[Liron]

Israeli here, can't directly answer your question since I've lived in the US for 99% of my adult life, but I consider myself pro-Israel and resent the way Israel is currently/always being portrayed. I see the key problem as people removing context: Context for why the current situation could easily be different if Hamas acted/acts differently, and context for why there is no "just stop fighting" option that leaves Israel with a high confidence that another Oct 7 won't happen in the next few years.

[brentm]

The problem here though is what will ever give Israel confidence that Oct 7 will never happen again? We know that going after terrorists for years and killing them just creates more terrorists (Iraq, Afghanistan). The young children who do not end up dying of starvation will be men in 20 years, still in Gaza with no options to leave and resent Israel who they will consider to be effectively their jailer. The situation is just untenable. I don't like to think that the result of Oct 7 is a more open Gaza but I don't really know what other options Israel has.

Hamas obviously started this but Israel won the war a long time ago. The world deserves an end. The longer it goes on the more Hamas will actually have achieved some kind of lasting positive image of Gaza which is rooted in their actions on Oct 7th and that would be an incredibly bad outcome for all.

[prepend]

> what will ever give Israel confidence that Oct 7 will never happen again?

No Hamas in power? Seems like that would give pretty good confidence.

This reminds me of alternate history stories where Japan refused to surrender. The US demanded unconditional surrender in WW2. What would have happened if the axis refused. What would have made the allies confident that the war was over without German and Japanese unconditional surrender.

It seems like Hamas is not surrendering and Israel is demanding that. If Hamas surrendered and left power, would that appease Israel?

[cultofmetatron]

Hamas isn' in control of the west bank. That hasn't gone so well for the Palestinians either.

Google "Great March of Return" if you want to learn about what happenned when palestinians tried to protest peacefully.

[tguvot]

if you will read wikipage of great march of return, it will tell you that from first day it wasn't peaceful

[cultofmetatron]

well.. straight from the page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_Gaza_border_...

```

At least 189 Palestinians were killed between 30 March and 31 December 2018.[28]: 6 [29][30] An independent United Nations commission said that at least 29 out of the 189 killed were militants.[5] Israeli soldiers fired tear gas and live ammunition.[31] According to Robert Mardini, head of Middle East for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), more than 13,000 Palestinians were wounded as of 19 June 2018. The majority were wounded severely, with some 1,400 struck by three to five bullets.[32] No Israelis were physically harmed from 30 March to 12 May, until one Israeli soldier was reported as slightly wounded on 14 May,[9] the day the protests peaked. The same day, 59 or 60 Palestinians were shot dead at twelve clash points along the border fence.[33]

```

yea, seems like it was the israelis who weren't peaceful. sorry if we're all starting to see a pattern.

edit: yes, 29 militants out of 189 killed and 130000 wounded. even at the most sympathetic take, Israelis come out looking like a bunch of sociopaths.

[tguvot]

29 killed militants in peaceful march of return ? you seems to be contradicting yourself.

you also seems to skipped the beginning of article. for example, day 1 of peaceful march of return:

Hundreds of young Palestinians, however, ignored warnings by the organizers and the Israeli military to avoid the border zone.[74] Some began throwing stones and Molotov cocktails, to which Israel responded by declaring the Gaza border zone a closed military zone and opening fire at them.[55] The events of the day were some of the most violent in recent years.[75] In one incident, two Palestinian gunmen approached the fence, armed with AK-47 assault rifles and hand grenades, and exchanged fire with IDF soldiers. They were killed and their bodies were recovered by the IDF.

[tguvot]

you need to improve your vibe quoting. article talks about 13,000 wounded, not 130,000. iirc, been impacted by tear gas is also "wounded".

but back to the point.

- do you still claim that it was "peaceful march of return" ?

- where do you think the "return" part of the march were leading and what would have happened there ? (just in case, in UN report on Oct 7 documented that in most of places civilians followed armed members of hamas/pij/pflp/etc and engaged in looting, killing (famously thai workers that their heads were chopped off by unarmed civilians with help of hoe) and kidnapping (later sold to hamas/etc)

[gmueckl]

I don't see why the result of a Hamas surrender wouldn't be a new organization with the same goals and methods. A surrender by itself is just a formality. But what is the real plan here? What would realistically come after that and how scary/brutal would it be?

[dlubarov]

Realistically, I think the plan is just reoccupation of Gaza. The military presence would make it harder for Hamas-like organizations to organize and assemble rockets etc. It might be something like pre-2005 Gaza.

[xg15]

And you think the children who's entire families were obliterated will simply forget that, only because Hamas was defeated?

[crote]

So who will be in power? You've got to remember that Hamas was democratically elected back in 2006, and its main rival Fatah isn't exactly pro-Israel either. Given the circumstances, I don't think there could possibly be a democratically elected government in Gaza which is pro-Israel or even neutral-Israel. Your only option is a puppet dictatorship government installed by Israel - but that's not really going to improve the situation, is it?

Besides, you've got to remember that a country is more than its government. What's going to stop its citizens from independently creating their own underground Hamas 2.0 terror group? What's going to stop the kids currently growing up and seeing their parents die due to Israeli actions from wanting revenge?

