The war against Hamas - Arguments
The final war between Hamas and Israel
began with
Hamas' barbaric massacre
on 7 October 2023.
Any country on earth would respond as Israel did - with a determination to destroy the enemy regime entirely.
The Western left was silent when
Israelis
were massacred, shrugged, and even marched against Israel.
Once Israel went to war with Hamas, the Western left found its voice and
got angry about Gaza civilian deaths.
Israel-haters in the West have tried every possible argument
against this war. They have called Israel's war:
- war crimes
- collective punishment
- starvation
- genocide
This page is to address these claims, which are all ludicrous.
Israel decided on 7 October to eliminate the Gaza regime.
A reasonable response, and most countries would do the same.
But eliminating any regime, and certainly Hamas, without damage to civilians
is a hell of a challenge.
Here is what I think:
-
This is a war of good versus evil, of a liberal democracy versus genocidal terrorists.
There are intelligent discussions about how to prosecute that war with protecting innocent life.
But anyone who does not accept the opening sentence has no place in any intelligent discussion.
There is an amazing contrast in how the world treats
Israel's war against genocidal jihad,
versus how the world treats the war of
other countries against genocidal jihad.
- Consider the war against ISIS.
Operation Inherent Resolve
was launched in 2014 by Obama, with America's allies, to destroy ISIS.
See thread.
It is still going on as at 2024.
It has killed around 10,000 civilians.
-
And no one cares, apart from the far left.
Everyone in the centre could see how evil ISIS was.
And they trusted America and allies to try to protect civilians when destroying it.
And let them get on with it, even knowing that many civilians would die in the fighting.
There seemed no alternative to destroying ISIS.
- Why should this war be any different?
The IDF does not want to destroy innocent life.
But they must destroy Hamas. There is no choice.
So let them get on with it.
Israel strategy to reduce civilian deaths in Gaza includes:
- Moving civilians around from sector to sector to keep them safe.
- Dropping warnings of attacks in a sector to tell them where to move to.
Even though this alerts the enemy.
- Aborting strikes when civilians appear.
- Letting in vast amounts of aid, even though this feeds and supplies the enemy.
We will now discuss all of these.
Israel spends a huge amount of energy moving civilians around
by telling them where is safe.
Almost no army in the history of the world does this.
- The ground invasion of the north:
- IDF warns civilians to move south
a few miles away from the war zone in Gaza city.
- West Point Professor
Michael Schmitt
is baffled at why humanitarian organizations are angry at this.
"[It] is bewildering that humanitarian organizations are not encouraging the civilian population to move away from what will be a destructive and deadly urban battle, in which telling the difference between fighters and civilians is particularly difficult, especially considering
Hamas's past tactics of operating near civilians, engaging in perfidy, and failing to distinguish themselves from civilians."
- Estimates that
1 million Palestinians
or
0.8 million Palestinians
have moved away from the war zone.
- Even as combat on the ground in Gaza City starts and heats up,
thousands of latecomers a day are moving south.
Why would anyone stay?
- 8 Nov estimate.
Out of 1.25 million people in the north, there are only about 100,000 to 200,000 left.
85 to 95 percent of civilians have left the war zone.
- Israelis are evacuated too:
- The ground invasion of the south:
-
Southern Gaza evacuations.
The IDF tries to tell the population where to move to be safe,
in a very complex war against fighters in the south.
- Warnings:
- As at 11 Nov 2023, the IDF had dropped
1.5 million flyers,
sent 6 million voice messages
and 4 million text messages,
to tell people where to go,
and of course alerting the enemy to where the next strike would be.
And here.
- As at 6 Nov 2023, the IDF had made
almost 20,000 phone calls to Gazans
asking them to evacuate.
Why? Why would the IDF do this?
- March 2024 update:
"The IDF reported dropping over 7 million flyers
...
Israel has made over 70,000 direct phone calls, sent over 13 million text messages and left over 15 million pre-recorded voicemails to notify civilians that they should leave combat areas, where they should go, and what route they should take."
