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Israel-Hamas War Megathread, October 27 to November 5
This is a place to post links to news and analysis of the conflict when you’d prefer not to post them top-level.
This is a place to post links to news and analysis of the conflict when you’d prefer not to post them top-level.
Israel steps up air and ground attacks in Gaza and cuts off the territory’s communications
as always, remember the asymmetry that gets glossed over by "well both sides are doing bad things" talk.
the Israeli military has the capability to deny Palestinian civilians food, water, electricity, fuel, and now communications. Hamas does not have the same capability against Israeli citizens.
Yeah, militarily, it's something like a siege, and it's not Israel that's besieged.
It seems Hamas did manage an extensive disruption of communications, but only for a matter of hours, and with a lot of advance planning. That was more like a large raid.
the siege has been happening since 2005
with the recent increase in its severity, the Israeli government has linked it directly to a demand for hostages to be returned:
Oct 12th: No power, water or fuel for Gaza until hostages are freed, Israel says
this is collective punishment, which is forbidden by Article 33 of the 4th Geneva Convention:
the examples given on Wikipedia of what they were trying to prevent matches the situation in Gaza almost exactly - the practice of an entire city or town being punished for the actions of a few people within it:
Gaza's population is 2.3 million.
Wikipedia lists the estimated size of all of Hamas at 20-25 thousand (with a citation to a page on the US National Counterterrorism Center's website, which seems like a believable source for this)
and 1,000 Hamas fighters, according to an Israeli military estimate from October 8th, took part in the actual October 7th invasion and hostage-taking.
it's collective punishment, plain and simple. Israel is straightforwardly and unambiguously committing war crimes.
It's interesting that this framing of "both sides doing bad things" isn't applied to situations like Ukraine for consistency sake.
I don't know. As far as I remember Ukraine did not attack civil population in russia.
Are you saying you, or the strangers, have insufficient subject matter expertise?
from Saree Makdisi, a UCLA professor of Palestinian & Lebanese ancestry, one of the best essays I've read about the war:
No human being can exist
To put this into context since it's not evident from the quote, the subtitle is:
I'm not an expert in any of this stuff but I'll make a serious attempt to answer that question anyway.
I don't know how to fix TV news. I think the short answer is "you don't" and my instinct would be to avoid it altogether. Media training and being careful who you talk to would probably help a bit. The politicians' motto that "if you're explaining, you're losing" would seem to apply.
Online, I'm in favor of writing FAQ's that link to further reading of gradually increasing depth, as a guide for actually curious and not entirely closed-minded people to go as deep as they choose.
Running through a long list of historical incidents in other places and implying that the Palestinian cause is similar seems like a bad approach. It comes across as basically a rhetorical trick, which is going to make the person using it look dishonest. Doing any single historical comparison would take a lot of work (first you have to explain the history) and in conversation there's no time for that.
It only makes sense as a long read. A series of historical comparisons, done properly, might be done as a series of blog posts, one introducing each historical incident. Linking to high-quality articles other people already wrote would be a way to reduce the work, but it would still be a substantial project.
Is that worth doing? Maybe history isn't the way to go, given how much education you need to do even to understand a historical analogy, and then it's just an analogy, where some things are similar and others are different.
I don't think they are comparisons. He is giving examples in history to better understand why violence begets violence and that there is a starting/root cause of it.
As with those examples, it is not widely accepted to point these out for Palestinians. It is overlooked and focus stays on the act and not why it happened thus continuing the cycle of violence.
The same can be said about 9/11 as well. It is a horrible terrorist act which to this day the average person is clueless to why it was carried out. The message is the same, they are animals who are jealous of our freedoms and "democracy". Let's return the violence 100 times over, but that isn't terrorism, it's a war against terror/fight for freedom. Which then also creates more instability/insurgents (ISIS)
Oct 25th: Biden says he has 'no confidence' in Palestinian death count
Oct 27th: Despite Biden's doubts, humanitarian agencies consider Gaza toll reliable
but something in the former story caught my eye. emphasis added:
meanwhile, let's look back at Biden's statement from October 7th:
and October 9th:
when innocent Israeli civilians are killed, that's murder, and unconscionable.
but when innocent Palestinian civilians are killed, that's the price of waging a war.