The situation is too far gone. Either Israel is going to learn how to live with the possibility of an attack (which is going to decrease over time as generations grow up who don't inherently hate Israel with every bone in their body for what it has done to them), or Israel is going to have to kill every single person in Gaza to make sure there's nobody left who could hate them. They should probably continue with Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt - because they all could attack Israel, after all...

France still has to live with the risk of Germany invading. It's fairly unlikely by now, but that risk exists. Germany has invaded multiple times in the not-too-distant past and done some pretty atrocious things while there. Germany still has a pretty large military, and I would be quite surprised if they didn't have some kind of invasion plan lying around in a drawer somewhere. Yet somehow, I don't think the average French citizen in 2025 loses any sleep over it. If they can live with the risk, why does Israel require absolutes?

[BrandoElFollito]

> , I don't think the average French citizen in 2025 loses any sleep over it. If they can live with the risk, why does Israel require absolutes?

No, we do not lose sleep about that. We have also been at war with England, Italy and Spain a lot. Especially England. We keep a close eye on them still that the Hastings battle is not forgotten.

But on the serious side, these concerns are so remote compared with the situation in Israel and Palestine. We do not have any territory claims with Germany. They have their land, we have ours. If you ask a random person in France about territoires we should get back, they would be really confused. The ones historically inclined would consider the 7th and 8th century and Charlemagne's lands.

I guess that this topic in the mind of Israelis and Palestinians is much, much more prevalent.

[bawolff]

In fairness here, germany and france have been at peace for something like 80 years, most of that a fairly friendly peace. The people who remember a time when Germany was the enemy are basically dead by now. 80 years buys a lot of by-gones

Hell, maybe Germany and Israel make a good comparison here. The jews who lived in mandatory palestine during WW2 were certainly afraid of Germany (and rightfully so), but i don't think Israel loses much sleep over the modern state of Germany.

[BrandoElFollito]

Yes, I totally agree. I wanted to make it clear that the analogy for France-Germany simply does not fly.

Our countries have been at war for two millennia (whatever "country" meant across the ages), like the rest of Europe. Then, after WWII, a tremendous effort was made to mend the relationship, and the really good idea was to involve the youth.

When I was a teenager in the 80s, those who had German as a foreign language (sometimes as the first foreign language, before English) had exchanges with peers in Germany (they were coming to us and living with us for a week, and then we were going to them). It was great.

30 years later, my son had the same exchange and I could look at the kids' behaviour more closely. They (the French and the Germans kids) decided to have a football match. I was sure that it would be a Germany vs France one. Not at all: they mixed up, with teams composed of pairs (local and foreign). It was a-ma-zing.

[nradov]

France no longer has to live with the risk of of a conventional invasion by Germany because France has nuclear weapons now and Germany does not. If a terrorist group was using German territory as a base to launch attacks against France and the German government refused to stop them then I'm pretty sure that France would retaliate kinetically, even if that meant some collateral damage. The USA did this in 2001 when Al Qaeda used Afghanistan as a base; France even assisted with that war.

Geography also matters. Israel is tiny compared to France. Israel has zero strategic depth and population centers could be overrun in a matter of hours if defenses failed. This tends to push their strategic planning towards absolutism. And to be clear I'm not trying to justify Israeli actions, just pointing out the strategic calculus at work and the difficulty of negotiating an agreement acceptable to both sides.

[xg15]

Israel also has nuclear weapons...

[nradov]

Yes, but those nuclear weapons are only a deterrent against other nation states. They aren't effective against Palestinian terrorist organizations, so they don't factor into the question of whether Israel should be willing to accept some significant ongoing risk of terrorist attacks.

[tptacek]

Hamas and Fatah are not comparable in their militancy (or, for that matter, their democratic legitimacy; that a plurality of Gazans are not old enough ever to have voted is not an accident on Hamas' part).

[DrNosferatu]

France no longer has to live with the risk of an invasion by Germany *because* the Allies stopped the cycle of violence by deciding to reconstruct Germany rather than erase her off the map.

That’s the reason why.

As abundantly mentioned already, the Palestinian survivors will remember and have their revenge someday.

…unless the plan is: “there will be no survivors”.

Have you noticed how shocking the above “plan” is? Events seem to closely align with it. A literal final solution. Equally shocking is how little people care about actual genocide, and - consequently - how normalized this is in practice.

The international community lets Israel get away with far too much.

[bluecheese452]

We don’t know this. There are several wealthy nations that have produced many terrorists and several poor nations that have produced none. The most famous terrorist in history was a wealthy man from a wealthy nation.

[giardini]

Whom do you refer to as "the most famous terrorist in history"?

[aspenmayer]

Considering that they mention his family wealth, I can only assume that they mean Osama bin Laden.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden

[bluecheese452]

Yep that is who I meant.

[nandomrumber]

Why do that? If you mean to say something, go ahead and say it.

[ohdeargodno]

>what will ever give Israel confidence that Oct 7 will never happen again

Why are you asking "what will give the genocidal state confidence", and not bothering for a single second about what will give the hundred of thousands of permanently traumatised, hurt and dead Palestinians confidence that their genocidal neighbours will not do it again ?

>still in Gaza with no options to leave and resent Israel who they will consider to be effectively their jailer.

