So it remains to be seen if Netanyahu will be indicted for war crimes (disproportionate violence against the violent actions of Hamas against Israeli citizens since October 7th).
At the same time, Hamas may be indicted for war crimes (using civilians as a human shield).
Personally, I have no way of telling which side is more wrong than the other, so I’ll let these issues be decided by international law.
As for military support of Hamas or Israel, it seems that Hamas is getting its weapons from Iran and possibly Russia (no friends of the EU), while Israel is getting weapons from the US (friend of the EU). So politically the EU tends to favour the IDF.
But on the humanitarian side, the EU seems torn between supporting Israel as a Western style democratic state, defending itself against a terrorist organisation (Hamas), versus supporting the Palestinians as an oppressed people, on the grounds of human rights.
So it is much more complicated than the Russo-Ukrainian war.
I think the discussion on historical events is valuable. I just want to clarify that the OGS logo isn’t a genocide tracker. It was changed to Ukrainian colors in response to the Kremlin’s bombing of our Ukrainian players. We’d received firsthand accounts from longstanding players on this site about the atrocities they experienced that are still ongoing. Although I have no real authority on the matter, I don’t see the logo changing until that circumstance changes. At the very least, we’d want to hear more perspectives from longstanding Palestinian players. And as others have mentioned, the political situation between Israel and Palestine is complex.
"Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: “The United States stands completely isolated globally for supporting Israel in this massacre… The world looks at the US aghast. The US stands alone with Israel… This is the worst foreign policy imaginable.” https://x.com/berningman16/status/1740633806183534951?s=20
Indeed, there is international agreement that Israel should stop its policy of settlements on the West Bank.
But how does Israel’s failure to meet those demands justify Hamas’ killing spree on October 7th from Gaza which has no Israeli settlements?
Hamas (governing Gaza) isn’t even on speaking terms with Fatah (governing the West Bank).
OK, so we agree on that.
But still you think the situation is not complicated in regard to which side is wrong or right in the hostilities since October 7th?
I suppose I agree with that, but I’d like to add that Hamas also needs to be eliminated, similar to terrorist organisations like Islamic State and Al Qaeda.
Even though the coalition forces (dozens of countries, not just the US, I know we joined as the Netherlands, mostly in Kandahar, and our highest commander even lost a son there in 2008) failed to eliminate the Taliban, I think they were right to attempt it.
Yes, that’s him. He’s just another person like us, qualified to talk about the topic. No more, no less than you or me. Just because you don’t have X, it doesn’t mean you can’t click on the link.
You don’t think the “leaving” issue raises intricate challenges? The voluntary departure of Jewish settlers seems unlikely, while resorting to systematic forced removal could potentially breach the Genocide Convention, constituting a crime against humanity. Any form of ethnic cleansing is morally reprehensible and infringes upon basic human rights and dignity. Beyond ethical concerns is the risk of counterproductive and dangerous consequences, potentially inciting violent resistance from settlers and their supporters.
To be clear, I do think settler violence must be addressed, migration controlled, and boundaries rationalized, maybe with land swaps to compensate Palestinians for lost land. But dismissing the complexity may not be a productive approach to these matters.
Israeli Official Suggests Gaza Be ‘Flattened Completely, Just Like Auschwitz Today’ David Azoulai added that Israel should forcibly send Palestinians to refugee camps in Lebanon. Israel’s slide into fascism is beyond doubt.
I feel the settlers must be removed, without legal concerns because there in non. Palestinians should regain their land and homes. The Israeli regime must play a big role in returning Palestinian property. It’s simple and straightforward. It’s time the Israeli regime is held accountable, as most of the world finds their actions unacceptable.
There is no Israel-Hamas war. This is NOT a war. It is the massacre of a people by a rogue state. Let us not grant them the veneer of respectability implied by the notion that they are fighting some war.
Trivilising and overusing words is a very serious issue indeed, especially when they are very serious like “holocaust” or “racist” or “offense” or “traumatic” or whatever other important term you can think of that gets viral and gets tossed around like candy. In this case though…
… this topic seems to be managing to trivialise a normal everyday word/concept like complicated/complex. That’s very impressive.
Talking about conflicts that span centuries or speaking about tens of thousands of dead people or relocating millions of civillians in terms of “not complex/complicated” is quite callous and wrong on so many levels that I think that you should all re-examine the use of that word in this context.
Unfortunately sometimes I wonder if it is so. In this topic the numbers of dead people are used casually just like a sports statistic and people are trying to discuss who is the GOAT of killing, as if the discussion is “Michael Jordan or LeBron James?”
I had a discussion recently with a very educated person (he holds a degree relevant to international diplomacy) about a local diplomatic conflict and the Prespa agreement of 2018 which is quite recent, but its context goes back for decades/centuries. I’ve noticed that even if the events are very recent, even very educated people will tend to have “selective memory” (to be mild about it) and tend to paint the facts with their own ideologicopolitical brush to post-facto excuse/explain events and actions made by the faction they support.
Have you listened to a radio coverage of a match while watching the same game on TV? The radio coverage is so wildly innaccurate (because they have to make it exciting) that you start wondering if you and the radio announcer is watching the same game. This is a good analogy with history. Even if you lived through a period of time, when you listen to people talk about it a few years later you start to wonder “where we all in the same time and place or are these people talking about a different country?”
Historical knowledge is supposed to be used as a warning and a study of the past to avoid the same mistakes. But is this how we use it?
