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Hamas/Israel conflict: news and discussion

Hamas knew this would be part of the Israeli response. They might be child murderers and rapists but they're not fucking idiots.

This is their fault.
Slippery slope. Israel were warned by their own intelligence agencies that violence they could stop would make attacks on Israel/Israelis more likely. Let's blame them or the settlers or the mandate or the Romans
 
Hamas knew this would be part of the Israeli response. They might be child murderers and rapists but they're not fucking idiots.

This is their fault.

Israel is responsible for how they choose to respond as are Hamas responsible for the attacks they choose to do.

You are contradicting your previous argument here by apologising for the Israeli response as caused by Hamas. How is that different to people apologising for Hamas by reference to what they are responding to?
 
Would it count as fighting back if it had been a bit gentler?
I think that if they had, for instance, concentrated on attacking military targets rather than civilian ones, that would still count as fighting back, and would be "a bit gentler". Do you not think that attacking military targets counts as fighting back?
 
200 Israelites dead
“oh it’s terrible but the Israeli state has…”

No you just need to say it’s terrible, we know (especially here) how horrifically the Israeli state acts towards Palestine. Running amok and shooting and unarmed civilians isn’t fighting back it’s murder plain and simple.
Yeh let's take things in isolation and refuse to look at the actual context, that'll give us a great analysis. for me, it's not so easy to tell which israeli adults are civilians and which are military due to the conscription in israel (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Israel; Militarism in Israeli society - פרופיל חדש). and following military service people are put into reserve units. given the centrality of festivals to many people on urban, it's probably a bit close to home to have a festival attacked. from the palestinian pov, though, it's likely viewed as killing off-duty soldiers than civilians.
 
Israel is responsible for how they choose to respond as are Hamas responsible for the attacks they choose to do.

You are contradicting your previous argument here by apologising for the Israeli response as caused by Hamas. How is that different to people apologising for Hamas by reference to what they are responding to?

I'm contrasting opinons that have been voiced here. We've had posters insisting that we view the Hamas attack in terms of previous Israeli actions. Now we have them refusing to see Israel's actions in terms of Hamas murders. Total double standards.
 
I'm contrasting opinons that have been voiced here. We've had posters insisting that we view the Hamas attack in terms of previous Istaeli actions. Now we have them refusing to see Israel's actions in terms of Hamas murders. Total double standards.
Who has refused to see Israeli actions in terms of Hamas' murders?

One of my earliest posts on this was saying that the morality of killing innocents aside, the attack is unlikely to bring anything but more suffering to Gaza.
 
I think Hamas (or Hizbollah for that matter) are about as controlled by Iran as Israel is controlled by America.
 
The order it seems to have been going in for some people I've seen online is something like:
  1. It didn't happen
  2. Ok, maybe it did happen but it wasn't as bad as is being reported
  3. It's as bad as reported but the victims were probably old enough to be in the IDF
  4. Ok well maybe some of them weren't in the IDF, but what were they doing in Israel anyway?
  5. Yes, lots of innocent people were killed, but have you considered that the Israeli state also does bad things?
I have absolutely no problem at all with criticism of the Israeli state for the evil shit they do, and a wider discussion of the long term causes of the conflict, but when the very first reaction of people online is not one of complete horror and contempt for the perpetrators of the atrocities, but to immediately jump to one of the above stages of denial/excuses, it makes me question the humanity of fellow people on the left. Comments on this thread like 'Palestinians have the right to try to end the occupation', 'Fuck yes! I could weep, I'm so delighted'.

Guess what, massacring 250 young adults at a music festival, executing civilians in the street and in their homes, and taking young children hostage, all backed by a despotic regime in Iran, isn't going to end the occupation. It isn't going to help Palestinians break out of their prison. It isn't going to break the cycle of decades of senseless violence. And it sure as hell isn't going to save the lives of the innocent Palestinians currently lying under the rubble of buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes.
people who demand 'complete horror and contempt for the perpetrators of atrocities' as a first response make me question the humanity of people on the left. i'd rather seek a mite of understanding of why things have happened than go straight for the majorite condemn a little more and understand a little less.
 
people who demand 'complete horror and contempt for the perpetrators of atrocities' make me question the humanity of people on the left. i'd rather seek a mite of understanding of why things have happened than go straight for the majorite condemn a little more and understand a little less.


