Hamas/Israel conflict: news and discussion

[danny la rouge]

An interesting thread

It’s worth remembering that Twi-X threads are not viewable any more by people who don’t have Twitter or having it open.

 

[Flavour]

Strategically they aim to achieve derailing the normalization of ties between Israel and other Arab countries, that's fairly clear.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

They are terrorists. This is inarguable.

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

 

[cupid_stunt]

An interesting thread:

That makes for grim reading.

 

[Knotted]

Most of the voices of domestic criticism that they've killed you mean?

Upthead I linked to the PFLP statement. They have been on the receiving end of Hamas oppression but are full out in support of the Al Aqsa flood/deluge. You can certainly say the PFLP have problems too but you're also not bringing anything context specific to the table.

Many years ago a certain future leader of the Labour Party invited delegations of Hamas and Hizbollah to Parliament and referred to them as "friends". This and similar adaptions to Islamist forces from left wingers are sickeningly wrong and naive for the reasons you point out. But general broadbrush rejections of Hamas are simply uninteresting without that context specificity.

 

[dilute micro]

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

What's a terrorist by your definition? Just curious.

 

[kabbes]

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

It’s a laughable idea anyway, that if you can just agree the correct label, that means you’ve resolved anything. So we call them “terrorists” — now what? Who cares? All that will happen is that you’ll see a shift in the way that the label itself is understood, so that the “terrorist” label now also comes to include all the messy interpretations you thought you’d avoided by assigning it as a label. In other words, you haven’t reinterpreted Hamas, you’ve reinterpreted “terrorist”.

 

[LDC]

Upthead I linked to the PFLP statement. They have been on the receiving end of Hamas oppression but are full out in support of the Al Aqsa flood/deluge. You can certainly say the PFLP have problems too but you're also not bringing anything context specific to the table.

Many years ago a certain future leader of the Labour Party invited delegations of Hamas and Hizbollah to Parliament and referred to them as "friends". This and similar adaptions to Islamist forces from left wingers are sickeningly wrong and naive for the reasons you point out. But general broadbrush rejections of Hamas are simply uninteresting without that context specificity.

No, and tbh I don't think I have enough knowledge or understanding of the whole area and issues to comment on much more than I have already.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

What's a terrorist by your definition? Just curious.

To the Vichy government, the French Resistance were terrorists. That's kind of my whole point. Any non-state actors in a conflict can be labelled as terrorists from a state's point of view.

 

[Pickman's model]

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

there's calling groups terrorist as eg thatcher did in the 1980s https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords...c7c-6f624fa3c20b/AncPrimeMinisterSDescription and there's proscribing terrorist groups, which i don't think ever happened in the uk to the anc or their armed wing

 

[The39thStep]

They are terrorists. This is inarguable.

We could go into pages of who is a terrorist/freedom fighter/ liberation movement etc , However if we do you will never get the opportunity to say what should be done to bring peace in Israel and Palestine which I assume is your desired outcome. So okay let's use the word, terrorists, what's the next step in your opinion?

 

[Pickman's model]

We could go into pages of who is a terrorist/freedom fighter/ liberation movement etc , However if we do you will never get the opportunity to say what should be done to bring peace in Israel and Palestine which I assume is your desired outcome. So okay let's use the word, terrorists, what's the next step in your opinion?

i reckon he's going to go for a) annihilation

 

[Kid_Eternity]

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

Terrorism has a technical definition that’s well established and widely used. Hamas fall into that definition by dint of their actions.

 

[The39thStep]

i reckon he's going to go for a) annihilation

Only one of a range of options that modern hard headed politicians making practical decisions has at their array

 

[Sasaferrato]

It reminds me of The Battle of Algiers and the bombs planted in Algiers in the 50s. They were also targetting young people having fun. They did it to draw international attention to their plight. And it worked.

I wouldn't have thought that the situation in Gaza was internationally unknown.

 

[Jeff Robinson]

Terrorism is a loaded term and it is used in inconsistent ways that suit people’s political agendas. But it’s not a meaningless or arbitrary label. When we reflect on the forms of political violence that most outrage us, and those we are inclined to call ‘terrorism’ we see that what we tend to mean is action deliberately targeting innocent people to achieve a political objective.

