this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2024
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In blatant violation of international law, particularly international humanitarian law, the Israeli army has executed 13 children by direct shooting in Al-Shifa Medical Complex and its Gaza City environs. This is a war crime and a crime against humanity, and is part of the genocide that the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip having been experiencing for the past six months.

For over a week now, the Israeli army has been conducting systematic and horrifying military operations inside and around Al-Shifa Medical Complex. These crimes include extrajudicial executions and deliberate killings of Palestinian civilians. The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor field team has received identical testimonies about the killings and executions of Palestinian children between the ages of four and 16.

Some of the fatal shootings occurred during an Israeli army siege while the victims’ families were inside their homes; others occurred when the victims attempted to escape via routes that the Israeli army had designated as “safe” after forcibly evacuating them from their homes and places of residence.

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[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social -4 points 8 months ago (3 children)

Say what you want about Hamas; they at least have the basic decency to not shoot children.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 6 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Hamas are a bunch of assholes just like Bibi, and neither should be allowed to continue in power. The civilians caught in the crossfire are distinct from both groups, whether Isreali or Palestinian - and most of them are alright.

I absolutely disapprove of Netanyahu - it isn't necessary to approve of Hamas to do so and neither party is worthy of your defense.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Funny how all of Gaza's government is responsible but only a single guy in the israeli government.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

In the statement above Netanyahu is shorthand for him, his ministers, and his supporting party... it's quite an oversimplification but it's probably the most comprehensible way of separating people who just want to live their lives from people who need to cultivate hate to retain power (and for some reason care about retaining power).

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I understand but deflects from the reality that if Netanyahu leaves this would never happen. The majority of israels population and their government fully support this Genocide.

This is an israel problem not a Netanyahu problem.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That is not my impression but I'm not familiar with any hard evidence towards or against that statement - so it may be true (if you have polling evidence I'd appreciate it). Netanyahu did secure a comfortable win in the last election and it's clear the hardline right wing parties have significant support.

The issue is that, much like everywhere else - politics is complicated. Likud has been a dominant force and voters who appreciate investments into defense research and Bibi branded international outreach do exist without necessarily embracing the settlement policies.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

Netanyahu might be losing ground, but his politics still resonate with most Israelis

In the same poll, respondents were asked, “What is the best way to obtain the release of the hostages?” and 81.5 percent answered that “military pressure should be applied to Hamas so that it agrees to acceptable conditions for the release of the abductees.” This is something that Netanyahu and his military chiefs repeat every day.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

when the problem is that civilian settlements should not be targeted to begin with.

I don't, don't get me wrong. But a lot of comparisons paint Hamas as an unsalvageable terrorist organization that should be wiped off the face of the Earth and the IDF as a "legitimate" army running rampant. You'll see this in people saying Hamas should be dismantled while the IDF should be forced to respect international law, which is wrong. Both should be dismantled, and if anything I'd be more comfortable with Hamas continuing to exist than the IDF, since Hamas at least has done the absolute bare minimum to try to end the fighting before (see: 2008, 2012-2013, more 2013). What I want to say is that the IDF and its genocidal Apartheid state Israel is even less compatible with peace than Hamas. Either a one state solution or a complete restructuring of Israeli law and government are necessary here.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I think a one state solution is unreasonable because it'd necessarily lead to a large cultural minority and I simply don't trust Isreali voters not to continue to oppress the Muslim population. It's a fucking complicated situation and I wish the politics weren't religiously framed but in the short term I'd be concerned about political retaliation against whoever the minority is.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I think a one state solution is unreasonable because it’d necessarily lead to a large cultural minority and I simply don’t trust Isreali voters not to continue to oppress the Muslim population.

It's not as big of a gap as you think. There are 7 million Palestinians in Palestine and Israel (not counting Jordan or Lebanon, let alone the rest of the world) compared to the same number of Jews in Israel. This is enough for either group to hold the other in check. Then we remember that not all Jews are right-wing, so in effect the people we don't want running the government will be overwhelmingly a minority).

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I will say this about Hamas: they did shoot children.

Fuck Hamas. Viva Fatah.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What? At least on October 7th there were multiple cases of Hamas soldiers entering a home, shooting the parents and sparing the children. I mean they shouldn't have shot the parents either but they're a bit above IDF snipers actively aiming at and shooting children.

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I have zero interest to comparing the awfulness of the IDF with the awfulness of Hamas.

But it is true that on October 7th Hamas killed kids, man, it's unfortunately just true.

https://www.factcheck.org/2023/11/dozens-of-children-died-in-hamas-oct-7-attack-on-israel-contrary-to-online-claim/

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

I have zero interest to comparing the awfulness of the IDF with the awfulness of Hamas.

It's worth pointing out because many people still hold the implicit assumption that the IDF is just an overzealous army or some other whitewashed nonsense while Hamas is an unsalvageable terrorist organization. Because of that it's important to establish that in terms of terror IDF >= Hamas, and not at all Hamas > IDF.