Which, yes, is the reason for October 7. Seems like oppressing a people (that already doesn't particularly like you for various reasons) has consequences. Unfortunately, these consequences land on civilians. Breeding the conditions for Hamas (and soon enough Hamas 2 provided the Gazan population isn't dead from famine within the next few months)

> I don't like to think that the result of Oct 7 is a more open Gaza but I don't really know what other options Israel has.

Why do you not enjoy the idea of giving a group independence and ownership over the land that has been theirs for centuries ?

>Hamas obviously started this but Israel won the war a long time ago.

Opening history books would tend to show that it started over 70 years ago with the forced resettlement of Palestinians already living within the protectorate (land already stolen from them), the colonization of Gaza, Golan heights, the nakba and the repeated offensives on Gaza and Cisjordania as well as the assassinations of multiple political leaders (both Palestinian and Israeli), but I guess the Israeli propaganda that Oct 7 started it all has taken root.

>The world deserves an end.

Your feelings about seeing this ongoing conflict doesn't really matter. Palestinians deserve an end to this suffering. The Israelis not supporting the ongoing genocide deserve an end to the conflict. The world has nothing to do with this.

>The longer it goes on the more Hamas will actually have achieved some kind of lasting positive image of Gaza which is rooted in their actions on Oct 7th and that would be an incredibly bad outcome for all.

You do realize that Hamas is getting a positive image despite being literal terrorists embezzling money and food from the Gaza population and establishing a dictatorship because the "only democracy in the middle east" is committing a genocide, right ? Genocide supported by the vast majority of the Israeli government, as well as the Knesset ?

This situation ends in two ways: either the Palestinians disappear, or Israel disappears. With their recent actions, they've ensured that a two state solution is impossible. Of course, the likelihood of Israel being destroyed is almost nil, so the only way this happens is a single state where both arabs and jews live equally and freely (and most likely under HEAVY international peacekeeping missions), but the ethnostate proponents are slightly iffy about this proposition.

[brentm]

> This situation ends in two ways: either the Palestinians disappear, or Israel disappears.

See this is the problem, that kind of thought is why Israel is comfortable allowing the people of Gaza to suffer indefinitely. Hamas and the people of Gaza have zero power in this situation. They can either bend over backwards and appease Israel to try to regain some trust and maybe at some point Israel will slowly loosen restrictions over them. Or Hamas and the people of Gaza can be defiant, say there is no room for both countries and then the obvious choice is for Israel to persecute them indefinitely because what else are they going to do? They are winning and they have that option right now.

Look I am not saying Israel has not done things here that appear from my perspective to be too much but Hamas brought this on Gaza. They murdered innocent people in their homes in a disgusting sneak attack and for that they have brought suffering on their people.

[ohdeargodno]

Bend over backwards to a country that tortured them and is committing a genocide against them? Would you have asked the Jews to bend over backwards to Nazi Germany to appease them?

You're not interested in discussing in good faith, pretending that this is only because of October 7. Hope you sleep soundly while tens of thousands of children die at the hand of a genocidal state.

[andriesm]

Not the original commentor, but outrage aside, what choices are there? Sometimes a problem isn't solved despite a solution existing. But in this case it's not clear to me that any real "solution" exists?

For Palestine: Either defiant resistance until extermination (or victory whatever it means) or bowing to a group one hates with every fiber of your being? No? Other alternatives? Alternatives they would be willing to accept? How do you even get concensus on such charged matters?

A lot of Palestinians are non-negotiable about wanting all Israelis gone from the region. And a lot of Israeli's may be willing to accept terrible solutions - terrible for the Palestinians. Some say genocide. But how do you choose between genocide or tolerating ongoing attacks?

Other solutions: Outside intervention. Outside world intervenes, but how and at what cost?

And for how long, and will it really be effective? And effective for which side? Is there a way to intervene without tipping the balance in favour of one side over the other? How to intervene in the most fair way to all sides? And is the cost and risk even worth it - unlikely?

I don't see how. I don't see any solutions. I have not heard of any viable solutions acceptable to majorities of populations on both sides, or even acceptable to most impartial outsiders.

Problem is not solved, because it is unsolvable. So it will end badly? Or continue as is for decades more.

I pasted this into Gemini trying to find solutions, the best I can come up with is a two state solution, involving land swaps to clear up the border, and then an international peace keeping force seperating them.

Exploring this solution reveals problems on both sides with proposed land swaps, suggesting basically that outsiders will have to ram a compromise solution down the throats of both sides - which to me sounds rather terrible.

[ImPostingOnHN]

> Exploring this solution reveals problems on both sides with proposed land swaps, suggesting basically that outsiders will have to ram a compromise solution down the throats of both sides

The point of land swaps is to seek an optimal solution, so all it requires for negotiation is israel and palestine starting from a mutually-acceptable (or mutually-unacceptable) set of lands, and swapping until either wants to stop. Not that it's necessarily the best way to do things.

Of course, it might require 3rd parties to arbitrate, which is totally reasonable, because there is not a consistent track record of each "side" treating the other "side" as absolute, inalienable equals, which is a prerequisite to equitable negotiation without intermediaries.

> how do you choose between genocide or tolerating ongoing attacks?

