[McDyver]

It makes sense that people don't want to become citizens and legitimise the entity occupying their country and committing genocide, no?

> In cases where civilians are shot (what Israel defines to be civilians), there are investigations and sometimes even punishments for the perpetrators.

Obviously Israel doesn't consider children to be civilians

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gd01g1gxro

[thyristan]

> It makes sense that people don't want to become citizens and legitimise the entity occupying their country and committing genocide, no?

I can accept not wanting to be part of that. But in that case, whining about missing democratic representation is just silly, of course you won't be represented if you chose not to be, no matter the reason.

> Obviously Israel doesn't consider children to be civilians

You seem to assume that all children are always civilians, but that is wrong. The articles of war don't put an age limit on being an enemy combatant. If you take up arms, you are a legitimate target, no matter your age. Many armies use child soldiers, and it is totally OK to shoot those child soldiers in a war.

[McDyver]

I assume children queuing for food are not soldiers. Yes, yes I do.

If they are killed while they are in uniform and holding a gun during a gunfight, then they are soldiers.

[reliabilityguy]

> legitimise the entity occupying their country

What’s country? Palestine never existed as independent country.

[McDyver]

Exactly, what's a country?

Israel never existed either, until it was administratively created in 1948. Maybe it shouldn't have been created where other people were already living?

[reliabilityguy]

You started with “occupying their country”. Can you tell me what country is that?

[DiogenesKynikos]

If it's not a different country from Israel, then give them Israeli citizenship.

There's a very simple reason Israel doesn't give the Palestinians citizenship: Israel wants to make sure the large majority of voters are Jewish. It wants the land, but not the people who live there.

[reliabilityguy]

> If it's not a different country from Israel, then give them Israeli citizenship.

The period we are talking about had no Israel either, so I am not sure what was supposed to happen there in your view.

> There's a very simple reason Israel doesn't give the Palestinians citizenship: Israel wants to make sure the large majority of voters are Jewish.

Of course. We all (1) see what happens to non-muslims in other middle eastern countries, and (2) saw what happened to the middle eastern jewry after 1948. I doubt that Iraqi jews living in Israel want to live under Islamic rule again.

> It wants the land, but not the people who live there.

This is false. Israel multiple times traded land for peace. The latest one was leaving Gaza in 2005.

Why are you keeping twisting the facts to suit your narrative?

[DiogenesKynikos]

＞ Of course.

And you think that's legitimate? Keeping millions of people under permanent rule of a state with no rights whatsoever?

I'm not going to get into your historical claims, except to note that the reason why the situation for Middle Eastern Jews changed so drastically after 1948 was because a bunch of people claiming to represent all Jews conquered a strip of land in the Middle East and expelled the native population. That did not go down well elsewhere in the Middle East, and the fact that the new state was proclaimed "the Jewish state" painted a target on the back of Jews throughout the region, who had had nothing to do with the founding of Israel.

> Israel multiple times traded land for peace. The latest one was leaving Gaza in 2005.

Israel left Gaza in 2005 so that it could concentrate on the settlement of the West Bank. It was a strategic move to conserve their forces.

The only "land for peace" deal that Israel has made is with Egypt. Israel did that because it did not want to risk another war like 1973 with a serious military opponent.

[McDyver]

Indeed. But what is a country? Is it a place where people live and have their identity, or does it need to be "ratified" by the UN? Before 1945 were there no "countries"?

Does it legitimise the invasion of someone's land? I don't think so

[reliabilityguy]

> Before 1945 were there no "countries"?

There were. They had their own government, and were able to have relationships with other countries.

At what point in time Palestinians had their own government and country? I’ll remind you that during the mandate there was no Jordan as well.

> Does it legitimise the invasion of someone's land? I don't think so

Jews also owned land there during the mandate, the ottomans, and even before. Is it okay to take their land?

[McDyver]

> Is it okay to take their land?

Of course not! It's not OK to take anyone's anything.

Edit: removing further comments. It would be ideal if everyone could just live in peace

[reliabilityguy]

I'll reply here

> And that is the basis of all this fighting, why doesn't Israel stick to the initial borders they agreed to?

You mean the ones that Palestinians do not want to stick to?

[thyristan]

Phrase it "occupy their land", then it will certainly be correct.

[reliabilityguy]

What about the Jewish people of the land? Do they have a say?

[thyristan]

In the most extreme case, you get a village-by-village, street-by-street or house-by-house subdivision of the resulting countries.

Of course this doesn't really work very well, see Bosnia.

[sva_]

> committing genocide

I've been hearing this for as long as I can remember, yet the population numbers tell a completely different story. It makes no sense to speak of a genocide if the birthrate far outpaces any casualties. In fact, the Palestinian population has been growing at a faster pace than Israeli over the past 35 years (that's how far the chart goes on Google)

[McDyver]

Ah, OK. So, in that case they can be killed, but just in a culling kind of way, is that it? Your children can be killed as long as you keep making them?

[reliabilityguy]

How do you propose to fight an asymmetric war?

Genocide requires intent, not just a number of dead. If you judge by the numbers only, then US committed many genocides in the past 50 years.

[tim333]

It tends to be in a defensive or retaliatory way rather than culling. Like things largely peaceful October 6th Hamas kill 1200 Israelis, rape, hostages etc. Israels amazingly enough hits back. Hamas: "help! genocide!"

[lostlogin]

So genocide hasn’t happened if the population grows?

‘Just adjust the frame of measurement. With this one simple trick, you can remove any genocide.’

[thyristan]

https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%2078/v78... PDF page 289ff (numbered 277).

> In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

> (a) Killing members of the group;

> (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

> (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

> (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

> (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The tricky part isn't about (a) to (e), it is in "intent to destroy".

[DiogenesKynikos]

"Intent to destroy" is usually difficult to prove, but in this case, it's the easiest part to prove. Israeli leaders (including the President, Prime Minister, Defense Minister, and other ministers), politicians, generals, soldiers and TV commentators (not to mention opinion polling of the general population) have made so many genocidal statements that it's difficult to keep track.

[reliabilityguy]

> "Intent to destroy" is usually difficult to prove, but in this case, it's the easiest part to prove. Israeli leaders (including the President, Prime Minister, Defense Minister, and other ministers), politicians, generals, soldiers and TV commentators (not to mention opinion polling of the general population) have made so many genocidal statements that it's difficult to keep track.

So, if you can’t prove the intent, you are saying it’s enough to use “polling”, TV interviews, and what the politicians had to say? I guess it’s bad news for the Palestinians, then. With Palestinians we have official policy that pays money to kill Israelis regardless of their status and political views. Way more convincing than “polling”.