Lurker > conduit

Foppe posted...

It gets even stranger...

Eye witnesses told CNN that some Israeli soldiers were also dressed as Hamas fighters.

But we're constantly told that Hamas fighters wear civilian clothing which is why everyone looks like Hamas?

False flag ops are more for covert or clandestine operations generally, and I'm not sure what the point would be in this case, of Israeli special forces trying to disguise themselves as American.

There are loads of American Israelis with dual citizenship, hardly surprising that some of them might be operating in Israeli special forces, though I'm not sure what the specific rules are. I know we've got British citizens fighting in the IDF and committing likely war crimes, questions are being asked about whether they'll face investigations when they get back, which I hope they will. hell, the Lieutenant Colonel of the IDF and international spokesperson Richard Hecht is Scottish and speaks with an obvious Glaswegian accent, and most of Israel's PR people are Brits with English accents.

Also I wouldn't be surprised if US and Israeli special forces have exchange programs much like Britain and the US have with SAS and Delta Force swapping soldiers for months or years at a time.

So imo the most obvious possibility is they were US soldiers on secondment from the US (but still operating within the capacity of Israeli forces), or they were simply Israelis with obvious American accents, because you know, a lot of Israelis are also American.

Umbongo posted...

What was the overall strategy behind freeing 4 hostages, while over 100 remain?

Did it improve the likelihood that they will all be released without some kind of ceasefire deal? Does it improve the conditions of confinement for the remaining hostages while they await their fate? Does it make it more likely that the living hostages will come out alive?

shockingly I'm gonna agree with Shrike and say Netanyahu was just desperate for a public relations win tbh, given public anger towards him at home especially from the families. also 3 were apparently killed so 4 out of 7 could be considered a win, when you're not capable of envisioning any option that doesn't involve extreme violence that is.

ROBANN_88 posted...

for anyone saying that the ordinary Russian citizens are innocent

CADE_FOSTER posted...

make russia feel it in there country we shall see how long till the people stand up to putin

This is the exact same pathological aggression that Israelis have towards Palestinians and the rationale that their government use to justify the 17-year illegal blockade of over 2 million people and commit mass murder of women and children. If we enact harsh enough punishment on the civilian population eventually it will cause them to overthrow their oppressive rulers.

Not only does this not work, it's counter-productive as it only reinforces the enemy's propaganda narrative, makes the population hate you and pushes them further into the arms of their authoritarian rulers who rely on using external threats (whether actual or perceived) to bolster nationalist ideologies, justify their own claims to power and crackdown on political dissent. Totalitarian regimes use fear to control people. Punishing the population (especially one that has virtually no democratic rights) often just reinforces that fear and leads people to seek the protection offered by authoritarian strongmen.

Zikten posted...

I still think this won't end until Ukraine is allowed to counter invade Russia.

Yeah, Ukraine should go full berserk mode and invade Russia when it is outnumbered 7-1 on the battlefield and cannot even break the deadlock in it's own country. That will definitely cause Putin to run away with his tail between his legs, the war will be over and we can all live happily ever after.

Are there no moderates here who believe a negotiated end to the war is possible, even preferable? Or are we still stuck in the mass delusion that "war is the only option", and anyone who disagrees is obviously a traitor and shill for the enemy?

https://quincyinst.org/research/the-diplomatic-path-to-a-secure-ukraine/#

VFalcone posted...

The problem is that statistically speaking, there were only 30,000 Hamas at the start of the war on Oct 7th compared to 2.5M population. That's 1.2% of the population. Not only that, Hamas is spread out across Gaza, West Bank, and other places in the world. Therefore it is literally mathematically impossible for there no be anywhere near the amount of Hamas dead as Israel claims there is.

If we apply those population stats to the current death toll, Hamas deaths don't even make it to 1,000 (441.6, to be exact). Now I can believe that Israel have probably killed a decent amount of Hamas.. factoring in the likelihood that more would be piled up in certain spots due to the war and for sure more have signed up throughout the months but rest assured, it is IMPOSSIBLE for Israel to have killed the 10k or 15k whatever the fuck they say they have.

40,000 Hamas fighters was the figure I was hearing earlier on in this "war", with some saying 30-40,000.