Also I'm not saying no children died; that's just impossible. I'm saying that instances of a Hamas soldier intentionally shooting a child when they could've just not are very few, if any. I mean hell it says right in your link: 29. That's out of 1139 people, 2/3 of which are civilians, and after the IDF shot and bombed their own civilians to get Hamas fighters. This puts the number of children casualties among civilian casualties at about 5%. There are probably many reasons for this, but I think it's clear evidence that Hamas was at least avoiding children casualties as a conscious decision.

[–] bartolomeo@suppo.fi 6 points 8 months ago

29/1139 gives you 2.5%. Children are a protected group under "non-combatants" in int'l law, and Israel has killed an estimated 13,000, or 40% of total deaths if it's 32,000, in just 6 months. Although I do agree with the other commenter that the correct number of children to kill, under any circumstance, is 0, I also think big problems need to be addressed first. Killing 13,000 children in 6 months is a big problem. The kicker here is the complete impunity, both legally and in the mainstream consciousness/ news reporting, with which Israel massacres children. That to me makes a whole lot more people than just Israel complicit in this big problem.

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Look man, the IDF is an army that has the capacity to perform crimes at with much higher efficiency than Hamas. They are responsible for war crimes, massacres and are plausibly on the hook for genocide. Bad hombres. Hamas is a bunch of jihadist fascists who are responsible for horrible crimes and massacres. They are the kinds of bad hombres that if they had the IDFs capabilities they would be doing what the IDF does. I do not care about who is better or worse. I want them both on the stand, tried for war crimes in the Hague. Just like after the Yugoslav wars, Bosnian, Serb, and Croat war criminals got their due, I want the same for both Israeli and Palestinian war criminals. Trying to keep a score is NOT HELPING PALESTINIAN LIBERATION, it only perpetuates the race to the bottom.

And, buddy, fuck this whole paragraph:

Also I’m not saying no children died; that’s just impossible. I’m saying that instances of a Hamas soldier intentionally shooting a child when they could’ve just not are very few, if any. I mean hell it says right in your link: 29. That’s out of 1139 people, 2/3 of which are civilians, and after the IDF shot and bombed their own civilians to get Hamas fighters. This puts the number of children casualties among civilian casualties at about 5%. There are probably many reasons for this, but I think it’s clear evidence that Hamas was at least avoiding children casualties as a conscious decision.

This is bullshit. They killed 29 kids. They could have, you know, not done that. Like they hadn't done shit like that up to now.

And I'm not even against armed struggle. If Hamas had targeted only the IDF outposts they did target and killed a whole bunch of IDF soldiers, but left civilians alone, I would not even have condemned it. Fair game, eh. But that's not what they did. They attacked civilians. They killed innocent people, non-combattants. They killed a bunch of hippies, man. No, Hamas are not "better" than the IDF. They are despicable scum and I don't mourn a single one of them. Fuck them.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 4 points 8 months ago

They could have, you know, not done that. Like they hadn’t done shit like that up to now.

You have to count, again, IDF-inflicted casualties and crossfire deaths. We have evidence of houses that were just blown up by the IDF with their residents inside.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

There were other smaller armed groups aside from Hamas that infiltrated which were a lot less informed nor caring about any rules.

Hamas trained soldiers didn't intentionally shoot any children. The very low child death rate compared to adults is direct evidence for this. And they have stated it is against their policy. (Hamas definitely shot some adults intentionally though).

Also we know that IDF friendly fire killed multiple of those kids, for example with the tank attack on Be'eri

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca -3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Hamas trained soldiers didn’t intentionally shoot any children.

To be clear: that's IDF-style hasbara.

The moment Hamas decided to target civilian settlements, they accepted that kids are acceptable types of casualties.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Except the numbers completely back up their claim.

The IDF Hasbara is a known lie because the results don't match their words.

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca -3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

I mean that you are arguing specifically about the shooting of children, as if that's a reasonable thing to focus on and debate, when the problem is that civilian settlements should not be targeted to begin with.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@kbin.social 2 points 8 months ago

when the problem is that civilian settlements should not be targeted to begin with.

The goal of the operation was taking hostages and dealing damage to the IDF, not attacking civilians. They then attacked civilians, but we have no reason to believe that was a goal of the operation.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Hamas sees israel taking Palestinians hostage and has figured out the only way to get their hostages back is take israeli hostages and trade them.

Hamas sees israel breaking these international laws all the time and just mirror it because people are fine with it when israel does it. At least Hamas is not targeting kids like israel.

Hamas certainly did war crimes but the worst ones are either heavily exaggerated or made up (40 beheaded babies in ovens). And that's the stuff people keep repeating. It only serves to demonize Palestinians to keep israel's Genocide going.

[–] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

If you ask most people how many children died on oct7 they're off by tenfold.

[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

One kid is one kid too many.

This is true in Gaza and it's true in the kibbutzes around Gaza.