- How many armies in the history of war have ever done something like this?
Hint: The answer is "none".
-
Gaza man: Israeli agents spent hours on phone with me to evacuate targeted buildings. 8 Nov 2023.
"The Israeli caller spent over an hour on the phone with Shaheen reportedly telling him that he would give him time as he did not want anyone to die.
...
When the bombing was over, the Israeli told Shaheen. 'We've finished .. you can go back.'"
- IDF phone call to a man called Abu Younes in Rafah, May 2024.
-
The IDF tries to save his family.
They warn him they are about to strike Hamas nearby.
They want him to move half a kilometre.
-
The man does not care. He is happy for his family to die to help Hamas:
"We want to die. And our children also must die.
... We love death the way you love life."
- This single audio explains so much about how children die in Gaza.
- And this single audio shows the nonsense of "genocide".
Why would Israel make such phone calls?
- If the war is "genocide" then why is Israel doing any of these things?
Even a Gazan who hates Israel,
Muhammad Smiry,
admits that Israel sends them messages telling them where to go to avoid imminent bombing and fighting.
And
another leaflet drop
on
8 Jan 2024.
What other army in the world drops such messages?
Of
course Israel does not target civilians.
The IDF targets only fighters.
Israelis have a normal Western-style universal morality that regards civilians in the enemy state
as human beings, who should not be targeted.
Muslims and Arabs fight for the IDF,
because they know the IDF regards
Muslims and Arabs as human beings deserving of rights.
This universal morality means the IDF has no interest in targeting civilians.
This is not the norm worldwide.
The Palestinians are not like this.
Because of the inadequacy of Islam in developing any universal morality,
the Palestinians have no such morality,
and regard all civilians in the enemy state as targets, as we saw on 7 October.
- Aborting strikes:
- If the war is "genocide" then why is Israel doing these things?
- Hamas terrorists are carrying children and using them as literal human shields during gun battles,
say IDF drone operators.
Daily Mail report.
"When we recognise children following terrorists we stop attacking.
They learnt from this. Now they're going down the street with a child in their hand."
- Why does the concept of a "human shield" work?
Why?
It would not work with Hamas. They would kill you and the human shield happily.
Why does it work with the IDF?
-
Question: In all the discussion of whether Israel does or does not do enough to protect civilian lives, I have a question.
Has any Palestinian leader, or any Palestinian intellectual, ever recognised the concept of a "civilian"?
I am not clear that Islam recognises the concept of a "civilian".
And I have never heard a Palestinian recognise the concept.
Civilian-combatant ratios in various wars, genocides and attacks.
Note where the Israel-Gaza war is (light blue).
See
full size.
From
Avi Bitterman, 25 Feb 2024.
Also
here.
The ratio of military v civilian deaths strongly suggests this is normal war.
John Spencer is
chair of urban warfare studies at West Point.
He writes about the IDF's conduct of the war.
-
I'm an expert in urban warfare. Israel is upholding the laws of war,
John Spencer, CNN, 7 Nov 2023.
He notes that IDF practices include:
- Calling everyone in a building to alert them of a pending air strike.
"a tactic I've never seen elsewhere in my decades of experience, as it also notifies the enemy of the attack".
- Dropping small munitions on top of a building to provide additional warning.
- Weeks of requests that civilians evacuate certain parts of Gaza.
- Providing routes that will not be targeted so civilians have paths out.
-
Israel Implemented More Measures to Prevent Civilian Casualties Than Any Other Nation in History,
John Spencer, Newsweek, 31 Jan 2024.
- And associated thread:
"IMO Israel has implemented more measure to prevent civilian casualties in urban warfare than
any other military in the history of war. This includes many measure the U.S. has (or has not) taken in wars & battles but also many measures no military in the world has ever taken."
-
Israel Has Created a New Standard for Urban Warfare. Why Will No One Admit It?,
John Spencer, Newsweek, 25 March 2024.
- Israel Is Winning,
by John Spencer, August 21, 2024.