People who don’t look at the murder of random people at a festival or in the street and instead go “well first we must understand why this has happened” make me question the humanity of people on the left.


I understand why we are here, that Israel is an artificial state imposed on territory stolen from others (what state is not) and I understand that it has done horrific things to the Palestinians for decades. But I still cannot look at the field of dead, on both sides, without horror. These were people regardless of whether Israeli or Palestinian.

I’m not going to look at the dead and think “well if the Israeli state had done x in 48 they’d still be alive”
 

Gaza hospitals are now failing due to power being cut.

Who knows how many additional lives this will cost when the inevitable land invasion begins.

What a mess.

I have a feeling this is going to end with another refugee crisis. Perhaps people in Gaza will be forced to flee to Egypt.
 
People who don’t look at the murder of random people at a festival or in the street and instead go “well first we must understand why this has happened” make me question the humanity of people on the left.
you're not really saying anything there. sure we have all looked at it. i don't demand you share my reaction, but you seem to want me to act as you would prefer than any other way.
 
There's a ton of fault to be spread around. The curious elements are what Hamas expected to result from this. This is clearly outside the usual, and the wrath of Israel would follow by any calculation. Hamas talks about victory and of this spreading. Again, if this was indeed set up by Iran, as it's being reported, to damage Saudi-Israel relations, it would make sense. Begs the question of how anything can get better with Israel and Palestinians unless everyone in the region agrees with it.
 
I find it bizarre that people wouldn't look at this horror, try to understand why it's happening, as a way of trying to understand how it could get better.

I don't go on Twitter but here and elsewhere I've seen people criticised for condemning all the atrocities, rather than only some.

Some of the arguments on this thread remind me of the Republicans and the NRA after the next inevitable mass shooting in the US. No thinking! No context! Only a superficial emotional response allowed at this difficult time!
 
Where were the right wingers on this thread over the last few years of massively increased violence against Palestinian civilians, including relentless violence against children?

Why does this violence resonate with you and not violence against the Palestinians?
 
There's a ton of fault to be spread around. The curious elements are what Hamas expected to result from this. This is clearly outside the usual, and the wrath of Israel would follow by any calculation. Hamas talks about victory and of this spreading. Again, if this was indeed set up by Iran, as it's being reported, to damage Saudi-Israel relations, it would make sense. Begs the question of how anything can get better with Israel and Palestinians unless everyone in the region agrees with it.
The people with the power to make this better, the zionists, have spent decades making it worse.
 
The people with the power to make this better, the zionists, have spent decades making it worse.
Whereas the good people in the government and intelligence agencies in the Islamic Republic of Iran have done all they could over the same decades to assist in helping Hamas come to a peaceful and equitable negotiated settlement...
 
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people who demand 'complete horror and contempt for the perpetrators of atrocities' as a first response make me question the humanity of people on the left. i'd rather seek a mite of understanding of why things have happened than go straight for the majorite condemn a little more and understand a little less.
I read the Haaretz editorial and found it more balanced than many posts on here

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I think Hamas (or Hizbollah for that matter) are about as controlled by Iran as Israel is controlled by America.
Hezbollah apparently had more direct training and inputs, Hamas as you suggest a handy stick to poke Israel with but not Shiite etc and far more tenuously linked.
 
Who has refused to see Israeli actions in terms of Hamas' murders?

I was waiting to see who would first bring up the collective punishment of Israel cutting off the services in response to the massacre of 250 of their kids, the rape of multiple women and girls, and the hostage taking of a couple of hundred civilians of all ages.

One of my earliest posts on this was saying that the morality of killing innocents aside, the attack is unlikely to bring anything but more suffering to Gaza.

Congratulations. It's a shame this didn't seem to be a consideration for Hamas.
 
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