Hamas Attacks Israel

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

How does any of that mean Israel has the moral high ground in attacking civilians, Clearspira?

The moment you behead babies and children you are not the good guys of this story. What do you want exactly? A Fallout-style ''Good Karma'' award to blink in the corner of your eyes? War is a big boy game played by big boy rules and that is why I brought up America. The US despite its problems is freedom, is democracy, is the rule of law, is a hundred times better than Al Quaeda or the Taliban. And yet sometimes it has to take the low road to preserve those ideals. Real life isn't light vs dark nor does it function in absolutes. Anyone who thinks otherwise is too naive to live in it.

The issue is you have to actually know what the state body is doing specifically as a means of retaliation. In a democracy there is still the will of the people to understand what their government is doing and hold it accountable. They don't just do what they want.

[phantom000]

How does any of that mean Israel has the moral high ground in attacking civilians, Clearspira?

The moment you behead babies and children you are not the good guys of this story. What do you want exactly? A Fallout-style ''Good Karma'' award to blink in the corner of your eyes? War is a big boy game played by big boy rules and that is why I brought up America. The US despite its problems is freedom, is democracy, is the rule of law, is a hundred times better than Al Quaeda or the Taliban. And yet sometimes it has to take the low road to preserve those ideals. Real life isn't light vs dark nor does it function in absolutes. Anyone who thinks otherwise is too naive to live in it.

The issue is you have to actually know what the state body is doing specifically as a means of retaliation. In a democracy there is still the will of the people to understand what their government is doing and hold it accountable. They don't just do what they want.

All the more reason why someone should be keeping an eye on Israel to be certain that whatever they do is directed at Hamas specifically and not Palestine in general. I am not so naive to say that Hamas is not a threat, but I'm worried Israel is just using it as a convenient excuse to annex more territory and drive the Palestinians out. Frankly, their evacuation order sounds like a cruel joke, even if the 2 million people living in Gaza had the means to physically leave the area, where are they supposed to go?

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

How does any of that mean Israel has the moral high ground in attacking civilians, Clearspira?

The moment you behead babies and children you are not the good guys of this story. What do you want exactly? A Fallout-style ''Good Karma'' award to blink in the corner of your eyes? War is a big boy game played by big boy rules and that is why I brought up America. The US despite its problems is freedom, is democracy, is the rule of law, is a hundred times better than Al Quaeda or the Taliban. And yet sometimes it has to take the low road to preserve those ideals. Real life isn't light vs dark nor does it function in absolutes. Anyone who thinks otherwise is too naive to live in it.

I want you to recognize that Israel doesn't have the moral high ground if it attacks civilians, and that innocent people shouldn't have to pay for Hamas's brutality. You can't go "It's all grey morality" and then go "but these are the good guys and have nothing to be ashamed of."

You don't automatically become the good guys just because you attack the bad guys. For all your talk of "real life isn't light vs dark" you seem to be the one talking in morally simplistic absolutes.

I wonder if you're going to defend the white phosphorous too.

[CharlesPhipps]

How does any of that mean Israel has the moral high ground in attacking civilians, Clearspira?

The moment you behead babies and children you are not the good guys of this story. What do you want exactly? A Fallout-style ''Good Karma'' award to blink in the corner of your eyes? War is a big boy game played by big boy rules and that is why I brought up America. The US despite its problems is freedom, is democracy, is the rule of law, is a hundred times better than Al Quaeda or the Taliban. And yet sometimes it has to take the low road to preserve those ideals. Real life isn't light vs dark nor does it function in absolutes. Anyone who thinks otherwise is too naive to live in it.

I mean that's kind of the attitude that leads to baby murder. Because if they've done something horrible to you, you feel justified in doing it to them.

And thus lots more dead children.

Either by bombing or more personal methods.

[McAvoy]

I sometimes think just making that whole area one giant glass crator would make things so much more simpler with no ancient ruins to fight over anymore. Better yet that crator fulls up with water too so they can't even resettle in that area.

Doesn't mean I would support it of advocate for it. Just saying.

[MightyDavidson]

I just can't get my head around people who think what's going on in Israel is a clear cut black and white conflict. Sure what HAMAS did was horrible, I'm not going to deny that but I'm also not going to deny that the Israelis did some pretty horrible things as well. I mean they've indiscriminately bombed the Gaza Strip numerous times, they've shot unarmed civilians as well some of whom were children. So why should I be less horrified by the deaths of Palestinian children then by the deaths of Israeli children?

The answer of course is, I shouldn't. Both these things are horrible and the people committing these horrible acts, regardless of which side they're on, ought to be punished. Simple as that.

[phantom000]

I just can't get my head around people who think what's going on in Israel is a clear cut black and white conflict. Sure what HAMAS did was horrible, I'm not going to deny that but I'm also not going to deny that the Israelis did some pretty horrible things as well. I mean they've indiscriminately bombed the Gaza Strip numerous times, they've shot unarmed civilians as well some of whom were children. So why should I be less horrified by the deaths of Palestinian children then by the deaths of Israeli children?

The answer of course is, I shouldn't. Both these things are horrible and the people committing these horrible acts, regardless of which side they're on, ought to be punished. Simple as that.

Israel and Palestine makes me think of what Sinclair said to G'kar in Midnight n The Firing Line "You're like an abused child that's gotten big enough to do it to someone else as if that will somehow balance the scales. It won't."

This whole operation looks less like Israel trying to deal with a terrorist organization than it does a military annexation while trying to get rid of as many Palestinians as they can.

[MightyDavidson]

https://apnews.com/article/israel-pales ... 7168e8e8ed

If that article is accurate, well the implications are fairly staggering. I'll spare you the super cynical interpretation that immediately sprang into my head but if the article is accurate then the IDF soldiers were either to incompetent to notice HAMAS troops planning the attack in plain sight.

[clearspira]

https://apnews.com/article/israel-pales ... 7168e8e8ed

If that article is accurate, well the implications are fairly staggering. I'll spare you the super cynical interpretation that immediately sprang into my head but if the article is accurate then the IDF soldiers were either to incompetent to notice HAMAS troops planning the attack in plain sight.

I don't know if I would blame the soldiers themselves. They are only as good as their leaders. But there is no question that Israel has had severe fractures in its politics recently including violent pro-democracy protests. It would only take a few people saying ''fuck it'' in the chain of command to muck up their entire response.

Here's the real question though: where were our intelligence services? Where was the CIA and MI6 and everyone else? This is as much our failure as it is theirs.

[CharlesPhipps]

https://apnews.com/article/israel-pales ... 7168e8e8ed

If that article is accurate, well the implications are fairly staggering. I'll spare you the super cynical interpretation that immediately sprang into my head but if the article is accurate then the IDF soldiers were either to incompetent to notice HAMAS troops planning the attack in plain sight.

I don't know if I would blame the soldiers themselves. They are only as good as their leaders. But there is no question that Israel has had severe fractures in its politics recently including violent pro-democracy protests. It would only take a few people saying ''fuck it'' in the chain of command to muck up their entire response.

Here's the real question though: where were our intelligence services? Where was the CIA and MI6 and everyone else? This is as much our failure as it is theirs.

Egypt warned Israel that Palestine was doing something massive.

This was a failure on Israel's part to take it seriously or, worse, using it as cassus belli which would be treason from the government.