Good thing the lawyer brigade is helping Israel stay just just just barely below the technical definition of a genocide. Google can rest easy knowing til this date one apparent body of justice has blessed the actions as not technically genocide. Certainly the employees should continue to keep their heads down and keep calm because so far its not technically genocide. Judgements based on evidence dated til Dec. 2023, new evidence dating prior could revise genocidal status
- The above is a satire. But come on what are we arguing about?
We are arguing about the meaning of words, especially words thrown around as libels to try and delegitimize justified self defense.
I'm sorry if the facts don't agree with your desires for something to be true. War is terrible and civilians die in all wars, especially those in urban areas where one party tunnels underneath civilian infrastructure to protect themselves while leaving civilians exposed to fire.
It is not libel to say that the ICJ's statement is a strong indication that a genocide is ongoing. What Joan Donoghue says is that, technically, there is no ruling on the "plausibility of genocide claims". Which is a technical legal claim separate from the sentiment in the ruling. Yes, the ICJ has not made a ruling on the plausibility because the legal process has not come far enough to make such a ruling.
This does not mean that the ruling does not indicate that the court thinks a genocide is occurring.
If you simply look at the definition of a genocide and the facts on the ground, you should quite easily come to the conclusion that this is a genocide and it should end -- and that Palestinians should have legal rights to live on their indigenous land and have human rights. This is not a radical position in my mind, this should be the status quo of a person with a normative moral compass.
"It is not libel to say that the ICJ's statement is a strong indication that a genocide is ongoing"
"This does not mean that the ruling does not indicate that the court thinks a genocide is occurring."
You've seen the video and are continuing to disagree with what the ICJ president herself has explicitly said. If you want to claim that Israel is committing genocide, you're free to do so, but don't continue to lie to yourself or others about what the ICJ has said now that you have been corrected.
"If you simply look at the definition of a genocide and the facts on the ground, you should quite easily come to the conclusion that this is a genocide..."
If you simply look at Israel government's military capabilities and the facts on the ground, should quite easily come to the conclusion that genocide is not the goal.
The Israel government's intention is clearly to kill enemy soldiers, even if it means killing civilians in the process. This is the same attitude that most countries have adopted in times of war.
The Allies did horrendously unethical things (like fire bombing millions of civilians) during WW2 but even that wasn't genocide.
Claiming that Israel's government is committing war crimes is a much more reasonable argument. It may not be true but it's not obviously false, the way the genocide claim is.
Ask yourself what Israel would do if every member of Hamas was willing to march out to a battlefield and meet them head-to-head in a large scale battle. Would Israel keep sending bombs at houses or would they target that battlefield?
Most people could be convinced that the right-wing Israel government is being unnecessarily brutal and hamfisted in their response to the Oct 7 attacks. If the goal was to convince more people to pressure Israel, that would be possible.
But the insistence upon specific word use ("genocide") is a transparent attempt at signalling in-group and out-group status. This has been a common pattern among political extremists for a long time. There's always some kind of rationalization about why its important but it's never the real reason.
Being divisive is the point.
Just like Trump's adherents signal their in-group status by pretending the 2020 Election was "stolen" so do the extreme left's adherents signal their in-group status by claiming Israel is committing a "genocide".
In both cases, the goal is not to actually convince people of something that is obviously false. The purpose is to have a loyalty test that can be used to differentiate friend and foe.
I'm not arguing about the current facts, facts change and I think employees shouldn't be timid when they are feeling uncomfortable about the fruits of their labor. Whether or not this is technically genocide is hilariously off-topic for the thread at large and serves to create a narrative that one's actions must be classified as genocide to reach the level of justified employee outcry. You obviously are free to quibble about what is or is not genocide and I'm free to ridicule it with satire.
You saw something like it in the 1980s over the conflict over apartheid in South Africa, and that’s without the level of acute violence as there is in the Israel/Palestine conflict. You saw it around the US’s own Iraq War, with no draft prospect. In short, no, this is very clearly wrong.