Of course who we label ‘innocent people’ is not always a straightforward matter, but indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets and areas are clear examples of terrorism.

Importantly, terrorism can be carried out by both state and non-state actors. Both Hamas and the Israeli state have engaged in terrorism.

The ANC, as I understand, targeted only state forces and what they called ‘collaborators’. They didn’t blow up schools and discos like Hamas have done in the past. I’m sure ANC members did on occasion go beyond these boundaries but it was not ANC policy. To Hamas any Jewish man, woman or child living in Israel is fair game. It makes sense to think of Hamas as a terrorist group and it’s makes sense to think of the Netanyahu government as a terrorist government - what else is deliberate collective punishment of a whole population other than mass terrorism (well it’s a war crime, but also terrorism).

 

[PR1Berske]

The continuing oppression of the Palestinians is fundamentally immoral. Their right to fight back is absolute.

Palestine/Palestinians as a whole? Because how Hamas carried out their attack puts a certain slant to your sentence.

 

[Sasaferrato]

Terrorism has a technical definition that’s well established and widely used. Hamas fall into that definition by dint of their actions.

Pretty much what I was going to say.

 

[kabbes]

Terrorism has a technical definition that’s well established and widely used. Hamas fall into that definition by dint of their actions.

Which of the many technical definitions listed by the OECD are you referring to? Presumably not the UK one, since Hamas are not targeting the UK. Seems to me that either lbj has it right and terrorism is basically defined as “violence we don’t like as a state because it undermines us” or it is defined in a way that captures Israel as well as Hamas.

 

[The39thStep]

Terrorism is a loaded term and it is used in inconsistent ways that suit people’s political agendas. But it’s not a meaningless or arbitrary label. When we reflect on the forms of political violence that most outrage us, and those we are inclined to call ‘terrorism’ we see that what we tend to mean is action deliberately targeting innocent people to achieve a political objective.

Of course who we label ‘innocent people’ is not always a straightforward matter, but indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets and areas are clear examples of terrorism.

Importantly, terrorism can be carried out by both state and non-state actors. Both Hamas and the Israeli state have engaged in terrorism.

The ANC, as I understand, targeted only state forces and what they called ‘collaborators’. They didn’t blow up schools and discos like Hamas have done in the past. I’m sure ANC members did on occasion go beyond these boundaries but it was not ANC policy. To Hamas any Jewish man, woman or child living in Israel is fair game. It makes sense to think of Hamas as a terrorist group and it’s makes sense to think of the Netanyahu government as a terrorist government - what else is deliberate collective punishment of a whole population other than mass terrorism (well it’s a war crime, but also terrorism).

Worth reading the Reconciliation findings.

 

[Aladdin]

Turkey pledgin to support Palestine. Iran supports Palestine. Israelis are surrounded by hostile neighbours and are not beyond blowing up the entire region including themselves.

This is horrific. And I fear what will happen will be unpunpecedente. My biggest fear is that Palestine will be wiped out because Netanyahu has to show the Arab world that Israel is ready to fight and win at all costs.

The innocent, as always, will die for the fear and greed of people living in the past who cannot envision living together in peace.

I still support Gaza and the Palestinian people; but pointing out that cutting-off their utilities and bombing them to oblivion was an inevitable consequence of an IS style terror attack has drawn the opprobrium of the usual crowd on here. That was inevitable too, and look what's happened. The thread's now become about what bastards the Israelis are. Saturday's all but forgotten. Someone should just change the thread title to Israel's Bombing of Gaza Oct/23 and be done with it.

It's ALL horrific.
Hamas is a terrorist organisation as you know. They are extremists. We all know this. Israel knows this. And yet Israel ignored warnings of a major attack. Got to ask the question here...why? Why did they let Hamas get in? I have my own thoughts on this..I don't think Israel is beyond sacrificing some in order to have a valid reason to wipe Palestine off the map.
I really don't like thinking that this is a possibility

None of this is going to end. This will continue as long as people in the region detest each other.

