a point.

Which is why the kidnapping tactics used by Hamas are not legitimate resistance. Right target, wrong methods.

Bullshit. Israel knew they were dead and was pretty sure Hamas was not involved.

They deliberately hid these facts to launch an unjustified raid and carry out unjustified arrests without charges.

1) Hamas *WAS* involved.

2) Of course there was a major reaction to such a kidnapping. What would be surprising is if there wasn't.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

That's where you are wrong. The teenagers were human shields. They were hitchiking on occupied territory to attend a religious school set up on stolen land. One of them lived on a settlement. They were just as justified targets as, say, civilians who Hamas orders to go to rooftops. Only thing that makes it a bad idea is the intent to kidnap and use them as hostages, instead of just killing them, because a kidnapping is basically an invitation for IDF to turn West Bank upside down searching for the victims.

You're usually more intelligent than this.

They were not in any way interfering with Hamas operations, they were not valid targets.

You are wrong about it being an invitation to turn the West Bank upside-down, though--Israel knew it was Hamas, not Fatah. I do agree it was an invitation for trouble, though. I strongly suspect this was deliberate--Hamas likes to find some pretext to blame Israel with.

 

[untermensche]

Bullshit. Israel knew they were dead and was pretty sure Hamas was not involved.

They deliberately hid these facts to launch an unjustified raid and carry out unjustified arrests without charges.

1) Hamas *WAS* involved.

2) Of course there was a major reaction to such a kidnapping. What would be surprising is if there wasn't.

No Hamas was not involved.

And the reaction was a ruse to go into Gaza and fuck with people.

 

[Jayjay]

That's where you are wrong. The teenagers were human shields. They were hitchiking on occupied territory to attend a religious school set up on stolen land. One of them lived on a settlement. They were just as justified targets as, say, civilians who Hamas orders to go to rooftops. Only thing that makes it a bad idea is the intent to kidnap and use them as hostages, instead of just killing them, because a kidnapping is basically an invitation for IDF to turn West Bank upside down searching for the victims.

You're usually more intelligent than this.

They were not in any way interfering with Hamas operations, they were not valid targets.

Who said they were interfering with Hamas operations? They are part of an Israeli operation of creeping land theft, and unwittingly being used to commit and justify war crimes. If Hamas sent children to Israeli side of the border to capture Jewish land and drive Jews to the sea, you would be the first one to say that they are valid targets.