The difference between the Israel/Palestine conflict and most other conflicts that people bring up with “why aren’t protestors attacking this” (including the inverted side of the Israel/Palestine conflict: “why aren’t people protesting against Hamas?”) is the combination of widespread US disapproval for Israeli action in the conflict [0] with substantial ongoing US military assistance for the Israel. People aren’t protesting Israel, they are protesting US policy in support of Israel while Israel acts in ways that are opposed. This is in common with both the anti-apartheid movement in the US (where, again, US government support for South Africa was the target) and the Iraq War protests (where the US was a direct party to the conflict), though while substantial opposition to US policy was involved in both cases, neither (at least at the beginning of substantial protest) had nearly the level of domestic opposition as exists to Israel’s actions in Gaza.
the US provides a lot of support and weapons to Turkey, which has committed one genocide in the past against Armenians and has been repressing the Kurds for decades. the US also provides weapons and support to Pakistan, which is an actual religious apartheid state and is involved in a messy conflict with India. China puts muslims in camps and these protestors happily use phones built in that country. none of these activist groups care about any of the conflicts mentioned above, which calls into question their true motivations.
this group has many non-jewish members and is used a fig-leaf by notorious antisemites to agitate for the genocide of the only minority state in the Middle East. it's like saying Clarence Thomas can't promote anti-black racism since he's black himself.
repeating lies doesn't make them any more true. starting a war, then losing badly, is just that, losing a war. Or maybe you think the US committed genocide against Germany in the 1940s too?
No, the term is ethinic cleansing. In war there are rules regarding civilians, rules Israel ignoring. And no, (in)actions by the enemy do not give the otherside a justification to do whatever they want. Rules and laws still apply during war.
I tired so tryong to get that point across to people. And worried what that attitude might mean for the future.
Israel gave civilians weeks to leave areas of fighting and warns them ahead of time before attacking. This is not ethnic cleansing no matter how many times you repeat the phrase.
Presence of civilians does not render an area illegal to attack. Using civilian cover to initiate attacks is a war crime, not wearing uniforms is also a war crime - both things Hamas does. Using civilian buildings for military purposes makes attacking those areas legal and within the rules of war. You don't get to change the definition of words or invent laws of war when convenient to attack Israel.
Hamas is free to hand out uniforms to its soldiers to prevent civilians getting killed. They’re also free to build barracks instead of tunnels underneath schools to house their fighters. Until they do so civilians will continue to suffer.
Setting aside the fact that these are numbers provided by Hamas, the same people who claimed 500 people died in a hospital Israel bombed but when it was revealed their own rocket bombed it the casualty numbers dropped 10-fold, war isn’t arithmetic.
The United States killed many more Japanese civilians than American civilians who died during the war, that doesn’t make them right. Hamas has miles of tunnels to provide cover for their rapists but doesn’t allow civilians to shelter, it’s tragic that Hamas is killing its own people this way but Israel should continue until Hamas is defeated like Germany was.
For the record, it was debunked that it was a Hamas rocket as none of them had that potential yield and still do not. The ordinance for that explosion only had one provenance: the United States.
> Setting aside the fact that these are numbers provided by Hamas […]
This is an unserious argument.
1. The numbers come from Gaza’s Ministry of Health, which is indeed “controlled” by Hamas since Hamas is their governing entity.
2. The Ministry has no verifiable history of being wrong on the civilian casualty numbers. In fact, it’s quite the opposite: The Ministry’s numbers have held up to scrutiny in ALL of the previous wars (including scrutiny from Israel) [0].
3. The Biden Administration has corroborated the numbers.
4. Israel hasn’t denied the numbers. In fact, in one report from the IDF a couple months ago, they corroborated the Ministry’s numbers at the time.
5. The same silly argument could be made to dismiss just about anything coming from Israel given their documented history of lying and even manipulating our (American) media, from lies about beheaded babies [1] to pushing propaganda via U.S. media outlets like the New York Times [2].
> The United States killed many more Japanese civilians than American civilians who died during the war, that doesn’t make them right. […]
This is just a whataboutism and another unserious argument.
One evil act doesn’t justify another evil act. This is as serious of an argument as someone trying to justify slavery in 2024 by pointing to America’s history with slavery.