I don't understand how this is even a question. War crimes [and crimes against humanity] are always bad, wrong, and illegal, no matter how much one feels they're being attacked. There is simply no justification for them whatsoever, not even war crimes from "the other side". That's the point of them being war crimes: some crimes are so heinous that even "war" doesn't justify them.

[brentm]

> Would you have asked the Jews to bend over backwards to Nazi Germany to appease them?

The holocaust did not happen because Jews were sneaking into Berlin and murdering innocent people in their homes. When the current conflict begins in that way then the group who started it needs to beg for forgiveness, especially when that is their only card. Hamas is no match for Israel militarily and have no cards to play here. Their only options is to continue to make their people suffer and hope that somehow that leads to outside powers interjecting and changing their situation for the better. The best way to resolve this is to beg for forgiveness and internally remove Hamas from power. Hamas is the problem here, I'd like to think the average citizen of Gaza could find a way to live in peace with Israel if given the choice.

[ohdeargodno]

>The holocaust did not happen because Jews were sneaking into Berlin and murdering innocent people in their homes. When the current conflict begins in that way

At the risk of repeating myself: you're not interested in discussing in good faith and are pretending this all started because of Oct 7. But sure, let's play that game: Some jews did kill nazis in Berlin. Maybe even mistakenly killed their innocent wives. Collective punishment was the only option to respond to this behavior, and all the jews needed to suffer from the actions of some.

I don't believe that's a game you want to play, because that's straight up nazi propaganda. It coming from the mouth of an Israeli and targeting Palestinians does not make it any less nazi behavior.

[ImPostingOnHN]

you speak as if the bad part of the holocaust was the excuse, rather than the ethnic cleansing and genocide

by this logic, if only the nazis had provided an excuse acceptable to germans, like israel has provided one acceptable to israelis, the ethnic cleansing and genocide would have been ok

oh wait, they did, and it was the same excuses: 'the preservation of our ethnicity is more important than them'; 'they’re subhuman'; 'we must wipe them out for the good of our society'; etc; etc

so much for 'never again'

[chimineycricket]

>the way Israel is currently/always being portrayed

Israeli soldiers, politicians, and many civilians are portraying themselves this way. Soldiers post videos sniping a child in the head calling it a "legendary video", politicians say Palestinians should starve, civilians block aid trucks.

Do you resent the way they are portrayed or do you mean you resent what a lot of Israelis are doing?

[9dev]

Especially the politicians. Some of the things said on record in the Knesset could have been uttered in the NSDAP, if you switch Palestinian for Jew.

It’s disgusting, and most importantly not at all a matter of propaganda.

[cool_dude85]

This happened in the occupied West Bank. What would you like Hamas to do differently there?

[Liron]

I often don't endorse the behavior of Israeli settlers. I'm responding to the question of what Israelis think about the news in general, a question to which I wanted to contribute the context of Israel's precarious existential security as a sovereign Jewish state.

[istjohn]

It's the "Jewish" in Jewish state that lies at the root of the conflict, isn't it? There aren't many options to maintain a dominant ethnic identity in a democracy when the land the nation was founded on was already inhabited by people who don't share in that identity. The only option is to either cede that ethnic identity or to engage in mass displacement and disenfranchisement.

It's exceedingly subtle the way ethno-nationalism gets smuggled into the phrase "as a sovereign Jewish state," but it is no less terrible and ugly than the ethno-nationalism in other parts of the world and eras in history.

[streptomycin]

There are currently about 40 countries that have a higher Muslim percentage than Israel's Jewish percentage. Many of them much higher. Many of them kicked out all their Jews in recent history.

[ohdeargodno]

Just as a confirmation, how many of those muslim countries are actively in the process of murdering, starving, dehumanising and destroying every single building the jews living in an open air prison ?

[streptomycin]

They all already completed that over the past 75 years, there aren't any Jews left in those countries anymore.

[metalman]

When Hitler asked the King of Moroco to hand over all the jews living there , the King replied that there wrre only Morocans living in Moroco, and he wasn't handing any of them over. Also many muslims voluntered and fought the Nazi's from all over the world, as indivuals and as soldiers in colonial army's. As to jews bieng kicked out, no thats not true, and to this day there is an ongoing effort to get jews to emigrate out of the US or wherever in an attempt to bolster the demographics of there ethnostate......which is currently facing the largest out migration,ever.....

[lo_zamoyski]

What exactly is your argument here? Jews were kicked out of Muslim countries, therefore, Jews can treat Palestinians like subhumans?

[streptomycin]

My argument is that people seem to get very worked up when the Jews do something, but basically nobody cares about other similar or even worse things done by other people. I suspect this is most likely because of antisemitism (not that every anti-Israel person is an antisemite, but that the movement would not have become so prominent without a large core of dedicated antisemites).

[fahhem]

Check your facts, most of those Jews left due to a) Israeli terrorism (bombing synagogues), b) Israeli policies (Magic Carpet), c) Israel-endorsed or Israel-caused racism that obviously wasn't there before because those populations were living there (including Palestine) peacefully for centuries.

[halflife]

Jews were kicked out of all the Arab nations they lived in, were persecuted in Europe, and you think that they shouldn’t get a sovereign country for themselves? Should the Kurds get one? Tibetans? Catalonias? Scottish?

