Skip Navigation
28 comments

  • They hide under residential neighborhoods, storing their weapons in miles of tunnels and in houses, mosques, sofas — even a child’s bedroom — blurring the boundary between civilians and combatants.

    So they fight like US revolutionaries, the insurgents who fought back against nazi invaders in WWII, and pretty much every population that is being overwhelmed by superior numbers during wartime.

    Why is that a bad thing when defending against invaders? Like yeah, it would be pretty shitty for invaders to do that, but pretty reasonable as a defensive tactic.

    • I hope you do understand that all you just said totally contradicts the genocide narrative , right?

      You can say its not a bad thing, but then you cant complain about the high civilian casualties.

      • No it doesn’t?

        Them fighting back by any means does not contradict they Israel today has gone from merely oppressing and murdering innocent people on a whim to actively trying to destroy every bit of medical aid, sanitation, food supply, etc to wipe out the Palestinian people.

      • No, it doesn't contradict anything about the genocide.

        Israel didn't need to completely destroy infrastructure and also deny foreign aid because of how Hamas fights. How Hamas fights doesn't justify the IDF killing reporters, or the unarmed children being gunned in the streets, or strapping injured Palestinians to hoods, or atracking aid workers that the IDF knew were coming through, or the most likely true reports of torture. We know all of this is intentional by how Israel acts, and they are using the excuse that civilian casualties are happening despite the IDF being careful, but they keep killing dozens of civilians and getting caught lying about things which is why they are not trustworthy.

        Plus Israeli senior leadership has made and keeps making statements consistent with genocide that align with their actions. All of that would still be genocide even if Hamas fought some other 'acceptsble' way.

    • How insightful... I can vividly remember the allies releasing statements saying how they wanted to kill an entire group of people based solely on ethnoreligious identity...

      Hamas showed off most of these approaches in an extensive eight-minute video released on its social media channels in early April.

      The video appears to show fighters carrying out a multistage ambush that is said to take place in Khan Younis, in southern Gaza.

      The video seems to show Hamas fighters, their faces blurred, sitting on patterned mats as they plan the attack. They use pen, paper and a digital tablet to draw simplistic maps detailing where they want to plant a set of roadside mines.

      “We ask, O Lord, for the ambush to achieve its goals — let us kill your enemies, the Jews,” the narrator says.

      Almost like employing guerilla warfare doesn't simply equate Hamas to those fighting Nazis. I see many more differences between the two and their tactics. This comparison is unfounded.

      Additionally, I don't recall anyone claiming the allies used human shields during their guerilla warfare tactics...

      https://stratcomcoe.org/publications/hybrid-threats-hamas-use-of-human-shields-in-gaza/87

      EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

      Hamas, an Islamist militant group and the de facto governing authority of the Gaza Strip, has been using human shields in conflicts with Israel since 2007. According to the Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the war crime of using human shields encompasses “utilizing the presence of a civilian or other protected person to render certain points, areas, or military forces immune from military operations.” Hamas has launched rockets, positioned military-related infrastructure-hubs and routes, and engaged the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) from, or in proximity to, residential and commercial areas.

      The strategic logic of human shields has two components. It is based on an awareness of Israel’s desire to minimise collateral damage, and of Western public opinion’s sensitivity towards civilian casualties. If the IDF uses lethal force and causes an increase in civilian casualties, Hamas can utilise that as a lawfare tool: it can accuse Israel of committing war crimes, which could result in the imposition of a wide array of sanctions. Alternatively, if the IDF limits its use of military force in Gaza to avoid collateral damage, Hamas will be less susceptible to Israeli attacks, and thereby able to protect its assets while continuing to fight. Moreover, despite the Israeli public’s high level of support for the Israeli political and military leadership during operations, civilian casualties are one of the friction points between Israeli left-wing and right-wing supporters, with the former questioning the outcomes of the operation.

      Funny enough your comparison falls flat on it's head when confronted with:

      https://www.justsecurity.org/27005/human-shields-weapon-strong/

      During World War II, the Allies bombed Nazi trains carrying ammunition even though they were aware that civilian prisoners were being used to shield the trains from aerial attacks. Indeed, immediately following the war, at the Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, German armed forces were accused of human shielding. In Vietnam, the killing of hundreds of thousands of civilians spurred international legal debates (on the eve of the 1977 Additional Protocols to the Geneva Conventions) about the status of civilian populations in wartime and their use as shields. And, in the 1990s, Saddam Hussein’s and Slobodan Milosevic’s use of human shields garnered considerable media attention.

      There isn't a legitimate way to equate the two, and history demonstrates the differences. You present one paragraph from the article depicting how Hamas blurs the line between combatant and civilian, and offer absolutely no evidence suggesting in the slightest that your comparisons hold any weight. I'm somehow obligated to provide sources for my claims, yet you're not. This is not the kind of discussion I think is worthwhile in this sub, and lazy at that.

      Edit: here's a novel thought... Instead of down voting factual information, perhaps someone can do the above user's homework and get them some sources. If I were a mod, I would view this as misinformation attempting to equate Hamas and the allies in WW2 (I'm not spending all the time to disprove every other comparison when this user is not required to back up their statements in any form). I recommend the mods discuss whether this is the kind of commentary they want in their sub, and how it may unfairly impact users who go through the work of sourcing their claims.

      • Wait wait wait... You're saying disguising combatants as civilians and using civilians as shields is bad because it directly results in a huge increase in civilian casualties? But that means you see how Israel might not be gratuitously committing genocide but rather it being an unfortunate side effect of the terrorist's strategy!

  • This article reads like if the Bad Hasbara podcast was renamed to The Truth and hosted by Elon Levy.

    In other words, typical NYT genocide cheerleading.

  • Hamas fights in defence of its land, Israel slaughters children to gain more.

    The IDF are monsters.

28 comments