I don't particularly like how Biden is handling it either, but this is simplistic, motivated reasoning. If you really want to litigate this then we'd have to at least talk about intent (accidental deaths from, say, a misdirected bomb are morally different from intentional targeting, though they're equally dead). Saying that innocent people die in wars is just true, regardless of the war. It's not saying much at all.
I think our efforts would be better directed towards hard news stuff, figuring out what's going on and what the people involved are trying to do, rather than looking for inconsistencies in politicians' statements.
from 2015: Rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian militant groups during last summer's conflict in Gaza amounted to war crimes, Amnesty International says
Hamas fired 4,800 rockets and 1,700 mortars over a 50-day period (averaging 130 per day).
and those weapons were not accurate enough to be sure they were only targeting military targets.
so intent is important, but it's not determinative. killing civilians accidentally can still be a war crime.
from an Oct 25th NYT article:
from the Israeli military's own figures - 7,000 strikes in 18 days. that's 388 per day, about 3 times the rate of the Hamas strikes in 2014.
for reference, here's the population density of Gaza compared with a couple of islands (which I think are the best comparison to the population of Gaza because Israel's fortified border with Gaza turns it into effectively an island):
so Gaza is a bit less dense than Singapore, but about twice as dense as Staten Island and three times as dense as Long Island.
and the Israeli military has been averaging an airstrike every 3.7 minutes for almost 3 weeks straight.
at some point, when you're targeting an area that is that dense with civilians, their deaths are no longer "accidental". they can't be shrugged off with "oh collateral damage happens" as Biden is doing.
you can post all the "hard news" you want.
I'm going to continue to try to humanize the conflict, and in particular draw attention to the way the US government and lots of media outlets talk differently about Israeli civilians and Palestinian civilians. this classification is step 1 in the 10 stages of genocide.
Your own links don't really support your argument. To be clear, from the bbc article you linked:
This is a nebulous call at best, but is justified by, as you pointed out, them being inherently discriminate. It sorta helps the classification that Hamas is generally very clear that that's exactly what they're doing, and generally unashamed about it (they do say in that very same article that they disagreed with amnesty international's facts to be clear). This recent attack was absolutely not at military targets by any stretch.
Everything else you're posting is awkward connections. Yes its a dense area. Yes civilians are dying. Is that a "flagrant disregard"? I have no idea. I personally find the classification almost pointless as it doesn't really line up with the history of war, and "war crimes" are mostly things powerful countries trounce out when they want to justify something, as just about every military commits them to some degree.
This is doubly true when you're talking about a war/conflict in a hyper dense area with no clear military infrastructure, and a hostile population. This always gets into the weeds of "well of course they're hostile, look at how they're treated" vs "well of course they're hostile, look at what they're taught", but it doesn't change the simple reality, that it's very unlikely any nation would accept this kind of attack without retaliation, and "well the population is too dense for us to do anything" is just not happening.
People talk about surgical strikes in these idealized terms when they're really not feasible and quite frankly, there's no military that's just going to risk its troops needlessly when it comes to them vs an enemy countries civilians. They will be using whatever options they have at their disposal to make their mission easier and safer for their forces.
That doesn't excuse what's going on, but tying to tie that complex reality back to the US presidents throwaway soundbites that were probably written by someone else is where it just feels like reaching. There's so many better and concrete examples if you want to point towards media bias or unequal treatment, that this kind of hoop jumping just undermines the conversation, at least in my eyes.
You have to remember that Gaza has been in a state of war this entire time. No they haven't really been successful, but the Hamas belief is to wage war with Israel.
Civilians die when you declare war. That's what war is. Hamas keeps up it's state of war which endangers all of it's citizens. Israel has gone on and off declaration of war in response and this also puts their own people at risk. The difference is that Israel is more capable of fending off attacks and Israel doesn't mix their military with civilian infrastructure.
When Hamas attacked, Israel was not in a state of war. It was simply murder. Now that they are both in war, another successful attack would be considered an act of war and be judged by those standards. Though the brutality they showed would never be considered a valid way to conduct war operations.
Israel has been colonizing the West Bank and dividing the existing populace into separate, isolated ghettos, as you can in this map from the BBC. Hamas considers this to be an act of war, and while I despise Hamas and to see them toppled, they aren't wrong on this account.
