I’ll retract that these bombs were precision, that doesn’t really help the argument since many civilians die when they do use precision bombs on civilian locations.
Israel claims they only target Hamas, in practice the vast majority of who they kill are civilians (mostly women and children). I’ve only found evidence of Hamas using civilian infrastructure twice in the 2014 war, which I can link if you want, can you share the evidence you’ve found?
The disengagement was not an end to the occupation, in many cases it became a more brutal form of it. It also highlights that the settlements never ended in West Jerusalem or the West Bank, only Gaza. I’ll share sources for why international organizations regard the blockade as a continued form of occupation, it boils down to Gaza still being under Israeli military control with Israel controlling its imports, exports, food, water, electricity, sea access, air space, etc.
I’ve only found evidence of Hamas using civilian infrastructure twice in the 2014 war, which I can link if you want, can you share the evidence you’ve found?
I’ll share sources for why international organizations regard the blockade as a continued form of occupation, it boils down to Gaza still being under Israeli military control with Israel controlling its imports, exports, food, water, electricity, sea access, air space, etc.
This all seems reasonable to me given that they remain belligerent. If Gaza were not actively violent all this would seem inhumane and would violate many laws, but this is a nation at war with Israel that refuses to pacify itself and lay down arms. Letting supply lines be open and uncontrolled to a government whose stated purpose is Israel’s destruction, a genocide of Jews, and ethnic cleansing of the levant, is absurd. Many international organizations are clearly biased against Israel and are holding them to unreasonable standards.
I’m still waiting on someone to provide for me a single source where Hamas or the Palestinian Authority admitted that one of Israel’s strikes hit something that wasn’t civilian.
A few things about the civilian casualty statistics: the statistic that 90% of casualties in wars are civilians don’t seem to be supported from what I can tell. It varies a lot but for example the civilian casualty ratio for WWII was like 67%. For the 2008 Gaza war the civilian casualty ratio was more like 74% (noncombatants) and 64% for the 2014 war (unless you only look at IDF sources, then it’s more like 40%). I can’t really get details on the 61%, are they counting all males 14+ as combatants? Even then it comes to 69% civilian casualties. I don’t see how they got to 61%, which is still very high for modern conflicts as stated in the article you linked.
You find collective punishment reasonable? You seem to believe Gaza is somehow its own nation despite being an occupied territory. Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem have always been under Israeli military control since 1967, when Israel aimed to take those territories by initiating the six-day war. Previously, Israel ethnically cleansed Palestine during the civil war and war for independence in 1947-48 with Plan Dalet and its previous iterations. After independence, the remaining Palestinians within now Israel were subject to harsh military law, until eased to 2nd class citizens they are today. Meanwhile, those military practices have been implemented on the West Bank, Gaza, and east Jerusalem since 1967. Except Gaza with the unilateral disengagement and blockade, which in many respects is harsher than the brutal martial law ongoing in east Jerusalem and the west bank. Palestinians have had no civil or human rights under Israeli military control. This is an apartheid state. Popular resistance began as nonviolent with the 1st intifada, until violence escalated after the IDF responded with lethal force. Violent resistance to the apartheid did not come out of nowhere. Before 1948, while early Zionists like Ben Guerion were advocating for partition, Palestinian officials were advocating for a unitary state instead of partition. Israel has never been interested in peace because they covet the Palestinian land but without the Palestinians. Keep in mind Israel as it exists today, is an apartheid state for the Palestinians. Not only do you ignore the 2017 Hamas charter, but that article doesn’t represent the 1988 charter quite right. Yeah of course the 1988 charter is super terrible, it was created by a fundamentalist resistance group under occupation and had no popular support. That doesn’t reflect the will of Palestinians at all. The two most popular goals are sovereignty and right to return, not genocide. This has been a cycle of violence between the Colonizer/Occupier and Colonized/Occupied. A one state solution with equal rights for all is what needs to happen with international pressure for this cycle of violence to end.
I’ll retract that these bombs were precision, that doesn’t really help the argument since many civilians die when they do use precision bombs on civilian locations.
Israel claims they only target Hamas, in practice the vast majority of who they kill are civilians (mostly women and children). I’ve only found evidence of Hamas using civilian infrastructure twice in the 2014 war, which I can link if you want, can you share the evidence you’ve found?