> The Ministry has no verifiable history of being wrong on the civilian casualty numbers
This is laughable. They claimed that Israel bombed a hospital and killed 500 people that the Palestinians themselves bombed. You are either hopelessly biased and unserious or uninformed.
I'm afraid you broke the site guidelines repeatedly and very badly in this thread. That's not ok. You're welcome to make your substantive points while respecting HN's rules, and indeed they will become more persuasive if you do so. But please, no more snark, name-calling, personal attacks, or flamewar posts—no matter how right you are or feel you are, and no matter how divisive the topic.
"However, the sound preceding the explosion, the fireball that accompanied it, the size of the resulting crater, the type of splatter adjoining it, and the type and pattern of fragmentation visible around the crater are all consistent with the impact of a rocket.
Evidence available to Human Rights Watch makes the possibility of a large air-dropped bomb, such as those Israel has used extensively in Gaza, highly unlikely."
Even Human Rights Watch (anti-israel propaganda outlet at this point) has said it was a Palestinian rocket:
"However, the sound preceding the explosion, the fireball that accompanied it, the size of the resulting crater, the type of splatter adjoining it, and the type and pattern of fragmentation visible around the crater are all consistent with the impact of a rocket.
Evidence available to Human Rights Watch makes the possibility of a large air-dropped bomb, such as those Israel has used extensively in Gaza, highly unlikely."
That's not what "debunking" means. It's an article that disputes the current consensus that an errant rocket from Gaza exploded in the hospital. Having the debate is fine (if it's on topic), but preemptively declaring the debate over, misrepresenting the consensus on the issue, and accusing those asserting the current consensus of "misinformation" is disingenuous, and you can't do that and still be civil.
> Setting aside the fact that these are numbers provided by Hamas
The UN and Lancet [0] believe the numbers are credible. Let's not forget there are likely 10k+ civilians still burried under rubble too.
> Hamas has miles of tunnels to provide cover for their rapists
Come on, you are not commenting in good faith. There is zero credible evidence that any rape took place, Hamas have staunchly denied it, and from what returning hostages have said it seems incredibly unlikely. There is however an abundance of evidence that Israel is trying to use rape as attrocity propaganda.
> it’s tragic that Hamas is killing its own people this way
This is absolutely absurd - it's like telling a domestic violence victim it's their own fault.
You think in a sudden 1143 person civilian homicidal attack, going door to door, no rape happened?
“UN team says rape, gang rape likely occurred during Hamas attack on Israel”
UN: “The mission team received clear and convincing information that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment occurred against some women and children during their time in captivity.”
> You think in a sudden 1143 person civilian homicidal attack, going door to door, no rape happened
Firstly, the latest figure from Israel is that 695 Israeli civilians were killed, with the rest being security forces. Of those 695, many were armed settlers.
Secondly, the fact you assume rape did occur, especially in the total absence of any evidence, is bizarre, and suggests you may have some deeply-seated biases against Palestinians and/or Muslims.
As I explained in another comment here [0], the UN report is a farce insisted upon by Israel to aid in laundering their lurid attrocity propaganda. The report is not the result of an investigation, it simply regurgitates what Israel presented to Pramila Patten. From the report:
> As a result of the aforementioned challenges, it must be noted that the information gathered by the mission team was in a large part sourced from Israeli national institutions. This is due to the absence of United Nations entities operating in Israel, as well as the lack of cooperation by the State of Israel with relevant United Nations bodies with an investigative mandate
Interesting that it does not bother you that Israel has been indiscriminately bombing civilians BEFORE October 7th as well as engaging in night raids all over the west bank, resulting in one of the deadliest years for Palestinians in the West Bank - again BEFORE October 7th. But somehow, their lives are worth less than the ones tragically lost on October 7th?
Second, as an occupier, there are no internal border. As the United States and Israel do not recognize a Palestinian state, they did not cross a border, they broke out of their concentration camp.
“In the medicolegal assessment of available photos and videos, no tangible indications of rape could be identified,” the report concluded.
> has been indiscriminately bombing civilians BEFORE October 7th
What do you think Hamas firing rockets into Israel is doing?