It is absolutely an act of war to militarily occupy enemy territory, and even more so to colonize that territory. It is bizarre to suggest that Israel was in a state of peace with Palestine prior to this particular Hamas attack.
You're talking about Palestinians as if they're a monolith, and as if Hamas is the chosen government acting on behalf of all the Palestinian people.
Do you really don't understand the west bank and the Gaza strip are completely different situations, with different governments, people and needs?
Putting aside the fact that Hamas has been controlling Gaza iligaly via their autocratic Muslim "government", they literally use their people as meat shields, hide missiles and commanders inside mosques, hospitals, scools and even graveyards. Moreover, they forbid citizens from leaving the areas of war, block main roads and punish people who have left.
Don't you get it? Hamas WANTS it's citizens to die.
Hamas is a terrorist dictatorship that controls the Gaza strip. It also has a presence in the West Bank and considers the Israeli settlements there to be a cassus belli. Even though they do not completely control the West Bank, they almost certainly wish to, and I have no doubts that they are deliberately goading Israel into killing Palestinian civilians in order to strengthen their position throughout Palestine. They aren't acting for the good of Palestine; they are acting for the good of themselves. Unfortunately, in the Gaza strip, Palestinians have no other meaningful options to turn to — in part because of Netanyahu's previous worked to undermine the more moderate alternatives and prop up Hamas in their place. (Like Hamas, he has been personally benefitting from the conflict, even if it has blown up a bit in his face now; his efforts to weaken democracy in Israel indicate that his priorities lie with his own power, not with the welfare of the people.)
But none of that means that Palestine and Israel were on friendly terms before this. Israel has been occupying and settling Palestinian territory for decades. Hamas uses this to justify their attacks.
This does not mean that Hamas and Palestine are equivalents. Think of it like this: During The Troubles, the IRA did not control Northern Ireland and it was not supported by all Irish/Catholics in Northern Ireland. It was just a terrorist organization, with even less governing power than Hamas. Nonetheless, it committed terrorist attacks in response to very real transgresses by Britain against the Irish. These attacks (as evil and deplorable as they were) did not come out of nowhere; there was already a conflict in place between Britain and Ireland, and the IRA stepped in and escalated it.
Sorry, which specific act is Hamas considering an act of war? The murders at the festival?
Hamas considers the occupation and colonization of the West Bank to be an ongoing act of war against Palestine, which I agree with: When Russia occupied Crimea and settled Russian citizens there, that was an act of war against Ukraine. When the US occupied Texas and settled American citizens there, that was an act of war against Mexico.
The attack at the Re'im music festival was committed by Hamas, but this is hardly the first time Hamas has committed violence against Israelis, nor the first time that Israel has responded with violence. Hamas and Israel have been at war for a very long time; what we are seeing now is further escalation of an ongoing conflict, not a sudden transition from peacetime to wartime.
The blockade of Gaza is an act of war by all legal standards. Even if you don’t consider their treatment of the West Bank to be relevant to the situation in Gaza, this is clearly not something that just came out of the blue.
I would add one was a premeditated terror attack which targeted civilians and tourists, the other multiple airstrikes which main objective is not to kill civilians (presumably. I think it would be disingenuous to think otherwise)
I think there's a major difference. It's the same difference why news organizations says one got murdered, whilst the other got killed. Intent has serious implications.
Arab Barometer polling suggests that the Hamas-led government in Gaza was very unpopular among Palestinians before its attacks on Israel.
all of the above happened in 2002: President George W. Bush joins in condemnation of Israeli attack (archive link)
I edited the quote to remove the names of the officials quoted, but left it otherwise unchanged.
time is a flat circle.
this one is from a few days ago: Israel strikes dense Gaza camp, says it kills Hamas commander
it's interesting to see how far the Overton window has shifted. in 2002, an Israeli airstrike to kill a Hamas commander had a reported 15 civilian casualties.
and even the George W. Bush administration was like "yeah idk bro that seems bad".
and then in 2023, we have another airstrike, this time on a refugee camp, with a reported 50 civilian deaths. (from just that one attack, of course - the current total Palestinian death toll is more than 9000)
and we get this: Biden facing tough questions over Israel’s strikes on civilians
what universe I am living in where the George W. Bush administration has a more principled stance about civilian casualties than the Joe Biden administration?
