Yeah, like being affiliated to universities is some kind of stamp of trustworthiness at this point... After the pro-Hamas protests that took place in said universities, and the persecution of Jewish students who were basically blocked from attending school.
I don't support the indiscriminate bombing of the Gaza territory by the IDF. The IDF should practice restraint and act in a way to minimize civil casualties.
But, consider that the Hamas militants deliberately use civilian buildings (hospitals, schools, mosques, etc.) as their military bases, and try their best to blend in with the civilians, when international law dictates all combatants in a war should be wearing uniforms so as to avoid mixing civilians in the skirmishes.
Under those circumstances, and knowing that until the Hamas is anhilated there won't be true peace for Israeli civilians (risk of new missile attacks), it's only natural that Israel will keep pressuring for the destruction on Hamas.
Will there be collateral damage? Sure, like all wars there will be. Especially when Hamas is doing its best to maximize civilian casualties so the useful idiots in the west take pity on them.
Should Israel be scrutinized for their effectiveness in minimizing civilian casualties? Sure. But I don't think that we, living comfortably in countries in which there's no neighbouring nation trying to send missiles at us, should be in a position to demand they cease the war just because we want them to, or pressure them to accept any ceasefire deal that's not good for them. It's primarily up to Israel to decide what's best for the security of their citizens. And also for the security of their soldiers, which have families awaiting for their safe return home when this war's over.
In this scenario, I'd not blame the IDF if they're a little more trigger-happy than we would feel it's reasonable. It's easy for us to judge when we're safe and sound in our countries. But the soldiers are human too and they'll do what's best to preserve their lives. If a neighbouring country launched missiles against my country, I'm sorry for sounding cold, but I'd rather they die them my people die. Of course, I'd prefer if the military acted in a way to minimize casualties so as to preserve the innocent, but if being too careful in this quest endangers the soldiers of my country, I'd prefer my soldiers enhance their survival rate a little more than grant this benefit to the nation that attacked me first.
But I know what's the dominant doctrine in western universities related to the Israel/Hamas war. They're mostly pro-Hamas. I know there are students that don't condone this worldview, but they're strongly penalized by peer pressure and institutional pressure (try being pro-Israel knowing your professor is pro-Hamas... Your grades will surely be affected negatively). When there's incidents of students suffering antisemitism, the administration of those universities have shown they're extremely lax on the perpetrators. It's a systemic failure in respecting different worldviews, because there's an "official" one already.
That's why I'm saying these universities have lost a lot of credibility regarding anything related to this Israel/Hamas conflict, given the pro-Hamas protests occuring in university grounds, and the lack of any condemnation by faculty staff.
When they chant "from the river to the sea Palestine will be free", what do you think they want? Israel is located between said river and sea, so they want to exterminate all Israeli so the land is all theirs. The extermination of all Jews is codified in written form in the Hamas Constitution.
If there are people there who only want to advocate for the Two State Solution for Israel/Palestine, that's a fair point to make. But when these people, knowingly or unknowingly, mix themselves with people that carry Hamas flags and chant "from the river to the sea", then they're either useful idiots, or they're pro-Hamas while using the pro-Palestine cause as a cop out.
No. What I'm saying is that the pro-Palestine protesters in the western countries are, knowingly or unknowingly, boosting the pro-Hamas message in many cases. There are probably very few (if any) pro-Palestine protests that don't include the presence of some degree of pro-Hamas (and by extension, pro-Extermination of all Jews) people. This manifests either in the form of Hamas Flags, explicit anti-Israel flags and demonstrations, or chants of "from the river to the sea".
On the other hand, the pro-Israel protests are very focused on the defense of Israel territory/citizens and anti-discrimation against people of Jewish heritage. There's no explicit call to kill/expell all Palestinians. If there is, it is very fringe and the protestors themselves would certainly eject said person from the protest. At most, the most aggressive remarks are reserved specifically to the Hamas only.