For the entire war, Israel has let in a vast amount of
humanitarian aid, even though this feeds and supplies the enemy.
COGAT
as at Aug 2024
says
48,000 trucks of aid have gone into Gaza during the war so far.
- Gaza wars
- As soon as the IDF went into Gaza,
Hamas abandoned its uniforms
and adopted civilian clothes.
- Hamas has no uniforms, and no morality in war.
- Weapons and fighters in every school, mosque and hospital:
- Col. Elad Shushan,
head of the 646th Brigade,
says every school and mosque is used by Hamas:
"There is not a UNRWA site, school, mosque, or kindergarten in which we didn't find weapons. None. One hundred percent."
-
IDF officers in Gaza
(quoted in New York Post, Dec 2023)
say that every mosque and every school in Gaza
is used for terrorism.
Every single one cleared so far!
And about one in every two or three homes.
"about one in every two or three homes in Gaza .. has military weaponry
... most often in the children's bedrooms and even under cots
... this is such a pattern that when they search a house they now go straight to the children's bedrooms to uncover weapons caches and entrances to the tunnels."
- Israeli defence speech at The Hague, Jan 2024,
says that every hospital in Gaza
is used for terrorism.
Every single one cleared so far!
- Interview with a British IDF soldier.
"I would say that 75 per cent if not more of the homes we went into had some sort of affiliation with Hamas.
Lots of weapons; we'd find RPGs and grenades on the floor."
- Al-Shifa Hospital,
the largest hospital in Gaza,
has been a long-time Hamas HQ.
- March 2024 raid on the hospital
-
IDF says 650 terror operatives captured at Shifa, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad commanders,
Times of Israel, 21 Mar 2024.
"Among them were Hussam Salameh, the commander of PIJ's observation and intelligence unit in Gaza City,
and his brother, Wissam Salameh, head of the terror group's propaganda unit in Gaza City
...
Also captured at Shifa are three senior officers in Hamas's so-called West Bank headquarters".
(Names follow.)
- Faiq Mabhouh,
head of operations in Hamas' internal security force, was killed in the IDF raid on Shifa hospital.
- See a good
summary of the raid.
-
Hamas fighter admits that Al Shifa Hospital is Hamas HQ.
-
Hamas senior commander admits
that 600 to 1000 terrorists were in Shifa Hospital.
- Hamas admits to extensively using Shifa Hospital.
-
IDF says hostage Noa Marciano was murdered by Hamas inside Shifa Hospital, Nov 2023.
-
Hamas moves hostages across Gaza in ambulances, released captive reveals.
- A typical Hamas day:
Civilians take shelter in school.
Hamas fighters dress in civilian clothes and stay with them.
Civilians spot IDF for Hamas fighters.
Hamas fighters emerge in civilian clothes, carry out attacks, return to join civilians.
No need to change clothes.
IDF has to slowly, painfully, separate fighters from civilians,
even if IDF soldiers die doing that.
Question: If Israel is committing genocide, why does it not flatten the school?
- Children being used by Hamas:
-
IDF accuses Hamas of using child soldiers. The Times of Israel.
"the Israeli military accused Hamas of using child soldiers, including to deliver explosive devices and to
"assess the damage" on battlefields and report it to Hamas gunmen."
- IDF
says Hamas are using children to deliver messages and ammunitions.
New York Post report.
-
IDF officer in Gaza
(quoted in New York Post):
"The soldiers saw a 13-year old boy running with a bag near one of the schools.
He put it down and ran away.
A few minutes later it detonated, badly wounding one of the Israeli soldiers nearby."
-
Yair Levi
reports a story of
Hamas using children as spotters.
In this example, because the IDF did not kill the spotters,
two IDF soldiers died.
- Obviously the conclusion is not go ahead and target the children.
The conclusion is this is a really hard war to fight.
- Hamas attacks aid:
The incredible difficulty of fighting Hamas:
As the IDF closes in,
Hamas assembles children at Al Shifa Hospital (Hamas HQ)
in order to protect it, 7 Nov 2023.