How Hamas broke through Israel’s border defenses during Oct. 7 attack (Washington Post)
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Your analysis has merit, but I think it's worth pointing out that not all modern military tech is proving worthless under real world conditions. While they're not always high-tech, drones are a massive game changer and have been used effectively by all combatants.
Unmanned aerial explosives or scout craft are incredibly useful, and this is part of why Starlink has been such a huge deal in Ukraine. The "internet of weapons" is a legitimate threat. Drones may not shift front lines, but they're clearly effective for tactical strikes.
I think this connection is quite tenuous and it would be better to analyze each conflict independently. There's a Ukraine topic for talking about the military lessons there.
Well, there's no rules as such. I do think if we want to continue talking about Ukraine we should do it over there.
This is really interesting from both sides. How easy it was for Israel’s system could collapse but also the amount of planning and precision required from Hamas.
The question is, having done that, after the day is over, what else can they do? Not a lot, I don't think? Was there ever a plan to accomplish anything more? So what's the point of it all?
Perhaps there are surprises in the tunnels.
Reminds me of 9/11, well planned and the US should not have been caught off-guard like that, but there really wasn’t much of a plan after that.
I’m guessing this was a similar call of terror to signal others to join the jihad.
Hamas forced Israel to respond. And life in Gaza was already terrible. Not sure if they ever needed another plan.
Forcing a response that's unfavorable to you would be a mistake. The Israeli response has resulted in a lot of Palestinian suffering already, with more to come. Does this nevertheless achieve some goal important to Hamas, or were they hoping it would play out differently?
Also, the logic of "forcing a response" is that the opponent makes a "forced move" which implies they have reduced agency. The Israelis "had no choice" but to respond and the blame is on Hamas for provoking it.
I don't think that's true. The Israelis are much stronger and have a lot of options on how to respond, so it's not a forced move at all? (Maybe there are fewer options than it seems once you take into account internal politics.)
The logic of deterrence, though, is playing out here. Hamas was presumably supposed to be deterred by the likely Israeli response. If deterrence worked, the weaknesses of the Israeli defense systems wouldn't be so important, since they'd never be tested.
Deterrence fails when the other side doesn't agree with your logic and attacks anyway. The incentives apparently weren't as important as you thought. A failure of deterrence is something this conflict has in common with the war in Ukraine, though they are otherwise very different.
Israel apparently feels they need to cause a lot of suffering, rather than it being exposed as a bluff? If that's what's going on, it shows a continued belief in the power of deterrence, even though it just failed.
The Israelis are stronger than Hamas but do we know Hamas' goal here? Are they planning to draw Iran into the conflict? If the Israeli army is tied up in Gaza, even Hezbollah from Lebanon could do some damage.
Bin Laden's goal in 9 11 to draw the US into a quagmire in the Middle East was achieved even though he personally was killed in response.
I don't know their goals. If that was their goal, Hezbollah and Iran didn't take the bait.
Here's a comment about that from Bret Devereaux:
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I'm no expert, but another arguable time to invade is after significant losses fighting Hamas in tunnels.
But I sincerely hope you are correct and your expert knows what he is talking about.
The Memories That Feed Distrust in the Middle East (Zeynep Tufekci)
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London hate crimes rise again in wake of Middle East conflict
Obama’s warning to Biden, Israel
Apparently, Israeli troops have temporarily blocked the main North-South road through Gaza. One Source Two, apologies for the german source. Source three. I admit the sources aren't perfect, but I haven't found a good EN source. And it doesn't look like the perimeter is airtight as of now.
I'd expect them to leave units in the area to maintain that blocking position while they conduct whatever operations they will in the north;
I don't think they'll be going back home.(Edit: BBC reports they did in fact move on.) Interesting question on my mind now is how many people are north of that line currently? Is there still a million people in there, or more like 100k? Relatedly, but currently even harder to answer, what's the plan now? Going Room-to-room in search of weapons? Or thunder runs to tunnel entrances and other targets that they previously weren't able to hit due to too many nearby civilians?(Edited it down a bit because I was conjecturing a bit too far beyond the evidence.)
White House frustrated by Israel’s onslaught but sees few options (Washington Post)
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Musk says Starlink will provide Gaza connectivity for aid groups
Who would smuggle one in? It seems like just talk so far.
It would have been smart for Hamas to arrange this in advance.