The disengagement was not an end to the occupation, in many cases it became a more brutal form of it. It also highlights that the settlements never ended in West Jerusalem or the West Bank, only Gaza. I’ll share sources for why international organizations regard the blockade as a continued form of occupation, it boils down to Gaza still being under Israeli military control with Israel controlling its imports, exports, food, water, electricity, sea access, air space, etc.
https://www.btselem.org/gaza_strip
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/menasource/gaza-israel-occupied-international-law
https://www.hrw.org/news/2004/10/28/israel-disengagement-will-not-end-gaza-occupation
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/10/israel-opt-israel-must-lift-illegal-and-inhumane-blockade-on-gaza-as-power-plant-runs-out-of-fuel
https://books.google.com/books?id=hYiIWVlpFzEC&pg=PA429
This is the nature of war. In most conflicts ~90% of the casualties are civilians, in this conflict, only 61% are. Israel is fighting a relatively humane war, (although no war is humane,) so I find it curious that they seem to get more ire than other current conflicts with higher body counts and more civilian deaths.
I’ve read a lot of articles and seen a lot of videos with said evidence, too many to list them all. Here’s an older NATO report with multiple sources showing that Hamas uses such tactics, here’s the wikipedia aritcle about Hamas’ use of human shields with many citations, and here’s the IDF’s youtube channel where they share video evidence.
This all seems reasonable to me given that they remain belligerent. If Gaza were not actively violent all this would seem inhumane and would violate many laws, but this is a nation at war with Israel that refuses to pacify itself and lay down arms. Letting supply lines be open and uncontrolled to a government whose stated purpose is Israel’s destruction, a genocide of Jews, and ethnic cleansing of the levant, is absurd. Many international organizations are clearly biased against Israel and are holding them to unreasonable standards.
“only 61% civilian casualties” require you to believe all men above 16 who were killed were hamas
I’m still waiting on someone to provide for me a single source where Hamas or the Palestinian Authority admitted that one of Israel’s strikes hit something that wasn’t civilian.
A few things about the civilian casualty statistics: the statistic that 90% of casualties in wars are civilians don’t seem to be supported from what I can tell. It varies a lot but for example the civilian casualty ratio for WWII was like 67%. For the 2008 Gaza war the civilian casualty ratio was more like 74% (noncombatants) and 64% for the 2014 war (unless you only look at IDF sources, then it’s more like 40%). I can’t really get details on the 61%, are they counting all males 14+ as combatants? Even then it comes to 69% civilian casualties. I don’t see how they got to 61%, which is still very high for modern conflicts as stated in the article you linked.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_casualty_ratio
https://gwern.net/doc/politics/2010-roberts.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Gaza_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Israeli_strikes_and_Palestinian_casualties_in_the_2014_Gaza_War
You find collective punishment reasonable? You seem to believe Gaza is somehow its own nation despite being an occupied territory. Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem have always been under Israeli military control since 1967, when Israel aimed to take those territories by initiating the six-day war. Previously, Israel ethnically cleansed Palestine during the civil war and war for independence in 1947-48 with Plan Dalet and its previous iterations. After independence, the remaining Palestinians within now Israel were subject to harsh military law, until eased to 2nd class citizens they are today. Meanwhile, those military practices have been implemented on the West Bank, Gaza, and east Jerusalem since 1967. Except Gaza with the unilateral disengagement and blockade, which in many respects is harsher than the brutal martial law ongoing in east Jerusalem and the west bank. Palestinians have had no civil or human rights under Israeli military control. This is an apartheid state. Popular resistance began as nonviolent with the 1st intifada, until violence escalated after the IDF responded with lethal force. Violent resistance to the apartheid did not come out of nowhere. Before 1948, while early Zionists like Ben Guerion were advocating for partition, Palestinian officials were advocating for a unitary state instead of partition. Israel has never been interested in peace because they covet the Palestinian land but without the Palestinians. Keep in mind Israel as it exists today, is an apartheid state for the Palestinians. Not only do you ignore the 2017 Hamas charter, but that article doesn’t represent the 1988 charter quite right. Yeah of course the 1988 charter is super terrible, it was created by a fundamentalist resistance group under occupation and had no popular support. That doesn’t reflect the will of Palestinians at all. The two most popular goals are sovereignty and right to return, not genocide. This has been a cycle of violence between the Colonizer/Occupier and Colonized/Occupied. A one state solution with equal rights for all is what needs to happen with international pressure for this cycle of violence to end.
https://imeu.org/article/plan-dalet
https://forward.com/news/470923/israel-land-conquest-1967-occupation-six-day-war-plans/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martial_law#Israel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_prisoners_in_Israel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018–2019_Gaza_border_protests
https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/12/17/born-without-civil-rights/israels-use-draconian-military-orders-repress
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/06/israel-occupation-50-years-of-dispossession/
https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Cablegram_from_the_Secretary-General_of_the_League_of_Arab_States_to_the_Secretary-General_of_the_United_Nations
https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/palestinian-arab-congresses
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hamas.asp
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/middle-east/israel-palestine-one-state-solution
https://mondoweiss.net/2018/01/examining-myths-israel/
https://theintercept.com/2023/11/28/israel-palestine-history-peace