As a said, even if the professor isn't pro-Hamas, he's beholden by institutional pressure to either hide his pro-Isreal views, or be lax on the pro-Hamas views of the students. No matter the side they are, it's controversial either way. But just the pro-Hamas or Pro-Palestien side are allowed to express themselves freely without some kind of pushback or retaliation.
In the end of the day, humans are like this. If faced with the option of saving oneself or another person, most people would choose themselves (unless it's a parent/child situation). In fact, in most jurisdictions, it's not a crime killing in this circustance, but a self-preservation act that nulls any penalty.
In the case of the Israel/Hamas war, Isreal will think of their citizens first and Gaza's citizen's last. And let's not fool ourselves: the Gazan population elected the Hamas with more than 60% of votes. I bet the IDF soldiers think of that before showing excessive pity towards the Gazan population.
I don't live in the cities that have the universities that held pro-Hamas protests so I can't name them, sorry.
I'm just arriving at this conclusion because:
The main doctrine among students and faculty is being pro-Hamas, or at minimum agreeing on things like: Isreal is causing a genocide, Isreal is an apartheid state, Israel makes living in Gaza feel like an open prison, etc.
If any student goes over the line and is explicitly pro-Hamas, or advocates the extermination of all Jews ("to the river to the sea..."), harasses jewish students or blocks them from entering the building, protest in a way to disrupt the right of the non-protesting students to attend class, litter the common areas, etc. If they do this, the faculty just do nothing or reprimend them with a slap on the wrist. In other words, they condone this stuff.
The presidents of those universities often are beholden by the opinion of the pro-Hamas students. There's a famous episode where the president of Havard, Claudine Gay, when asked if “calling for the genocide of Jews” would violate the college’s code of conduct, was evasive and said "it depends on context".
And I'm sorry if I originally said they're mostly pro-Hamas. What I really meant is that they're either pro-Hamas or Pro-Palestine. If they're not, they'd fell intimidated to express their pro-Isreael opinions, just like most pro-Israel students would when they see the treatment their jewish colleagues receive, so it creates the illusion that 99% of the faculty and students are pro-Hamas or pro-Palestine, but it's the social and institutional pressure that I cited above that makes it seem so.
No, it's empirical evidence. It's a well known fact that western universities have a left-leaning bias.
And by extension, a pro-Hamas and/or pro-Palestine bias. This one is supported by the 3 points in my previous comment.
I don't want to make it seems I'm arguing my point. We can agree to disagree, of course. Especially if, for you to be trully satisfied with my answers, it would require me to go in person to those universities and do a field research. I don't even live in the USA. 😅
There's some variation in this. The humanities courses have a higher concentration of left-leaning individuals than other areas. But it might also be explained that the left-leaning are more vocal about their concerns. I know there's a significant silent population of students that might be right-leaning, but they just aren't interested in discussing politics in the unniverity: they just want to finish their course with the minimum trouble possible.
This is just a conversation on the internet. We aren't here presenting an undergraduate thesis. I try to limit things to empirical evidence and appeal to common experiences between us so I don't have to make everyone read a huge wall of text. That's why I said we can just agree to disagree. There's nothing wrong about it. 👽
By the way, sorry for the late response. As I knew my responses would require the most extensive use of quoting, I decided to respond it last.
Your comments contradict one another. You say this here but your other comments give a whole different mindset.
The main idea I'm trying to express is that the IDF should practice restraint where possible. If the restraint is at the cost of raising the risk of their opperations, I'd not blame them if they don't restrain themselves as much as we, people that are safe and sound possibly in another continent, would think is reasonable.
This doesn’t matter much. Because Israel have bombed refugee camps where Hamas didn’t even went to. Israel is bombing anyone who’s a Palestinian, heck even journalists. The argument of “Hamas is using humans as shields” is an old excuse.
