New UN report outlines the ‘Anatomy of a Genocide’ in Gaza ( mondoweiss.net )

DouchePalooza , 2 months ago

Gimme a break... A war with supposedly 20000 casualties in a highly dense country with 2 million people is NOT a genocide.

If Hamas and the palestinians want the war to be over, they could just give back the hostages they took on October 7...

Pretty simple really

WraithGear , 2 months ago

At this point just drop the weasel words and say it plain. It is a genocide by all accounts. Its not going to change anything, but call it like it is already.

JustZ , 2 months ago

I disagree.

OccamsTeapot , 2 months ago

On what grounds?

JustZ , 2 months ago

Lots of reasons but mainly that the high civilian death toll is easily explained by Hamas's strategy of using human shields and Hamas's criminal leadership decisions.

The most shocking and inflammatory "reports" are usually unverified and usually come from incredible or incompetent sources, and that this is readily apparent in virtually every article about the war if you can slow your emotions down and actually evaluate the reported facts. Article from credible journalists usually even say "these reports could not be independently verified."

I also find the IDF to be generally credible, usually victims of lies and exaggeration, whereas I find Hamas to have zero credibility whatsoever. I also think it's completely justified to continue bombing military targets until every member of Hamas is dead, and that if civilians in the area of a military target have been reasonably warned to evacuate, that's all that morality or international law requires before launching a strike, especially in light of Hamas's strategy of hiding among willing civilians while also failing to wear uniforms.

Also the death tolls are going down month over month, and the fact that only 30,000 people are dead in in such a densely populated area of 2.3m people, is a testament to the fact that the warnings mostly work, that the evacuations mostly worked, and that the targeting is mostly very precise. Otherwise, the death toll would be much higher.

I also view the conflict almost entirely in terms of the posture between Israel and Iran and trying to avoid a broader war that could kill 100,000,000 people, perhaps more. Like what are we talking about here? Human life, human rights? Try on 30,000,000 dead and see how sad that makes everyone.

Also, I don't see how giving Hamas a country advances the cause of human rights? Extreme religious autocracies have never once secured human rights for anyone. In fact if you go to Gaza and start talking about securing human rights for people you might get murdered for being an infidel.

Finally, the handful of legit war crimes committed by Israelis don't color the entire war for me. Israel actually has a history of prosecuting war criminals, unlike in Gaza where war criminals get a prize from Daddy Hamas.

filister , 2 months ago

If Israel is not gullible, could you please ELI5 why are they not allowing journalists to enter Gaza?

Because if they do and you are right they will show the whole world what a moral army Israel has. Right? Do you see the paradox here?

Weren't Israel also found guilty to provide adequate humanitarian aid, cut food, electricity, drinking water, telecommunications, found guilty of using dumb and extremely powerful bombs over densely populated areas. Destroyed completely the health facilities in Gaza, along with their infrastructure, people's home, forced mass displacement of millions of Gazans who by the way up until now are not allowed to return to their homes and induced immense suffering of millions of civilians? Isn't this collective punishment? What about the reciprocity rule in wars? Do you not find the suffering of regular Palestinians extreme?

So please use a bit of critical thinking next time before posting something.

JustZ , 2 months ago

Found guilty to provide adequate humanitarian aid? No, they were not found guilty of anything. The ICJ denied South Africa's request for a preliminary injunction and instead told Israel to submit a report and to be sure to provide aid. It literally didn't order Israel to do anything it wasn't already doing. Not sure where you got the idea that Israel had been found guilty of something by anyone.

Israel does allow journalists into Gaza in groups. But their reasoning is not secret and not unreasonable.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/high-court-says-israel-can-keep-barring-foreign-reporters-from-gaza/

filister , 2 months ago

Oh man, aren't you living in parallel reality?

Didn't Israel just kill 7 humanitarian workers, making it 200 since the beginning of the war? They hit three clearly marked vehicles with three separate bombs.

There are multiple reports that they don't have a proper deconfliction mechanism 6 months into the war.

Children are dying from malnutrition.

There are multiple reports that their COGAT agency doesn't provide clear guidance on what items are prohibited and are artificially delaying admitting humanitarian aid.

They didn't do anything when a bunch of demonstrators blocked the humanitarian aid with days in an already dire situation in Gaza.

They are currently trying to block UNRWA from functioning in Gaza, during a pre-famine. Shall I also remind you that all UNRWA employees are also going through a vetting process by Israel and all their employees are checked by Israel and now they complain about them being Hamas. So if this is true, Israel has done pretty sloppy job. Shall we also comment the fact that they created a story where they were claiming 12 UNRWA employees to be involved with Hamas, out of 30K. That's less than 0.5%. not to mention that they didn't even provide publicly a proof for their allegations.

Heck, even their closest allies, the US and UK have rebuked them and told them to do more.