[istjohn]

No one is entitled to displace people from their homes or deny people equal rights on the basis of their race, religion, or ethnicity for any reason. There is no exception for people seeking refuge from oppression.

Jews have and had the right to seek refuge from oppression. No one has the right to perpetuate oppression.

And no, I don't believe ethnonationalism is a panacea for anyone. The world would not be a better place if we could only subdivide into a multitude of homogenous little nations. I am grateful for the cultural diversity of my country. Countries like Japan that strive to protect their racial homogeneity will pay a steep cost.

[kjkjadksj]

There are two lines of logic that disrupt this reasoning. One is israel as an independent state hasn’t existed for thousands of years. The other is Jews do have refuge and safe harbors in the form of western countries. Plenty of Jews living quite comfortably with no threat of war protected by the largest military on the planet in west LA.

So really these people have no reason to be elevated among similarly displaced people who did have a sovereign nation within much more recent timelines, and they aren’t without safe harbor or communities in safer nations that guarantee their rights.

So if the state of Israel does not exist for the safety of Jewish people as logic has plainly laid out, why does it exist? Easy. Military foothold. This is a modern day crusader state. A beachhead. An airbase. A missile platform. A hidden nuclear arsenal. A prolific defense industry with very little red tape binding it. These are the true foundations of Israel today. Everything else is a fig leaf poorly hiding this when you apply rational logic to the emotional justifications that people use. And everything Israel does makes perfect rational sense in light of its true purpose.

[ohdeargodno]

>and you think that they shouldn’t get a sovereign country for themselves?

That's a really easy question: no.

Plenty of people don't have sovereign countries for themselves. Some of them persecuted, some of them integrated by force into other countries. Countries are not owed. They simply are. Tibet is being wholly integrated and controlled by China. Catalonia is somewhat asking for it, native americans are being relegated as second class citizens, and aboriginals in Australia are being left to die. Romanis do not have a country based around their culture.

Jews should absolutely be protected, in whichever country they are. That does not make the world owe them a country. Countries are not owed, they just are. As it stands, Israel is, but as a result of what they have done, not because it was owed to them.

[halflife]

Countries are not owed, they are either won, or given, in every instance of every county in history. Which is exactly how Israel came to be.

No one is questioning the existence of Bulgaria as a separate entity from turkey, when they declared independence after the Russo Turkish war.

[TheOtherHobbes]

The Scottish have a nation called Scotland. It's not entirely sovereign - yet - but it's clearly heading in that direction, and it has already diverged significantly from England on many fundamental policies.

But even when it does become sovereign, I'm finding it hard to imagine that Scotland would annex Northumberland - which used to be Scotland in the distant past - and rape, murder, and starve the English people living there.

There is no excuse for the kind of barbarisms that Israel is perpetrating in Gaza. Not ethnonationalism, not history, not the holocaust, not October 7.

And from an obvious common sense point of view, living in an embattled fortress territory is an eccentric definition of "safe."

It's an outbreak of collective psychopathy and deserves to be labelled as such. The people in charge are basically insane. Extremist ethnonationalism always is, whatever the nationality or background.

[arp242]

The Kurds, Tibetans, Catalonia, or Scottish don't need to ethnically cleanse the land to get their own nation. That's the difference. This is not hard to understand. Most people do not object to the concept of a Jewish state, they object to the ethnic cleansing.

[halflife]

So where can a Jewish state be established without removing the local population?

And regarding some history on the establishment of Israel, after the UN partition resolution the Arabs started a civil war, where Arabs fled from Jewish territories, and Jews fled from Arab territories (Bethlehem and Hebron for example). So you could say that 2 ethno states were established.

[rajup]

Native Americans?

[halflife]

Is there a movement for native Americans sovereignty?

[rafram]

"Precarious" strikes me as a misleading way to describe a nuclear-armed state (and the only nuclear-armed state in its region).

[tome]

Do you believe Israel's continued existence is assured?

[PontifexMinimus]

No, because of their own behaviour. Israel might well lose the support of the USA and Europe, and if that happened the continued existence of their state would be far from certain.

[ben_w]

Europe is certainly shifting.

I think the USA is unlikely to shift for as long as it's one single democratic nation, owing to internal political demographics. Same reasons it hasn't shifted on Cuba. But the USA keeps surprising me by failing to implode despite what all the politicians have been saying about each other, and by the anti-government language often used to justify gun ownership, so if I was in a position to influence Israel, I would be suggesting a diversification of international support.

[tome]

Do you think Israel is acting against its own survival?

[Der_Einzige]

Even without nukes it would be because the arabs in the region are bad at fighting.

But with nukes it for sure is because of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Option

[tome]

I suspect most Israelis think differently. Even if "the arabs in the region are bad at fighting" they still outnumber the Israeli population by something like 20 to 40 times, depending on how you count. About one Israeli was killed for every three Hamas fighters on Oct 7, and it's not an exact comparison for many reasons, but hopefully it provides some perspective.

EDIT: There are a couple of axes that helped me get a broader perspective:

1. Whether one supports Israel's continued existence 2. Whether one believes Israel's continued existence is guaranteed

Having started about midway between yes and no on 1, and at yes on 2, it was extremely enlightening to reinterpret my observations from the point of view of yes on 1 and no on 2. All Israeli behaviour that I had previously found incomprehensible finally made sense.