But I'm pretty sure there's been more than 1,000 Hamas fighters killed. Previously I was using the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor for death stats and at their last count back in Feb there were 38,066 people killed, of which 34,570 were civilians, which implies about 3,500 Hamas dead.

https://euromedmonitor.org/uploads/IMG_8905.png

None of the death stats include indirect deaths though. does anyone know if there's been any good studies showing "excess deaths"?? Because there's going to be tens of thousands more dead due to the collapsing health system, illness/disease, dehydration/malnutrition, etc which are not counted because they're not directly combat related but are still attributable to the Israeli offensive.

It's great that Israeli captives have returned home and been reunited with their loved ones. But we probably should also remember that in theory these hostages could and should have been released months ago if Israel had been willing to accept/maintain previous ceasefire agreements. So using a hostage rescue operation as an excuse to launch another wave of bombings across the Gaza strip killing hundreds more people is just unnecessary bloodlust.

SHRlKE posted...

Said it so many times before. I think Saudi should be the peace keeping force. Especially with their attitude of trying to cool relations with Israel. Something that was happening just before the October attacks.

No offense but this is completely braindead. You have to understand that Israel sees Gaza and the West Bank as Israeli territory and part of what it calls Greater Israel. Israel only tolerates the Saudi's at the behest of the US but doesn't trust them at all, and any presence of Saudi troops in Israeli occupied territory would merely be seen as an occupation of Israel by Arab forces, which would be utterly intolerable to Israel. Saudi Arabia is not seen as neutral by Israel.

And if by "cool relations with Israel" you mean abandon Palestinian rights in return for lucrative deals from the US and Israel, then sure. The Abraham Accords was bad for Palestinians and would have left them out in the cold, even as the UN had been warning for years that Gaza was on the way to becoming "uninhabitable" by 2020. Gaza was already dying a slow death and the Abraham Accords would have sealed their fate.

lol, who thinks Britain is neutral?

Poll back in February revealed that 98% of Israeli's surveyed thought the IDF was using sufficient, or too little force in Gaza. (Not sure what the polls are like now or whether its changed much).

Less than 2 percent of the respondents said they believed the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) was using too much firepower. Perhaps even more horrifyingly, nearly 58 percent said they were using too little firepower.

Israeli Jews were asked To what extent should Israel take into consideration the suffering of the civilian population in Gaza when planning the continuation of the fighting there? Over 80 percent responded with to a very small extent or to a fairly small extent.

https://truthout.org/articles/polls-show-broad-support-in-israel-for-gazas-destruction-and-starvation/

How do you de-radicalise almost an entire population that have been living in fear, hatred and insecurity for generations? The settler-colonial mindset is baked in. Like someone else said, it will take generations to reverse, and that's if it doesn't just continue to get worse, given the massive power imbalance.

back in December it was reported that 470,000 Israelis had left the country after October 7 and hadn't been back.

It was also reported that initially half a million had been internally displaced after October 7 due to evacuations along the borders.

around 20% of the Israeli families who were evacuated by authorities after October 7 had decided not to return to their homes in areas near the Gaza Strip.

So it looks like, of the half a million that were initially displaced, 20% (100k) are still displaced. But its unclear from that article how many of those chose not to return, versus how many cannot because of evacuation orders. Either way it's hard to imagine people actually wanting to go back, given the level of trauma that has probably affected them.

On a side note, I remember how the former IDF soldier Eran Efrati described a hierarchy to where people settled in the country. European Jews were concentrated in the center of Israel while Arab Jews/Mizrahi Jews and presumably other non-white Jews were used as a buffer and were settled in the more dangerous places along the borders, such as the borders with Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, etc. in case of attacks they'd be the first to die. The Kibbutzim which were largely autonomously organised and armed were expected to be the first line of defense.

I know it was published a week ago but I didn't notice anyone else post it. +972 Magazine is the original source for that article, as well as the Guardian article it links to, and Local Call, but I can't read the latter because it's in Hebrew.

+972 has been an outstanding source imo and broke the stories regarding Israel's AI targeting systems 'Habsora' and 'Lavender' with help from 6 Israeli intelligence sources. I've not seen any other publication reveal such in-depth accounts from inside Israel's bombing campaign and it's targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure.

https://www.972mag.com/mass-assassination-factory-israel-calculated-bombing-gaza/
https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/

https://www.972mag.com/icc-israel-surveillance-investigation/
"Surveillance and interference: Israels covert war on the ICC exposed" including a decade of surveillance, harassment, death threats, attempted blackmail, etc.

prison level. the one where you're captured and all your stuff is taken away and you have to break out and get all your stuff back.

another vote for Twin Warriors. also Fist of Legend and Fearless are another two of his best films. (not hollywood)

Danny the Dog (Unleashed its called here in the UK) is also a great film. think its a British-made film though so wouldn't count as Hollywood.

