> Palestinian society is deeply propagandized and radicalized

What definition are you using that trips for Palestinians but not Israelis (or practically any other group in the Middle East outside e.g. cosmopolitan Gulf cities)?

A standard might be: uses suicide bombers.

An even more radical form would be: uses child suicide bombers.

Suicide bombers don't make it terrorism.

Were the Japanese Kamikaze pilots terrorists? No--their targets were clearly military in nature. Likewise, was the US pilot that kamikaed a terrorist? No. (His plane had no hope of making it back to the carrier, he could have bailed out but the only possible rescue would be from the very fleet he was attacking. No path with a meaningful chance of survival, as soldiers in hopeless situations often do he chose to take as many enemies with him as he could.)

Terrorism is about the target, not the means.

The point was regarding how to ascertain a population had been deeply propagandized and radicalized and tell them apart from others. Terrorism is, as you point out, not necessarily relevant to that.

The example of kamikaze pilots also works like suicide bombers to distinguish different groups on those terms.

All in all, what you’ve written has the sense of a rebuttal but is acting as support for my point.

All in all, Israel is doing most of the killing here. They have access to more sophisticated weapon, but it's no less barbaric.

Using one's own children to suicide bomb is no less barbaric than firing a missile? That's not even true in a mathematical sense, let alone a moral one.

Some facts about that number:

1) It's the total death toll from all causes, including natural causes.

2) The majority of those "journalists and media workers" were Hamas propaganda people.

3) UNRWA had a higher proportion of it's people identified as terrorists than the population at large.

4) It's what Hamas claimed, without any means of verification. Israel showed about 4k were unquestionably false. Hamas also claimed 10,000 buried in the rubble--which never changed. Then when they started digging after the war only some hundreds were found--and Israel caught them planting bodies to be found.

And, fundamentally, the death toll proves nothing. Blame war on the side that chooses to fight, not on the side that is successful at fighting. Typically they are one in the same as most countries will not launch a war they don't expect to win. But when a little guy goes and tries to beat up a big guy and gets pounded it's still the guy who started it that's in the wrong.

1) It's not. In fact, most scholars agree these numbers are way lower than the real one, as those are only the confirmed deaths.

2) Source? The only places where I can read about it are in far right Israeli or American communications.

3) Source? It seems like Israel was interested in labelling UNRWA as a terrorist organization at some point, but there is no evidence to back up their claim. After all, the IDF is known to shoot at journalists and humanitarian aid workers in their strategy to starve Gaza, so it makes sense they would try to discredit the org.

4) I can't find what you're talking about.

I think it would be more honest if you simply stated that you are fine with the ethnic cleansing in Gaza, rather that argue about who started what while ignoring the century that Israel's settler-colonial project has existed. This isn't country vs country, this is well-funded colonizer vs colonyzee. More akin to the American expansion over natives territory. Did native American attacks back then justify the US in killing them all? Of course not. Same thing here.

Hamas's existence is at least explainable (if not excusable) in the light of a Palestinian population that feared for its lives, and was vindicated in the last few years in thinking that Israel was out to kill them all. Because it is.

1) What scholars? Because everything I see is garbage. Prime example--they compared two different lists of the dead in Gaza. A capture/recapture model to estimate what percent was actually captured. But capture/recapture inherently requires your captures to be independent and the second list was specifically an attempt to catch those missed by the first. Thus the two lists were not remotely independent.

2) Unfortunately, most sources are not willing to report things Hamas does not want reported--reporting things Hamas doesn't like would interfere with their ability to report anything. Thus you're stuck with mostly Israeli sources. But Israel has published lists. And, notably, nobody comes along and shows any problems with the Israeli reporting. It's always dismissed without evidence--and that is pretty strong indication that it's true. In discerning the truth between competing sides look at how each side responds to the claims of the other.

3) Once again, Israel has published lists. And note that you are presuming your conclusion in your argument. You can't claim Israel shoots innocents because Israel shoots innocents. And you also are presenting without evidence the claim that Israel was trying to starve Gaza.

I will not deny that Israel shoots "journalists"--because the propaganda people pretend they are journalists. And, likewise, "humanitarian" aid workers--the aid system was basically controlled by Hamas and used to maintain control over the population. It's the unfortunate reality of almost all "aid" operations--the aid is controlled by the very people who cause the situation and is used to maintain control. Gaza is normal, not an outlier.

