I feel like I’ve been kind of in the loop for most of the headlines regarding this confrontation. Yet somehow I can’t find it within myself to actually care about either side. It seems like both are lead by genocidal parties, hell bent on indoctrinating their populace into hating the other side. Yet at the same time people are able to discern which state is the good one. And some going so far as to believe that one state might even be right over the other.
So far from what I’ve read and heard, it seems that overall Isreal is just more successful militarily and is encroaching on Palestinian land, and is exhibiting control over some of it. Is that the reason why one might support Palestine? Is it the fact that Isreal has more direct power in the region and thus can easily execute its will a problematic issue for some? From what I can see, both sides have caused massive civilian casualties and neither side wants a two state solution, so neither of those reasons can be a contributing factor to side picking, right? That being said, I can’t find a reason for supporting Isreal, so does Palestine win out by default? But what of the people that support Isreal, do they do that purely because they’re an American ally? Is any of this side taking have anything to do with the insertion of Jews into the region? What is expected to be done outside of a two state solution or genocide by those taking sides?
I have a lot of questions, and I obviously don’t expect all of them to be answered in a single post. So maybe focusing on the elements you’re highly informed on would be helpful and then I can kind of piece together the details. Thank you in advance!
Read the genocide statute linked above, genocide just requires an attempt to destroy a protected group in whole or in part, combined with some specific acts, has nothing to do with effectiveness or number of deaths.
Hamas openly intends to destroy Jews/Israel (which, as national, ethnic, and religious groups are protected) as per their charter. Israel claims they are attempting to destroy Hamas, which is not a protected group.
Call it a massacre, call it terrible, call it any number of negative terms, but it’s not genocide.
Just listen to Itamar Ben-Gvir’s opinions on palastinians. He does not care about the distinction between Hamas and Palestinians, they are the same to him.
Oh yeah he’s a real piece of shit, loves Jewish terrorists, but he isn’t conducting the war nor does his opinion represent Israel at large.
It is genocide by the definition that they are directly targeting a whole lot of civilians who are not directly aligned with Hamas. By directly shooting them, bombing hospitals, preventing them from leaving Gaza and actively blocking foreign aid even though the UN has told them to stop multiple times. That’s not “attempting to destroy Hamas”, that’s an active “attempt to destroy a protected group [Muslim religion, Arab ethnicity, Palestinian nationality, probably a mix of all three] in whole or in part”.
Their charter has been amended. I’m not going to say I know what Hamas is thinking but saying they openly intend to destroy the Jews is false.
Their actions speak to either a deliberate desire to do so, or a callous disregard for the lives of innocent Jews in their military campaign. But the same is true for Likud and the IDF. There is absolutely no way to claim Hamas is engaged in genocide and IDF is not. Not to mention that Oct 7th was a one off event while the mass-murder of Palestinians is ongoing to this day.
Hamas’ genocidal intentions are not ambiguous. It’s all nicely summed up in this article,
In order to make such a case about Israel, one would have to prove that their intentions are different than what they state, and all evidence indicates that while they may have more tolerance for collateral damage than they had in the past, they still go to great lengths to choose legal targets and minimize civilian casualties, doing things no other nation does to protect civilians. Meanwhile, Hamas obviously and intentionally targets civilians, as displayed on Oct 7.