Not only have their parents totally refused to move south out of the war zone (for 4 weeks!)
but their parents have deliberately placed the children at ground zero,
the Hamas HQ, the very centre of the coming fighting.
-
Casualties of the 2023 Israel-Hamas war
- Hamas has been providing casualty figures.
It is important to note:
- These numbers are from a barbaric terrorist organisation
that rapes and massacres civilians, and will tell any lie to advance its cause.
- These numbers do not distinguish between civilians and fighters.
- Thread about Hamas-sourced death figures.
Probably most deaths are Hamas and other fighters, plus children and teens recruited to help their mission.
Some deaths of course will be innocent civilians accidentally killed.
Death tolls must consider all the following groups:
- Terrorists engaging in combat.
- Families of terrorists forced to stay with them. Will include children.
- The many under 18 male teenagers working for the terrorists. These will count as "child" deaths.
- Civilians killed by terrorists, by accident.
- Civilians killed by terrorists, on purpose.
- Innocent civilians caught up in the fighting, as in every war.
- The thousands of normal deaths in any period, from old age, cancer, etc.
Hamas probably adds many or all of these to the death toll.
- Completely fictional stats made up by terrorists.
- As at March 2024,
Israel estimates that 12,000 to 15,000 fighters have been killed.
- Obviously many civilians have died, as in every war.
My position is not that this war is good.
Not that Gazan civilian deaths are great.
My position is this is all terrible.
A disaster.
Gazans should have chosen peace.
-
How the Gaza Ministry of Health Fakes Casualty Numbers
by
Abraham Wyner,
March 7, 2024.
Argues that Hamas is just making up the numbers:
-
The data is too regular.
-
The child deaths do not track the women's deaths, as they should.
Children are not in houses alone. They have their mothers.
-
Women's deaths should somewhat track men's deaths, as violence ebbs and flows. But they do not.
-
The data also implies that Israel never kills a man who is not a Hamas fighter.
The data is made up.
- Hamas's death toll figures are not believable
by Dermot Meleady, 23 Mar 2024.
- The Palestinians
have a history of making up numbers:
- "The Jenin Massacre" in 2002.
The PA said "thousands" of Palestinians had been killed.
In reality, 50 terrorists and 20 IDF soldiers were killed in fighting.
- Al-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion, Oct 2023.
Hamas said 500 Palestinians were killed by an Israeli strike.
In reality, maybe 100 were killed, and they were not killed by Israel.
-
Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry admits to flaws in casualty data, April 2024.
- Hamas admits it has "incomplete data"
for 11,371 of the 33,091 Palestinian fatalities it claims to have documented.
- There could be 22,000 dead. Up to 15,000 combatants and 7,000 civilians.
- The majority of the dead in Gaza might be combatants.
- Analysis, Apr 2024,
says there may be 12,000 terrorist dead and under 5,000 civilian dead.
- UN admits Gaza death toll wrong, with almost 50% fewer women, children killed than previously reported, May 2024.
-
Lifting Hamas's 'Fog of War' Reveals a Very Different Conflict, Seth Mandel, 13 May 2024.
"It's possible, then - perhaps even likely - that the IDF has achieved a
civilian-to-combatant casualty ratio of around 1.5 to 1.0, an unheard-of level of precision and civilian protection in urban warfare."
-
Friendly fire deaths in Gaza speak volumes about the chaos of war, Jake Wallis Simons, August 21, 2024.
Even the craziest conspiracy theorist does not think the IDF is trying to kill the IDF.
So what, then, about the many IDF friendly fire deaths?
They should make people stop and think about the war.
They show how hard war is. How chaotic and confusing,
and how easy it is to injure or kill the wrong people.
- Well worth a read. Could the IDF do better to protect civilian lives? A rational argument for Yes it could:
More than half of "journalists" killed in Gaza were linked to terror groups. At least 13 were actual terrorists.