If Kiss of the Dragon is a hollywood production then I would say that. Otherwise maybe War.

Ricemills posted...

Nice quote, but have you applied it to yourself and your blind Putin support?

I don't support Putin you absolute tool. Did you miss the part where I described how Putin threatened to wipe out an entire country just to stop it joining NATO? And the Ponsonby quote applies as much to western propaganda as Putin propaganda or any national wartime propaganda.

Trumble posted...

You could at least try to hide your alts, dude.

I've never had an alt account on gamefaqs ever and I've been registered for nearly 20 years. Unlike some people here who I know have been posting under multiple accounts (shrike/punkfanalways).

Also I don't agree with ManaYuka's slant. Pro-Israeli/Pro-Russians seems to go hand in hand from what I've seen, so I agree with you in that respect.

Anti-imperialists like myself are opposed to all forms of imperialism, not just the Russian kind. I might accept the label of "pro-Russian" only insofar as I support the rights of ordinary Russian people, but I'm not pro-Putin or pro-Russian government and object to fascist authoritarianism wherever it arises. Same as I would never describe myself as anti-Ukraine or anti-Russia either, because you can't generalise an entire country based on its leader or government.

If you support one brand of fascism but oppose another, then you're still a fascist, no point pretending otherwise. The problem here is that opposing western propaganda automatically gets you labelled as pro-Putin. All who doubt our propaganda are traitors. You honestly need to take a critical look at the propaganda on both sides, because the irony is that often those who uncritically accept the western propaganda line are also the same people who accept Putin's propaganda as well. Hence why the Owen Harries Quote is also important. There is a much more effective way to dissolve the authoritarian fascism that Putin stands for, but sadly the west is not doing this and that is what frustrates me. I'm not going to derail the thread any further on this.

"We do not want war.
The opposite party alone is guilty of war.
The enemy is inherently evil and resembles the devil.
We defend a noble cause, not our own interests.
The enemy commits atrocities on purpose; we make mistakes.
The enemy uses forbidden weapons.
We suffer small losses, those of the enemy are enormous.
Recognised artists and intellectuals back our cause.
Our cause is sacred.
All who doubt our propaganda are traitors."

Falsehood in Wartime: Propaganda Lies of the First World War (1928), Lord Arthur Ponsonby

No one is justifying Russia's invasion of Ukraine. I'm merely saying that attributing it to some grand scheme to revive the Soviet Empire is a laughable cliche best explained as 'Ultimate attribution error' which stems from cultural bias.

I thought there were more people in this thread who were in the realist camp when it came to international relations theory, but I guess not.

"Take particular care to understand the position of your adversaryand to understand it not in a caricatured or superficial form but at its strongest, for until you have rebutted it at its strongest you have not rebutted it at all. This is a necessary condition both for developing your own position fully and attacking his successfully. " ~Owen Harries

ZechtAurion posted...

Isolating South Africa is how we got rid of that garbage, this is the right way.

Did that include blanket travel ban on all South African citizens though? You need to isolate the state, certainly, but without necessarily alienating the general population. Its difficult in the case of Israel because the level of genocidal racism and hatred is so much more severe than the racism that existed in South Africa. Sanctions against ordinary citizens only reinforce the states propaganda narrative about the whole world being antisemitic.

Kradek posted...

It's literally what Putin has expressed he wants to do.

No it isn't. Putin has made it abundantly clear for years that wants to negotiate with the US over NATO expansion which Russia sees as a threat to its national security because it doesn't want NATO long range missile bases along its border, hence Ukraine and Georgia being red lines, while Putin said repeatedly to the US, if you try to drag Ukraine into NATO then I'll make sure Ukraine no longer exists.

The record of warnings to the USG about this go back over 20 years to the US decision in favor of NATO expansion in 1998 under Clinton.... https://archive.is/stMC4

I find it hilarious that the word "imperial" is uncritically applied to both Russia and China without even blinking, yet US military expansion apparently has nothing to do with imperialism? The NATO policy of encirclement is an inherently hostile strategy which we wouldn't interpret as anything other than hostile if it was the other way around.

I'm tired of this western propaganda narrative about imperial Russia trying to restore the former Soviet Empire and take over half of Europe.

CobraGT posted...

