[woooooo]

Bro, I get that you care about Israel, but posting sophistry to Hacker News is not going to change the fundamentals.

Israel is going to be "the country that committed genocide" unless Israelis find a way to stop it. There's no "but you need to understand the complexities of the situation" when it comes to killing hundreds of thousands of defenseless civilians.

[dotancohen]

Then we should both do everything that we can to end this war before the death toll get to the "hundreds of thousands of defenseless civilians" stage.

How about Israel stop fighting, right now? Right this minute. The magazines come out of the rifles and the fighter jets stay on the ground. As soon as the Gazans decide that this is what they want, they can return the hostages and this will happen.

[woooooo]

There was a ceasefire earlier this year, hostages were being released.

Netanyahu won't stop the killing until Israelis, or maybe a future American President, make him.

[dotancohen]

I am Israeli and I completely oppose the war ending until the hostages are all returned. You said it yourself, hostages are returned and the war ceases. Return the remaining hostages and we will have no more need for war.

At the very least, acknowledge that war is expensive and one of the most common tropes thrown at the Jews is that we are cheap. We don't want this expensive war either.

[bigyabai]

> I am Israeli and I completely oppose the war ending until the hostages are all returned.

Then surely you are capable of empathizing with Palestinians. Israel holds thousands of their (civilians!) hostage, in violation of international law, with no fair or expedient trial planned.

Demanding the slaughter of captors does not set a safe precedent for the release of Israel's political prisoners.

> We don't want this expensive war either.

Israel is a nuclear nation. Your countrymen chose to invest in catastrophic war as a way of life, no different from America or Russia. Don't weep about the price of fighting until the IAEA inspects Dimona proper.

[bonesss]

Much of the criticism of Israel is self-serving, one-sided, and predicated on definition twisting.

After 9/11 there was ample “glass parking lot” sentiment. If some enclave of Canadians or Mexicans tortured, murdered, raped thousands then kidnapped hundreds of Americans those parts of Canada/Mexico wouldn’t exist any more. And rightfully so. The hyperbole and constant double standards in the criticism undermine the credibility of all involved (I mean, Sudan… Congo… Afghanistans border…).

Every westerner involved in dogpiling needs fundamental clarity in the order of the “Death to ____” claims. Every, single, argument against The Jews applies immediately afterwards to The Brits, The French, The Spanish, and Great Satan itself: The US.

“500 thousand dead Iraqi children” is a “genocide” too, if we don’t care about facts or words. That specific strain of propaganda directly supports 9/11 style attacks and ongoing terrorism against the US.

I deeply disappointed in the mush brained cowardice we’re displaying. The best liberal democracy in the Middle East, and victim of constant horrific terrorism, deserves better.

[vharuck]

>How about Israel stop fighting, right now? Right this minute. The magazines come out of the rifles and the fighter jets stay on the ground. As soon as the Gazans decide that this is what they want, they can return the hostages and this will happen.

The Israeli government can stop fighting in a way that's currently killing Gazan civilians and destroying Gazan civil infrastructure.

The Gazan civilians cannot release the hostages. Those hostages are held by Hamas, the Gazan government.

This broad-brush blaming leads to despicable crimes against humanity, and is why so many nations have agreed to rules of war. It is inhumane to intentionally punish civilians for what their government is doing. Collateral damage is inevitable, but there must be an effort to minimize it and to actively preserve the lives of civilians. If that means sending in convoys of food trucks after securing a city, then that's what a humane government should do.