> their lives are worth less than the ones tragically lost on October 7th?
No. Equal. We need a framework that stops cycles of retribution and saves the most lives long term. Probably imposed by an international coalition since it's easily observed that groups of people obviously respond to massacres against them with more retribution.
> As the United States and Israel do not recognize a Palestinian state, they did not cross a border, they broke out of their concentration camp.
Are you going to treat the invasion of Taiwan the same way? Since US "doesn't recognize it," it's fair game for them to butcher thousands taking Taiwan?
Concentration camp is ridiculous hyperbole. Gaza is dense overall but half of it isn't https://maps.app.goo.gl/hNEpzVno4z5n9WQH9 . Do you expect the Israeli's to currently allow Gaza to freely trade and receive as many weapons as Hamas desire? Egypt supported the blockade. October 7th would've been 5x worse. Strengthening Hamas' weapons just extends this horrid conflict. Israel was relaxing the travel restrictions and more people were border crossing until Hamas attacked. What kind of message does that send to Israel about letting their guard down?
How do you propose to fix this? You want a ceasefire and Palestinians integrated as Israeli citizens in a 1 state solution? There is no will for this from Hamas. Their 2017 charter wants 1967 borders, your "concentration camp," yet they attack outside of it.
I abhor any rapes perpetuated against humans of any kind. Why are you deflecting my correction that GP’s “There is zero credible evidence that any rape took place” is wrong?
"The Grayzone is an American fringe,[7] far-left[19] news website and blog,[23] founded and edited by American journalist Max Blumenthal"
"It is known for its negative coverage of American foreign policy,[1][4] misleading reporting,[25][26] and sympathetic coverage of authoritarian regimes."
Again debunked, the UN investigation did not speak to any victims or physicians that would validate the claim. The claims came from organizations known to have lied in the past. Why would Israel forbid the doctors involved from speaking to the UN?
Just to make things clear. Few people are denying that sexual violence did occur. These were a bunch of men doing a bunch of violence to other people, I would be shocked if none of them did sexual violence.
What people are debunking is the notion that Hamas used sexual violence as a weapon of war. There are no evidence for that (nor for sexual violence at all, it is just that it is very plausible). And the use of such stories in propaganda purposes.
This is in contrast to the Israeli military who has been recorded using sexual violence as a weapon of war against Palestinians on multiple occasion.
What makes this disgusting, is the use of stories of sexual violence to propagandize anti-Palestinian sentiment. Sexual violence is a horrible crime, that is truly horrendous for the victims. The victims of such crimes deserve better than their horrors being used to justify other crimes.
There are no confirmed accounts of rape, and the NYT Hamas hit piece that is re-laundered daily by the MSM has signs (such as Anat Schwarz) of Israeli intelligence all over it.
Regarding the UN report, it is not the smoking gun you seen to think it is, though I can see why you'd think differently if you only read the "highlights" from MSM - go ahead and read the report [0]:
> As a result of the aforementioned challenges, it must be noted that the information gathered by the mission team was in a large part sourced from Israeli national institutions. This is due to the absence of United Nations entities operating in Israel, as well as the lack of cooperation by the State of Israel with relevant United Nations bodies with an investigative mandate
Pramila Patten didn't "investigate" anything; she previously said on this: "It's not my role to investigate" - her job was to repeat what the Israelis told her. While in Israel she even met with proven hoaxers from Zaka, the organisation responsible for spreading many of the putrid attrocity propaganda that came out at the start.
Pramila Patten also infamously made the incredible, unsubstantiated claim that Russia gave their soldiers viagra and sent them out to rape Ukranains. She's a well-known fraud [1], who now sits in a position created by Hilary Clinton - who herself infamously spread false rape propaganda about Libya.
I feel we are now at an impasse, and so I won't be engaging in this thread any further.
"Might makes right" isn't a subject for justification, it is the natural state of the world. It's like asking for a justification for gravity. It's just a category error.
Unfortunately, might does make right. Violence is the ultimate authority and the fact most people don't acknowledge or willfully don't know this is embarrassing.