4) Israel put out some stuff showing "dead" that weren't. Things like a group of "dead" where the identity numbers were sequential, the names were different, the rest of the details were the same. Really, now, a bunch of people with sequential ID numbers die together???? Especially when sequential ID numbers aren't possible with their system. (The ID numbers have a check digit.)

I am decidedly not fine with ethnic cleansing in Gaza, I just do not think it's going on. Hamas engineered an atrocity to make you think Israel is evil.

> it would be more honest if you simply stated that you are fine with the ethnic cleansing in Gaza

You guys have been arguing in good faith and interestingly. You undermine your credibility with insults.

Please, be calm and respectful.

Firstly, I haven’t mentioned terrorism, nor Palestine or Israel in particular (though that was obviously mentioned by others). What I have given is a way - I maintain - that will separate any groups based on how far or deeply they have been propagandised. Using suicide attacks is clearly one way to do that.

It can be used with and without numbers, so referring to the volume of death or the means is not entirely relevant. Firstly, because if we accept that the suicide attacker has been deeply propagandised and radicalised, then there is an argument that they are innocent (at least in the sense that they are also a victim) which only increases they younger they are.

Secondly, it is possible to fire a missile at a group containing only people it would be straightforward to justify using force against (e.g. military targets). That is difficult with suicide attackers given the point about innocence made above, and also given the targets for attacks that suicide bombers often choose or have chosen for them (which is why they are associated with terrorism, to the point that you actually misread my comment to such an extent that you replied with a clumsy straw man).

So, take your time when responding in such situations, it will benefit your response and everyone involved.

More Germans died in WW2 than Brits. Guess the Allies were the bad guys.

Are you fine with the mass killings of civilian populations in Gaza, yes or no?

War is ugly, I'm not trying to make the Palestinians into saints, but the other guy is advocating the insane position that Israel can do no wrong, and that them using excessive force is completely justified.

I feel like I'm losing my mind, why is it so hard to say "killing tens of thousands of civilians is barbaric"??

> why is it so hard to say "killing tens of thousands of civilians is barbaric"??

Because it’s not true unless we’re just saying war is barbaric. Which I agree with. But it’s not useful when trying to delineate justified versus excessive force.

I agree Israel is using excessive force in Gaza. I also think Hamas is a terrorist organisation that seems committed to continuing to do terrorism. I genuinely haven’t figured out how to balance thsr equation, though I think discussing it without calling someone engaging in good faith a monster/genocider/anti-Semite is a good start.

At some point, you have to call out a genocide for what it is. Many are still quick to rationalize it away, or relay Israeli propaganda about the many killed journalists being Hamas terrorists, or humanitarian aid workers also being Hamas terrorists, or the UN orgs also being Hamas terrorists, etc. You get the gist.

This doesn't excuse any crime that Hamas has committed, but anyone still not calling for Israel to move out of Gaza, in light of the many exactions committed by the IDF, is not engaging in good faith, in my book.

The continued killings of civilian populations in Gaza is vindicating the Palestinians in their belief that Israel is legitimately out to kill them all. Because they are. This in turn will create a new generation of "terrorists" who see violence as the only escape. This is also how Hamas was created.

Israel is interested in cleansing the Gaza strip. Whatever the solution to this cycle of violence is (two states, one state...) it first involves stopping Israel immediately and getting the IDF out of Gaza. There is no equation to balance here.

> At some point, you have to call out a genocide for what it is

Maybe. I’ll admit, on this first day of 2026 I am thoroughly confused as to the boundary between hybrid/guerilla warfare and genocide.

More pointedly, the debate becomes alienating when we’re calling each other genociders and anti-Semites.

> This in turn will create a new generation of "terrorists" who see violence as the only escape. This is also how Hamas was created

This is not a great argument for peace in Palestine. One, lots of oppressed populations don’t resort to terrorism. Two, it suggests an independent Palestine would continue to be a security threat to Israel.

> Israel is interested in cleansing the Gaza strip

Let’s be blunter since “cleansing” has similarly been semantically obliterated. Members of Israel’s leadership have expressed views that sound like they want to exterminate Palestinians. Others want to move them to away places, which is bad, but categorically different from the first. Plenty of others, however, just don’t want their kids kidnapped at raves or are angry and polarised in the face of violence.

We can do the same for Hamas. Exterminating Israelis and Jews is an explicit aim of Hamas. I don’t think that means everyone in Gaza who supports Hamas is bent on genocide. I do think that makes them—like Israelis pushing to keep bombing Gaza—relatively unsympathetic. (Them and them specifically. Not their whole group.)