I raised the question of offshore natural gas before. This is one more source. It is not conclusive of course. The author may not know what he is talking about.

https://unherd.com/2023/12/who-will-win-israels-oil-and-gas-war/

There is an opportunity here to develop the gas fields in offshore Gaza, on behalf of the Palestinians, Amos Hochstein, Bidens energy security advisor, said during a visit to Israel last month. Hochstein noted that he was 100% sure Israel would allow this, adding that there is no reason for them not to it is not theirs [the Israelis], the gas belongs to the Palestinian people.

Lol. Of course Israel are going to exploit the energy in Palestinian territory "on behalf of the Palestinians" and then give the money to Palestinians.

There's another article about Gaza's gas here....
https://mondediplo.com/outsidein/israel-s-war-for-gaza-s-gas

Its from 2012 though, but the author is the British journalist and policy researcher Nafeez Ahmed, and he knows his stuff.

He then wrote another article for The Guardian in 2014...
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jul/09/israel-war-gaza-palestine-natural-gas-energy-crisis

The above article resulted in him being fired from The Guardian the same year.

16 dead and 42 wounded in Yemen, by US-UK airstrikes, including civilians according to the Houthis.

"the Houthis focused Friday morning on a strike they said struck a building housing Hodeida Radio and civilian homes in the port city on the Red Sea.

The Houthis described all those killed and hurt in Hodeida as civilians,"

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/houthi-rebels-least-16-killed-080652045.html

In the United Kingdom, the country's Defense Ministry said that Royal Air Force Typhoon FGR4s conducted strikes on both Hodeida and further south in Ghulayfiqah. It described its targets as buildings identified as housing drone ground control facilities and providing storage for very long-range drones, as well as surface-to-air weapons.
The strikes were taken in self-defense in the face of an ongoing threat that the Houthis pose, U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said. There's an ongoing threat that the Houthis pose.

The Houthis pose a real and serious threat to Britain's ability to provide support for genocide.

LightningStrikes posted...

Anyway speaking of elections and utter clowns, Rishi Sunak is saying that if he wins he will bring in national service for 18 year olds and even refuses to rule out jailing teens who dont comply and fining their parents. This is both heinous and stupid, but at least it will almost certainly never happen!

he's probably only saying it because he knows it's not going to happen anyway. but still tone-deaf and detached from reality.

Cheater87 posted...

My mom and I had an argument about this yesterday and she went down the whole, if Israel drops their weapons and goes away, what happens to them next?

yeah, imagine pinning some guy to the floor and strangling him. what happens when you let go? Its understandable this fear that the oppressors have, "what if we stop brutalising Palestinians? what if we let them out of their concentration camp? what if they're still mad and want revenge on us because of the decades of war crimes we did to them?" So what then? Just keep killing Palestinians until they're all dead?

it's the tribalism that's the worst part. the more closely you identify with a particular group, the less able you are to empathise with anyone outside that group. everyone just becomes dehumanised to you unless they're part of your in-group.

Spartan_Jedi117 posted...

Except Russia did to use Cuba as an outpost. It was called the Cuban Missile Crisis. America was able to Russia out because Russia asked us get our shit out of Turkey, which we did and Russia pulled out of Cuba, iirc

Exactly my point. From the Soviet perspective it was an attempt to close the nuclear missile gap and even the odds, from Castro's perspective cosying up to the Soviets was attempt to deter US imperialism, however it had the opposite effect. It triggered a (failed) US invasion followed by a US campaign of terror bombings, industrial sabotage and attempts to overthrow the Cuban government.

Taiwan is like China's Cuba.

McSame_as_Bush posted...

Chinese imperialism is the reason the conflict exists. Taiwan and the Taiwanese have no desire for reunification with China and they pose no threat to mainland China.

The problem is US imperialism. The threat to China emanates from the US and its desire to use Taiwan in its war against China.

Same as US still sanctions the f*** out of Cuba because its scared of Russia or China using Cuba as an outpost against the US.

https://geopoliticaleconomy.substack.com/p/ukraine-us-kill-chain-taiwan-war

someone never seen The Princess Bride.

Not sure why that would blow anyone's mind. The political constraints/dynamics are very different when you're fighting another global super power, versus some poor people that don't even have a functioning state.

Obviously in the case of Russia the US is to some extent wary of escalation, particularly because in Ukraine Russia maintains escalatory dominance and will always be willing to take things 1 step further, and because the US doesn't want to directly implicate itself in attacks on Russian soil for fear of some kind of retaliatory measures.

