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by prmph 886 days ago
> There was never a realistic threat of Hamas "destroying all of Israel" from Gaza, regardless of what Hamas might have wished they were capable of

This is the argument I just don't get. Are you saying Hamas is not all that bad because, although they have clear genocidal intent, they are not likely to be able to carry it out?

Its like saying a hitman, who fails to carry out a plan to kill, is better than a driver whose car malfunctions and actually causes a fatal accident.

2 comments

"Its like saying a hitman, who fails to carry out a plan to kill, is better than a driver whose car malfunctions and actually causes a fatal accident. "

No, it's like saying a a hitman who fails to carry out a plan to kill is better than an army of hitmen who succeed. And that is simple to say.

[edit]

If you really want to understand the people with whom you disagree, you might find it useful to understand that no one believes that this situation is just some accident into which the IDF has been forced to act. That is a long history, but the idea that one group is malicious and the other group is just acting like a person operating a car is central to the disagreements.

To use your metaphor for a lot of us what we are hearing is that drivers in cars have a historical mandate to mow down pedestrians who aren't in crosswalks. I don't think that is true, and I don't think that the IDF is operating ethically in any sense.

That's not an argument, that's a cold hard fact.

The argument is that someone wishing they could commit ethnic cleansing does not excuse actually committing it on a third party. Just like Hamas thinking collective punishment is justified doesn't mean you get to respond with collective punishment. Hamas and other terrorists are not the standard.