> it first involves stopping Israel immediately and getting the IDF out of Gaza. There is no equation to balance here

Israel has a security imperative. If getting out of Gaza means Hamas reärms over a population that supports another October 7th attack, withdrawal is not in their interest. (If you aren’t using violence, which to be clear, means people continent away deciding—again—how borders in the Middle East should be drawn because they know better than the folks on the ground, you need a solution that’s in both parties’ interests. I don’t think Likud and Hamas are interested in negotiating. I do think Gazans and Israelis are.)

It's normally easy to tell apart war and terrorism.

Look at the person who selects the target. What do they believe is at that point? Civilian--it's terrorism. Military/government, it's war or insurgency. Look at the pattern--taking out a guard post to get to the civilians behind does not make it legitimate.

Note that you need to look at the person who selects the target--a soldier in the field often knows little of what they're shooting at. And what do they *believe* is there? When we hit that Chinese embassy it was an intel failure, not terrorism--the bomb was dropped on what used to be in the building. Being wrong doesn't make it terrorism. Missing doesn't make it terrorism.

But when Iran drops a missile on an Israeli hospital and claims they were shooting at a "nearby" (no, there was nothing military within many CEPs of the impact point) military facility it's either terrorism, or since they are state actors, a Geneva violation. Especially as they did not apologize, nor even admit the hospital was hit.

> Look at the person who selects the target. What do they believe is at that point?

We rarely have access to or even knowledge of who this person is, let alone their mens rea.

Any metric based solely on intent is (a) impossible to objectively adjudicate and (b) corrupted by the crazy, who will legitimately believe in fantasies if it serves their ends.

I don’t think you’re wrong. Just that this metric is inadequate. (For what it’s worth, I don’t have a good alternative. My takeaways from the last couple years is that the civilian-military boundary has been irretrievably blurred by hybrid war and non-state actors; the term genocide irreversibly blurred by activists; and the term warm crime rendered irrelevant by the world’s great and regions powers—without exception— explicitly rejecting it as a constraint on themselves. All of this means that the vocabulary we once relied on to make sense of the moral aspect of geopolitics no longer works, which makes discussion a bit confusing.

While we don't have access to their minds we do generally have access to what they say. They think they are shooting at bad guys, the claim is innocents hit without military advantage--if they considered the target valid they'll generally either say what they were aiming at or that the ones hit aren't actually innocents. The Chinese embassy case illustrates what I'm talking about--we admitted we made a mistake and indicated what the intended target was. Nobody challenged the validity of the intended target. Or, multiple times, Israel hits some high profile "innocent", in response to the criticism they release pictures that show the person wasn't an innocent.

Israeli society is no less radicalised, so this is irrelevant. What's relevant is that Israel illegally occupied Palestinian territories under international law and instituted a regime of apartheid on those territories.

This applies to Israel as well.

You'd be amazed at the amount of radicalization Israeli society gets if you'd bother to look with unbiased eyes. Attacking aid trucks? Spitting at Christians, even tourists? Stealing houses of West Bank people? (Oh must be for that Lebensraum)

Maybe that's one goal you should add to your 2026 list...

It's a lunatic society.

Radicalization??

No. Yes, there were a few attacks on aid trucks. People who saw aid going to those who were holding Israeli hostages. You realize Israel was under no legal obligation to permit the aid? Don't chant "Geneva", it only requires allowing aid to non-combatants. When there is even a reasonable threat of diversion to military purpose the obligation goes away--and there was not only a reasonable threat, but the vast majority was being diverted.

The only appreciable Geneva violation that Israel engaged in is not sending notice of suspected misuse of civilian things--but this is of no actual importance as the rule exists to avoid mistakes. It wasn't written with a situation where civilian cover was used to the greatest extent possible. For them to have simply said "everything is being misused" would have been a pretty good approximation of the truth.

Thanks for citing the laws that legally clears the starvation of civilian children and elderly, amongst others! Since it's legal, that means it's also morally ethical? Right?

Ok, case closed, let them rot to death! Next problem?

How about next we argue why it was perfectly acceptable to crash 2 planes into 2 civilian buildings. Seems to be in the same ballpark!

How about recognizing who is actually causing the "starvation" (hint: it's never actually been demonstrated)? Israel lets aid in, Hamas seizes it and then points to the people who didn't get it.

Does the "modern world" mean watching their children get deliberately sniped time and time again (confirmed by many 3rd party sources)? Let alone their homes destroyed, land usurped, and then treated as non-humans. Yet again, comments like this shows how they are being dehumanized.