[cherry_tree]

>often don't endorse

So you do not condemn the behavior of the illegal settlements?

[ashoeafoot]

Hamas was a direct reaction to sharon removing settlers and occupations from the ghaza strip. Hamas os the ultimate answer of trading land for peace. Hamas also has in its charta that they do not want a 2 state solution and they must murder all the jews.

[ASalazarMX]

> there is no "just stop fighting" option that leaves Israel with a high confidence that another Oct 7 won't happen in the next few years

How can the same country that prides itself in their intel/spying prowess, and has demonstrated sophisticated capabilities and attacks, claim it will be helpless if they don't absolutely disappear another group of people and take their territory?

I seriously doubt the Oct 7 attack caught Israel by surprise, given the scale of it and the level of compromise Israel had on Hamas. Given the disproportionate response Israel was prepared to employ, it was a perfect casus belli to appropriate even more land, as it is happening right now.

[ncr100]

Agreed - the apathy and simultaneous granting of an individual's power to e.g. the state or the movement + abandonment of agency is the literal killer here.

[nielsbot]

Oct 7 happened as a result of the Israeli occupation. If there’s occupation, there will be resistance.

Instead Israel could become a democratic state with equal rights for all citizens.

Which context has been stripped from the narrative in your opinion? Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified?

[paulryanrogers]

> Maybe you’ll say Israel is the original Jewish homeland and therefore the occupation is justified?

Being raised evangelical, I was taught the land belonged to the Jews since God judged the original inhabitants, and was given to them forever. Those who taught me see modern Israel as righting ancient wrongs and Palestine as occupying Jewish land. They've even visited the West Bank through a food effort with a Christian missionary.

Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years. Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together. Sadly those with guns, reductive beliefs, or (sometimes understandable) grudges just won't stop. I'm ashamed the US is supporting these cycles of violence, especially evangelical Christianity.

[C6JEsQeQa5fCjE]

> Having left the church, it's much clearer to me that Arabs and Jews have both lived there for thousands of years

Yes, and there was a lot of mixing and slow but gradual conversion to the dominant socio-cultural muslim group that happened over more than a millenium. After the muslim conquest of Levant in about 630 AD, caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab lifted the Christian ban on Jews entering Jerusalem some time later during his reign. We do not have data on how many jews decided to return there, rather than keep living in civilizational centres across the region and in Europe.

What we do know is that the jewish population of Palestine at the time that the British government initiated the process of handing over Palestine to jews in return for Lord Rothschild's money that they needed to keep fighting WW1 [2], was only about 7%. Subsequent immigration of mostly European jews into Palestine, resulted in about 30% jewish population by the time Western powers decided to declare an independent Jewish-dominated state of Israel on top of Palestine in 1947.

> Both have a right to exist and the capacity to live peacefully together

Brutal occupation has no right to exist. The supremacist state has to go. Apartheid South Africa had to go, and now South Africa is a better country. Nazi Germany had to go, and now Germany is a better country. Imperial colonial Japan had to go, and now both itself and its former colonized territories are better countries. Supremacist ethno-nationalist Israel that occupies natives of the land it was established upon with despicable brutality has to go. In the resulting state that comes after it, yes, people of any religion and ethnicity need to be able to live together in peace. After reparations have been made, the right of return has been honored, most of the stolen land has been given back, and apartheid has been dismantled.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration

[TsiCClawOfLight]

South Africa is currently performing a reverse genocide against the White population. It's a war zone. Saying that it's better is quite short sighted.

[C6JEsQeQa5fCjE]

Do you mean the land reform so that the minority white descendants of colonists don't still control 90% of the land even 30 years after the apartheid was officially ended?

If not, can you share links to proof that there is something more serious going on, that would deserve to be called genocide against the white population?

[nielsbot]

This might better be called reverse colonization, which is justice.

[arp242]

Maybe not locking people up in the world's largest open-air prison for an entire generation and constantly kicking their teeth in would help. Just a thought.

"Give me liberty or give me death" as you say in America, I believe. Or does that only apply to the white man?

[lawlessone]

>see the key problem as people removing context

ok when is it contextually ok to starve children?

[bigyabai]

> why there is no "just stop fighting" option

I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that, though I admit I'm not up-to-date on Israeli affairs. Don't the overwhelming majority of outsiders want a two-state solution, or failing that a more secular Israeli administration?

Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace. We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government, and there are simple ways to fix it if the willpower exists.

[bawolff]

> > why there is no "just stop fighting" option

> I don't recall many people ever seriously asking for that

i live in Canada, literally half a world away. Every street light pole seems to have some sort of "Ceasefire now" sticker on it. I also see similar sentiment in online threads on the topic. I think there is a significant group of people who want Israel to commit to an unconditional ceasefire in Gaza.

> We know exactly why Lebanon, Jordan and Syria are angry at the Israeli government

When people talk about this topic, they are usually referring to the conflict with Palestine.

[18172828286177]

People are arguing for an unconditional ceasefire because innocent people and children are literally starving to death.

Many of the people arguing for ceasefire probably wouldn’t be so animated about it if that wasn’t the case, i.e. if Israel was conducting a legal war with targeted strikes. That isn’t the case.