The reality is that they can open more crossings and start delivering adequate amounts of humanitarian aid, but they deliberately chose not to. And I can provide you a lot of articles from the likes of Reuters, AP, etc . who should be the least opinionated sources.

Regarding the journalists: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68423995

https://www.ebu.ch/news/2024/03/call-to-allow-foreign-journalists-into-gaza

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4513542-foreign-media-is-banned-from-gaza-biden-should-press-israel-for-access/

And all this coming from the most "moral" army, right.

Maybe next time you should start using that head of yours for something more than sucking your state's propaganda, and perhaps try to put yourself in the regular Gazan's shoes, and tell me how you would feel.

JustZ , 2 months ago

I think your knowledge of this is superficial and you're actually the one in the parallel reality. Like, just one example: Dozens of countries didn't suspend funding to UNRWA over 12 workers, but 12 workers became the face of it. It's the single largest employer in Gaza. It's like Wal-Mart (or is it Amazon now, in America).

You really think only 12 of them are in Hamas? The actual report from Israeli intelligence suggested 12 people helped with October 7. It found that there were thousands, up to half of all UNRWA employees, with direct supportive ties to members of the local government (Hamas, very popular in Gaza), and likely hundreds to thousands of actual card-carrying members, in addition to the 12 known employees who used UNRWA resources to execute October 7.

UNRWA has long been accused of enabling Hamas and acting as an impediment to peace.

Israel can and should allow more aid. And it seems like its failure to do so is going to cost its leadership their jobs in the next election, not Hamas though, because their leadership is holed up in Rafah surrounded by hundreds of thousands of human shields and the first thing they did after being elected to power was cancel all future elections.

in4aPenny , 2 months ago

Where is the proof that there are thousands of UNRWA employees that helped Oct 7th happen? I tried looking it up and couldn't find anything.

JustZ , 2 months ago

That's not what I said. There were 12 known to have helped at the time funding was pulled. A few others have been discovered since. An Israeli hostages was rescued out of the attic of an UNRWA teacher, for example.

I said hundreds to thousands are members and close supporters. I'm seeing articles saying 30 helped and 450 employees are members. I cannot find right now in the sea of articles the details I am referring to, but they were in a 13 page report from Israel to the US Congress a week or so after funding was pulled. The report is classified but some folks talked about it. I think it was a gang of eight member who gave the details on how many UNRWA employees have a family member in Hamas. I want to say it was 4,000 to 6,000. I'll poke around for the article. It may even have been a press briefing by a legislator. State Department I think had some details in a press conference as well, around the same time. I'll find it when I get some time.

Keeponstalin , 2 months ago

Zero were 'known to have helped'

In January, Israel set out allegations that were seismic for the United Nations’ relief work in Gaza: staff working for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine (Unrwa), it alleged, had taken part in the 7 October attacks by Hamas. Almost two months later, with funding for the agency paused by international donors including the UK and US, UN investigators are yet to receive evidence of Israel’s claims – and relations between the two sides are at an all-time low.

The evidence cited in Israel’s dossier included text messages, intercepted calls, and mobile phone data said to establish the 12 staffers’ movements during the attacks. In early February, Unrwa fired nine staffers accused of being involved in the attacks, saying that it had done so in advance of any investigation because “the ability of the entire agency to continue to operate and deliver critical humanitarian assistance was at stake”.

But as the weeks have passed, the reliability of Israel’s allegations has been called into question. “Unrwa say they’ve barely received any evidence, and that they have seen some confessions that appear to have been obtained under duress in Israeli detention,” Jason said.

Israel has refused to cooperate with the UN and has provided none of its evidence despite a fact-finding mission by investigators, the Daily Telegraph reported. And a US intelligence assessment reportedly found with “low confidence” that a handful of staff had participated in the attack but cast doubt on claims of wider collaboration between Hamas and Unrwa.

In the meantime, the situation for Palestinians relying on Unrwa’s aid remains dire, with the World Food Programme and the World Health Organization warning this week that northern Gaza is now on the brink of famine, and only about a third of the 500 trucks of aid needed a day crossing into the territory. There have been 168 Unrwa employees killed since the conflict began, and Lazzarini said on Monday that he had been denied access to Gaza by the Israeli authorities, a claim Israel denies. Last week, a food distribution centre in Rafah run by Unrwa was hit by an Israeli airstrike.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/20/first-edition-israel-unrwa

JustZ , 2 months ago

I know it's crazy you can find anything on the internet. Including some obviously false quotes in the Guardian article. Israel provided a confidential report to the ICJ on February 21, I think was the date.

Anyway you're going with the theory that Israeli intelligence officers and diplomats came to America and lied to President's face, along with Sec State and Sec Def, and not only that, but all of them fell for the lie. Give me a break. You were born yesterday I guess, not me though.