Analysis from
Elder of Ziyon, 27 Feb 2024.
The ludicrous claims of "genocide" are nothing new.
They have been applied to Israel's actions in Gaza almost every year since 2005.
-
Claims of "genocide" in Gaza 2005 to 2022
- People accusing Israel of "genocide"
each year in 2016, 2017, ... 2021.
- The president of the UN General Assembly described
2008 Gaza war
as a "genocide" against the Palestinian people.
- Abbas accused israel of "genocide" in Gaza
in 2014.
-
"While I welcome the attention that is rightly being focused on Ukraine,
we must not forget the genocide that is being perpetrated by Israel on the Palestinian people."
- Sinn Fein TD
Patricia Ryan
in the Dail, 2 Mar 2022.
- They were accusing Israel of "genocide"
within 10 days of 7 October.
Probably within one day. It would not surprise me.
- A Special Dictionary for Israel
by Shany Mor, Jan 2024.
- Terms are invented just for Israel.
-
"You can search the archives of the New York Times going back about 100 years. The phrase "collective punishment"
appears 633 times, of which 447 are in reference to Israel."
- "Occupation" of Gaza is another one:
"if a territory is occupied because its border with a hostile neighbor is closed, a great deal of the globe is occupied."
- "Genocide" is the latest:
"Not coincidentally, this rhetorical escalation was brought about by the Hamas operation, which
more than any other incident in the century-long conflict over Palestine actually looked genocidal
- Einsatzgruppen with GoPros."
-
"The claims of Israeli genocide in Gaza ... are once again couched in scholarly language and legal principles that are invented for Israel and Israel alone. Were any of them applied to any other theater of conflict, there is scarcely a military action in the world that couldn't be classified as genocide."
- Good comment
on this strange "genocide":
"The ethnic population that has been putatively targeted in this ostensible genocide also has
2.1 million members who are Israeli citizens.
They have been entirely untouched and have representation in the government ostensibly committing 'genocide'."
"Stop Gaza genocide" in 2010.
Original photo is from
"One victory on a long road to freedom",
Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign,
8 April 2010.
Total population of the Gaza Strip.
Note in 1967 the brutal Israeli occupation begins and the Gazan population falls.
Then in 2006 after Hamas takeover the Israeli genocide of Gaza begins and the population is decimated.
There will be no one left in Gaza soon.
The Gaza war compared to other wars and genocides.
From here.
"Comedy" may be the wrong word for it,
but the absurdity of Palestinian arguments since 7 October lends itself
to a form of dark comedy or absurdity.
The absurdity of the attack
Gazans on 6 October:
"Israel is a uniquely evil, heavily-armed, dangerous genocidal state. It has a powerful military and will kill us all for any reason."
What Gazans did not say:
"Let's stay away from this dangerous state. Do not go near the border. Do not go near it."
What Gazans did say:
"Things are quiet right now. Let's invade the dangerous genocidal state and rape and slaughter its people. Oh yes, and kidnap hostages to bring back into Gaza. Sounds like a plan."
Also Gazans, after months of war:
"Help! Israel is a dangerous genocidal state!"
The absurdity of the war
Gazans during the war:
This is the worst genocide we have ever suffered!
Please, please stop doing this to us!
Please let us live!
We are desperate.
We will do anything, anything at all, to stop this genocide.
Israel: Surrender and release the hostages.
Gazans: No way.
A "genocide" unlike every genocide in history.
Found
here.
"If you wanted to commit genocide, you'd crack on and commit genocide.
You wouldn't spend ten months faffing around facilitating aid delivery to your victims and blowing up tunnels."
- Andrew Fox, 17 Aug 2024,
sums it up.
"If Israel was committing genocide, none of our prisons would be full of terrorists. They'd be empty."
- Another brilliant summation, from here.
If this is "genocide", why are any of the captured terrorists still alive?
"The Palestinians would rather see all of Gaza destroyed than return the hostages."
- Another quote that sums up this tragic war.
From here.