 

[Spymaster]

They're the perfect example of how 'terrorist' is a loaded term. Were the ANC terrorists or a guerrilla force fighting a war of liberation? UK government also labelled the ANC terrorists once upon a not so long ago.

It's about how a group goes about achieving their aims. The ANC were very definitely terrorists, albeit terrorists with aims that most now consider laudable.

 

[frogwoman]

Don't think the Israelis would have let this one through deliberately. It's far more likely that hamas had help from people working for eg Russian or Iranian intelligence.

Perfectly OK with calling them terrorists even though Israeli actions have ensured their actions gain support. These are not good guys

 

[Pickman's model]

Terrorism has a technical definition that’s well established and widely used. Hamas fall into that definition by dint of their actions.

does it really? it seems rather a live issue rather than a settled one, being as this author, from the international centre of counter-terrorism, "pleads for a narrow definition of terrorism" https://www.icct.nl/sites/default/files/2023-03/Schmidt - Defining Terrorism_1.pdf

 

[frogwoman]

Mossad I don't think is the intelligence agency it's always portrayed as. There's a lot of corruption in Israeli police too iirc

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Terrorism is a loaded term and it is used in inconsistent ways that suit people’s political agendas. But it’s not a meaningless or arbitrary label. When we reflect on the forms of political violence that most outrage us, and those we are inclined to call ‘terrorism’ we see that what we tend to mean is action deliberately targeting innocent people to achieve a political objective.

Of course who we label ‘innocent people’ is not always a straightforward matter, but indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets and areas are clear examples of terrorism.

Importantly, terrorism can be carried out by both state and non-state actors. Both Hamas and the Israeli state have engaged in terrorism.

The ANC, as I understand, targeted only state forces and what they called ‘collaborators’. They didn’t blow up schools and discos like Hamas have done in the past. I’m sure ANC members did on occasion go beyond these boundaries but it was not ANC policy. To Hamas any Jewish man, woman or child living in Israel is fair game. It makes sense to think of Hamas as a terrorist group and it’s makes sense to think of the Netanyahu government as a terrorist government - what else is deliberate collective punishment of a whole population other than mass terrorism (well it’s a war crime, but also terrorism).

I don't want to get bogged down in this as I don't think it really helps understanding, but I think your last paragraph sums up the limitations of labels. A non-state actor committing an atrocity is a terrorist. A state actor committing the same atrocity is a war criminal.

But it is all very muddy. Was the fire-bombing of Dresden a war crime? It was the deliberate slaughter of civilians after all. War studies types talk about a concept they call proportionality. But that is such a subjective judgement. There is no clean way to wage a war. And in a highly asymmetrical conflict, that counts even more so.

 

[Riklet]

Don't think the Israelis would have let this one through deliberately. It's far more likely that hamas had help from people working for eg Russian or Iranian intelligence.

Perfectly OK with calling them terrorists even though Israeli actions have ensured their actions gain support. These are not good guys

Apparently even the head of Hamas didnt know this was going to happen. And even the ones that orchestrated it have admitted they didnt expect IDF to crumble and to kill 900 Israelis+ I'm sure. It does seem the initial aim was more focused around hostage taking.

I suspect a closedly guarded military secret. If there had been much communication especially outside of Gaza or electronically the Israelis would have rumbled it.

Seems like the Egyptians got wind of something last minute and warned Netanyahu but he ignored them.

 

[Pickman's model]

It's about how a group goes about achieving their aims. The ANC were very definitely terrorists, albeit terrorists with aims that most now consider laudable.

i think most people considered their aims laudable then too, and it took the anc 50 years before they turned to armed struggle.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Don't think the Israelis would have let this one through deliberately. It's far more likely that hamas had help from people working for eg Russian or Iranian intelligence.

Perfectly OK with calling them terrorists even though Israeli actions have ensured their actions gain support. These are not good guys

You're right. They're not. And so ordinary Palestinians are fucked if they do and fucked if they don't wrt supporting Hamas.

 

[RD2003]

I wonder which terrorists people will be discussing in 20-30 years time? There will almost definitely be a whole new bunch added to the mix.

And which of the wars that will be raging in various places will get attention, and which ones largely ignored?