[ivape]

Also:

https://youtube.com/shorts/MuPfkxQns1k

I don’t think it’s okay for a bunch of humans to be rallied in the middle of a desert like that. Forget the fact that they are shooting into the crowd, we’ll talk about that later. Let’s just start with not creating a ghetto in the desert and calling it a humanitarian effort.

I have not even seen movie scenes like that, maybe the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan where the Americans were trying to hide on the beach.

[bawolff]

You're responing to me as if my comment disagreed, but i didn't say anything about the "why", just that their exists people who advocate for an unconditional ceasefire. Which i'm sure you'd agree with.

[ars]

Why are they calling for a ceasefire instead of for Hamas to surrender?

[actionfromafar]

First, maybe they still keep a sliver of hope that the Israeli state will be at least marginally morally superior to a terrorist organization.

Second, many do call for Hamas to surrender.

[ImPostingOnHN]

because an end to the ethnic cleansing is more important than waiting for surrender, if that's even possible given hamas' disrupted command structure and israel's constant creation of new terrorists

a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality

we have seen in the west bank what surrender without a ceasefire or sustainable peace looks like, and it is very bad (see this article for an example)

[bawolff]

> a ceasefire provides room for diplomacy that might lead to concessions from both sides for their atrocities, and thus might lead to peace and equality

We've had something like 100 years of failed diplomacy at this point. I don't know the solution to this conflict, but i can understand why both sides suspect further diplomacy won't lead anywhere unless something fundamental changes.

[gopher_space]

> Through a lens of historical context and not just Oct 7th, it's hard for me to believe that Israelis don't know how to attain regional peace.

The subtext to this conflict is that every avenue leading towards a lasting peace also opens the Netanyahu regime to prosecution.

Israel isn't an ex-Soviet satellite with a dictator propped up by a cold war giant, but their actions become predictable if you think of the state as Netanyahustan.

[disgruntledphd2]

Yeah, basically the only reason they didn't keep the ceasefire is because Netanyahu would have been pushed out of power (and could therefore be tried for corruption more effectively).

But ultimately, the current government is what a (small) majority of Israelis want, which is the most depressing part of this entire conflict.

IDF service is mandatory and there appears to be no resistance to this, which supports the point above.

[7952]

But reading between the lines there are not many plausible end states. Its a choice between a return to a status quo where Israel has defended borders. Or a removal of Palestinians from the territory. I think most people in the international community would prefer the former even when they don't come out and say it. And that may reasonably be safer and better for Israeli civilians.

[ivan_gammel]

There is always possibility of foreign intervention with security guarantees for Israel. Apparently this is already on the table now.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250729-qatar-saudi-e...

[insane_dreamer]

> I see the key problem as people removing context

this is also the main problem with your post; your context goes back to Oct 7, whereas it should go back to 1948 (or earlier).

You cannot drive people from their land into a barren reservation, oppress them for decades, and expect them to not resist or fight back. It's the same colonization tactics that were used on the Native Americans, who launched their Intifadas and occasionally also committed the type of horrible atrocities as Hamas did on Oct 7. You can't justify Oct 7, but the reality is human nature is such that unless you remove the conditions which caused Oct 7 in the first place -- then it will repeat, maybe not Hamas, maybe not in this generation, but the next generation, as we've already seen.

The Israeli government is trying to "solve" the Palestinian problem the same way that the US government "solved" the Native American problem -- kill enough of them, make deals and then break them (this is the Israeli settler problem), and move them far enough away from their original lands, for long enough, that you finally and completely break their spirit and ability to resist. And if that means bombing and starving tens of thousands of women and children, so be it. And the Israeli God-given "right" to the Palestinian land, because it's the "holy land" from 2000 years ago, is very much like the God-given "manifest destiny" that US colonizers invoked to "settle" the West. It was genocide then and it's genocide now.

[ncr100]

Yup - granting power to the state -- from a democratic citizen to the state -- is risky and here it permits a corrupt anti-life (e.g. genocide) state to operate unchallenged.

As it was with the USA, this is a foundational tragedy of Israel.

The innate xenophobic "kill the THEM!" human quality appears to be alive and well, across the world today.

[oa335]

settler attacks against West Bank Palestinians were not caused by Hamas, but by the settlers religious belief that the land is promised to them. That is a key part of the context as well. And in that vein, what options to Palestinians have to defend against violent settlers and displacement?

[tguvot]

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Price_tag_attack_...

[franczesko]

Being pro-Israel, what's your take on quotes from figures such as Smotrich and Ben-gvir?

[tguvot]

majority of israeli population finds them despicable. in polling for next election smotrich party disappears and ben-gvir party shrinks

[empath75]

I am very much of the opinion that Hamas should not be allowed to continued to exist for Israel's benefit and for Palestine's, but there is a lot of space in between "just stop fighting" and "genocide", and Israel is way closer to one side of that than I would prefer.

[Dig1t]

Isn’t the greater context that most of these people (Palestinians) had their ancestral homes stolen by “settlers”? I would vote for a pretty extreme government if someone came and stole my house.

Also, the situation on the ground seems pretty clear cut. You can literally watch videos of brutal war crimes committed by Israel on Reddit. Everyone has direct proof.