Palestinians sadly don't have the political power or influence of a global super power, such that their opponents need not fear any reprisal or counter-measures from them. You can pretty much murder them with impunity, the only direct consequences seem to be from regional groups like the Houthis and Hezbollah.

ICJP director warns UK MPs justice is coming over complicity in Israeli war crimes..

https://i0.wp.com/skwawkbox.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/tayab-ali-warning-full.png?ssl=1

heat death just means the universe becomes inert because all the chemical reactions are exhausted due to entropy. eventually there will be no more new suns created.

I'm not a Tolkien fan or a fantasy fan. so I found them pretty long and boring. not really worth it.

Hard to see the UK alienating itself from US policy by recognising Palestinian statehood at this time. The British government will follow the US until death.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/f/fd82dfd3.jpg

SHRlKE posted...

yeah but how far do you want to go back. I dont think its helpful. We need to focus on the future and bringing peace to the area. That means removing Hamas and Bibi from power imo.

So when someone tells you that Israel deliberately brought Hamas to power in Gaza your response is to throw causality out the window and say forget about the past "focus on the future". You absolutely have to go back and analyse the historical context to have any understanding of what's going on, and therefore come up with a solution.

So ok, lets talk about the future. How do you defeat a political ideology? Is it by mass killing tens of thousands of civilians and dumping thousands of bodies into mass graves? Is it by systematically destroying civilian infrastructure to make Gaza unliveable? Is it by cutting off all food and water and fuel to starve millions of people?

Terrorism is like a virus. You cannot defeat a virus by attacking the host. Israel knows full well it cannot eliminate Hamas with what its doing (see the Shin Bet report). Therefore defeating Hamas is not a realistic military objective, even Israel's own military leaders know this.

You don't defeat Hamas by giving Hamas more reasons to exist. You have to create conditions on the ground which are not conducive to the political ideology of violence. But Israel has no interest in doing this and actively wants to portray Palestinians as inherently violent in order to provide a pretext for continued military occupation. They want to scatter the Palestinians in the West Bank into Jordan, and try to push Palestinians in Gaza into Egypt. Ethnically cleansing Gaza is the goal here so that they can finish consolidating Greater Israel. The US has been trying to do deals with Egypt on behalf of Israel regarding the resettlement of Palestinians in Gaza to the Egyptian Sinai since 2007.

Exactly. Israel is an extension of US power, not the other way around, and is a tool for enforcing US policy in the region. Even John Mearsheimer seems to have trouble recognising that the US could compel Israel to seek peace if it actually wanted to, by simply cutting off arms shipments, Israel would be screwed, instead he seems to think Biden is working tirelessly to come up with some solution. The fact that the US avoids using it's leverage over Israel (when it is literally the only one that has any) is a political choice. At this point what is going to compel the US to put its attack dog back on it's leash? The US clearly has as much concern for international law as Israel does.

Biden certainly has a point about one thing though, no one can say there is any equivalence between Israel and Hamas. Maybe if Hamas had nuclear weapons, and one of the most technologically advanced militaries in the world, the backing of the worlds biggest superpower and an entire state apparatus at its disposal, then maybe there'd be some equivalence. But pointing out the lack of equivalence between a highly militarised state and a non-state terrorist group has got to be the most pointless thing I've ever heard.

Isn't Joe Biden the one that has spent his whole political career famously saying "If Israel didn't exist, we'd have to create an Israel!"

A user on Reddit earlier pretty much described Israel as a US military base masquerading as a country, which I more or less agree with.

Lots of people think Israel controls America or has somehow made America it's b****. But the US can exist without Israel. Israel cannot exist without the US. I think that tells you who wears the trousers ('pants' for our American friends) in this relationship, when Israel is dependent on 70% of its arms from the US and relies on the US to save it from Iran. Israel needs the US more than the US needs Israel.

VFalcone posted...

So I wonder where that Mmaguy is now that the ICC just issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant on account of extermination (genocide) and multiple other things.

I don't think they have yet, have they? Its only an announcement that they intent to apply for arrest warrants, they still have to actually make the application, and then the application has to be approved, so still two steps removed from actual arrest warrants being issued as far as I know.

It does rather seem like the ICC are desperately dragging their heels in the vain hope that the US and Israel will miraculously get their act together, grow a moral conscience and completely change their behaviour, leading to the arrest warrants being cancelled and then the ICC can breathe a massive sigh of relief and all go home. Like they clearly don't want to go through with it and are trying to give them plenty of warning. Never got that with Russia. The ICC didn't come up with a song and dance publicly declaring their intentions to apply for international arrest warrants against Putin. They just did it and only announced when the warrants were issued, according to what I've heard.

Francesca Albanese talked about Israel using humanitarian "camouflage" to sanitise their genocide. Terms such "safe zones", "humanitarian corridors", "evacuation" etc. Evacuation is basically a euphemism now for bombing people until they run for their lives, its ok guys its not forced displacement, its not ethnic cleansing, it's a humanitarian evacuation. Would be funny if it wasn't so disgusting.

British right wing media The Telegraph had a headline earlier about how its Russia and China that's behind the pro-Palestinian student protests here. It's all Putin's fault, lol.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1790439607667986532

divot1338 posted...

All of the Israeli settlers are illegally occupying the West Bank so there arent really any without some kind of bad behavior on their hands.

Obviously squatting is very different from destroying food for refugees though.

Israeli settlers have done far worse than squatting, we're talking about armed settler militias raiding Palestinian homes, setting fire to their houses/cars, and shooting people.

'Rise in intimidation, settler violence in the West Bank, warns OCHA'
https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/11/1143087

Israeli settlers have assaulted, tortured, and committed sexual violence against Palestinians, stolen their belongings and livestock, threatened to kill them if they did not leave permanently, and destroyed their homes and schools under the cover of the ongoing hostilities in Gaza.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/04/17/west-bank-israel-responsible-rising-settler-violence

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/20/nowhere-is-safe-fear-and-mourning-inside-the-west-bank-villages-where-israeli-settlers-went-on-the-rampage

sci-fi easily tbh, no contest.

I'm not a trekky but I can easily watch Star Trek and actually get into it. But Star Wars is just straight up garbage to me.

sci-fi also covers alien/ufo horror, post-apocalyptic action, time travel, super powers, etc, so many good sci-fi.

what does this say about humankind?

Cheater87 posted...

I told my parents that and they don't believe me.

The generational shift will be damning to Israel in the coming decades. The older generations still get all their propaganda from the legacy media, but younger generations are seeing the true face of Israel and once seen it can never be unseen. The current generation won't forget. They'll always see Israel now as a genocidal racist apartheid state that has complete contempt for international law.

"You are shredding the UN Charter with your own hands!" ...he says as he shreds the UN Charter, with his own hands. Typical Israel. Do something blatantly and in front of everyone then simultaneously try to blame it on everyone else instead.

Only when Europe slowly starts to shift its position will it put pressure on the US to follow suit.

It took 30 years for the West to support the UN committee against apartheid in South Africa. Apartheid only ended when the US changed it's position and it was the last to do so.

We definitely don't have 30 years.

still playing GTA Online after about ten years. played it on ps3, played it on ps4, now playing it on ps5. spent over 2000 hours on it.

I think you completely misunderstood what he was saying. His example was obviously meant more generally.

Yazarogi posted...

It is absolutely insane people are over here like "Hamas needs to go before Israel stops blatantly slaughtering a bunch of innocent women and children"

Israel is doing to others what was done to them. I'm actually disturbed at how casual people are about this. There is no comparison between Hamas and the IDF. There is no comparison between Hamas and the government of Israel. Israel has the power, Israel has the means. They don't HAVE to be doing what they are doing, and saying "Well whaddya expect" is a cop out answer.

Agreed.

I think it's equally ignorant and short-sighted that people would also project blame onto Netanyahu, as if Bibi and the Likud can be ousted from power and everything will instantly be solved. As if the entrenched hatred, racism and genocidal rhetoric, dehumanisation and vilification of the 'Other' isn't a systemic structural problem that is pervasive throughout the Israeli state, it's institutions and society.

The realpolitik for Israel is that it has nothing to gain from peace and everything to gain from violence. Israel's behaviour won't be curbed without sufficient external pressure acting on them. And this can only come from the US primarily. Without counter-measures against Israel it has absolutely no reason to change.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-idf-intel-assesses-that-hamas-will-survive-as-terror-group-post-war/

I see it as unproductive because it ignores where responsibility lies.

and to Bloodychess, you can't use hypotheticals justify genocide no matter how much you want to.

Israel deserve 20 times more condemnation than Hamas simply by the fact that the scale and intensity of their crimes are on a whole different level, and also the fact that Israel holds all the power. The more power, the more responsibility.

the whole "both sides" argument has always been an absurd distraction from the widespread and systematic crimes of a lawless belligerent nuclear power engaged in genocide and ethnic cleansing of a stateless occupied population.