[ncr100]

Do you feel apolitical, or that you must be apolitical? As if you have no say in how things turn out?

This grants power while losing agency. And it is more, and more common, e.g. in the United States with its "Deep State" myth of the Q-Anon sect.

[Yeul]

What is the context? A bunch of religious crazies decide to build a colony on the sovereign territory of another state.

Now unless you ascribe to that religion or believe that your tribe can do no wrong it all seems simple.

[senderista]

What state? The Ottoman Empire? The British Empire? In either case, foreign colonial states?

[9dev]

The sovereign state of Jordan, for example?

[dlubarov]

Are we talking about the West Bank now? Jordan relinquished any claim they may have had to the territory.

[nandomrumber]

Australian here.

Aside from a vocal minority, the impression I get around from conversations with and reading other Australians is that the Australian people largely agree with your position.

[xg15]

Unlike the Palestinians, you can simply move to the US though.

[ychnd]

In terms of civilian deaths, Oct 7 is the least important event in this entire fuckup. Or do you think Palestinian lives matter less?

[lo_zamoyski]

It's possible to be critical of both Hamas and Israel, while recognizing that what Israel is doing to Palestinians is evil and a war crime.

Just war principles are important to observe.

The Nazis were a thuggish and murderous regime with plenty of complicity from the German populace, but the firebombing of Dresden was evil, as were the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Targeting civilians is evil.

If we accept that these are evil, and we ought to, then we must accept that what Israel is doing is unacceptable. Bibi should be punished.

You can target Hamas, and you should, but just war does not allow for the means Israel has used.

[18172828286177]

[flagged]

[bawolff]

Can you be more specific why you think so? I don't think what the commenter you are responding to said would meet the definition of collective punishment under international law.

[18172828286177]

Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future.

The commenter’s position is that the situation in Gaza is justifiable because Israel had to take action against Hamas.

This is textbook collective punishment: causing suffering to a massive number of people due to the actions of a minority.

[bawolff]

> Israel is directly causing a mass starvation event in Gaza. Innocent children and women are dying every single day, and if nothing is done soon, scores more will in the near future.

Asuming all that is true, the person you are responding to never said they supported the policies that lead to that or that state of affairs.

It is possible to imagine that someone could both believe that Israel's continued military operation is neccessary and that changes could be made to relieve the humanitarian situation. I dont know if the person you are responding to actually believes that, but based on their comments there is no reason to think they dont.

Edit:

I would also add that the war crime of collective punishment has a specific intent requirement. The perpetrator has to specificly intend to punish the group for an act. Even if the person you were responding to supported all the things you mentioned, unless they supported it as a punishment for oct 7, instead of out of a belief (for example) that it would allow Israel to defeat hamas, then it would not be collective punishment. It would be other war crimes but not collective punishment. See https://opiniojuris.org/2023/10/24/a-short-history-of-the-wa... for a summary of what collective punishment is.

P.s. not so fun fact, the ICC lacks juridsiction over collective punishment, and given they are the main legal body investigating this conflict, we probably arent going to see any investigations into collective punishment

[ivape]

When you speak to someone from MAGA, can’t you tell when they are being amicable but still obviously support all the crazy MAGA stuff? They call this a dark trait that sociopaths have, an unusual propensity to use amicability and charm to appear perceptively reasonable. Good examples of this are Ben Shapiro and Joe Rogan, where often they just seem like well meaning balanced people. It’s manipulative behavior. If you want to see a masterclass on it, check out Steve Bannon’s podcast.

So, while there are people that can present an allegedly reasonable take, the reality is that it’s just a polite smile in front of underlying beliefs and emotions. People in tech should be well acquainted with this type of abuse because we see it all the time in leadership and general corporate nonsense.

Having a back and forth conversation over time is truly violating to one’s self with such people. It’s almost like they think you are stupid. I think given the state of affairs, it’s fine to be more obtuse and blunt with such people so as to draw a red line where they are not allowed to run their manipulation. Genocide is a pretty clear red line.

In short, don’t worry about being so polite. Genocide apologists are running game with the mental gymnastics.

[bawolff]

When you start to dehumanize the other - believe everything they say is just a front for their true evil beliefs, regardless of if you have any evidence of that or especially if your evidence is race, religion or national origin of the speaker - That is the road to facism, and something I disagree with in the strongest possible sense.

[tome]

It's indeed collective. Are you certain it's a punishment?

[SadTrombone]

Playing this corny HN-brained faux-debate game when Israel is blocking hundreds of aid trucks from entering Gaza and letting children starve to death is in really bad taste.

[tome]

It's not "faux". I mean it genuinely. It's one thing to claim that Israel should ensure food security (that's my point of view). It's quite another to claim "collective punishment", and that doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

By the way, there are hundreds of trucks on the Gaza side of the border, the opposite of blocked, let through by Israel, but the UN refuses to collect them and distribute them: https://x.com/Ostrov_A/article/1950577195153580306

It's impressive how thoroughly Hamas has won the information war when they have made it so heart-wrenchingly emotive that presenting any alternative view point is "bad taste" (at best, it can also be much worse).

[lawlessone]

>Are you certain it's a punishment?

I don't think people enjoy starving.

[tome]

Can you please finish the argument? I don't think you can be saying that all starvation is punishment.