I'm not aware of all the movements of the IDF. When Isreal bombs any civilian building, they always claim it was being used as a Hamas hideout or a missile launching base. If there's civilians casualities, it's possible the Hamas forced them to remain there to act as human shield deterrent. If not, I see no reason for Isreal to waste their bombs on buildings where there's no terrorists hiding. For now there's no way to confirm things one way or another. If journalists died, we can't confirm at the moment the IDF targeted them specifically or if it's mere casuality of war (doing journlistic work in a war zone is risky, after all).
Would Israel bomb their own hospitals, schools, refugee camps and all that if Hamas was within Israel? (bet not).
In this case, I think it would e much easier to identify the Hamas terrorists when they're surrounded by people of another ethinicity, and when those people would gladly point out where's the terrorist instead of being coerced to cooperate with Hamas. So I think Israel would not bomb the hospital.
You see the old argument of “Hamas being destroyed” does not work at all. Israel killing innocent civilians creates more hatred against Israel as a whole. It means that anyone who’s a Palestinian and lost their entire land, home, friends, acquaintances and family will high likely join Hamas to get vengeance. Now, guess whose fault is for children joining Hamas after losing everything they ever cared for? Israel.
Even before the October 7th, Hamas was already fostering hatred for Israel in its population. The children were being indoctrinated from their school ages to hate Israel. Most humanitarian donations the Gazan government received from the UN and other countries they diverted for the construction of their tunnel system and missile launchers whenever possible. Contruction materials for building houses and schools were all used to build the tunnels they're using now to hide from the IDF. The pipes for pumbling were used for missile launchers. Instead of using the international aid to develop their community, they used it for terrorist purposes. At this point, capitulating for the Hamas' demands will not stop the hatred, because they were hateful long before October 7th. Israel saw that the only way to stop the future attacks is in a pragmatic way: destroying Hamas and its military e political capabilities, and making sure no future Gazan government shall have the military capability to attack Israel. How the're gonna do it? I don't know, but they're adamant in doing it.
36 000 innocent civilians is not collateral damage. Its purposefully murdering innocent Palestinian people, its genocide and all the evidence backs it up. It is not Hamas who’s bombing refugee camps, hospitals, schools, homes and any place that a Palestinian is. It is Israel. You’re good on pointing fingers but there’s zero factual evidence.
These numbers were provided by the Hamas, which have an incentive to inflate it so as to exert pressure on Israel's allies. I'm certain there's no way for anyone to provide an accurate body count of casualities in this war, as it is ongoing, and there's many bodies that might be under rubble. And as I said: it's a Hamas tactic to use their citizens as human shields whenever possible. When they brag about the number of casualities, deep down they like when there's more dead citizens, because for them it only represent necessary sacrifices for achieving one goal: pressure Israel allie's to make Isreal stop their military advancement, so the Hamas can regroup and resume their missile strikes against Isreal territory at full force. For them this is a holy war: they just hate Isreal and want it gone. If they make Isreal back down and agree to a indefinite ceasefire, it'll signal to the other enemies of Isreal (Hezbolah, Iran...) that they're soft, and will encourage them to attack Isreal as well. Isreal is a country that's surrounded by enemies that hate it, so they were forced to invest heavily in millitary defense systems, and make millitary conscription mandatory to both genders. Israel is the only democracy in a area brimming with autocracies and teocracies.
You do realize from the moment Israel become a state, Israel has never lived in actual peace? They stole the land, displaced 750 000, murdered thousands of people. Set fires to homes, good and everything else. Placed mines so Palestinians cannot return. This “war” didn’t start on 7 October 2023 neither somewhere in 2020. It started the moment Israel decided to murder and steal everything the Palestinian people owned. The ceasefire deal is a joke to begin with. 6 weeks ceasefire and then they’ll continue bombing the entirety of Gaza again. Its needs to be permanent. Israel has to be held accountable for their actions (genocide). Israel want 100% safety? Well, should not have stolen the land, displaced thousands of Palestinian people, murdering, Apartheid system, discrimination. And for everything I say here; I can link sources if you want. It’ll be tomorrow though, not on PC. But I will if you ask me to.
I'm not extremelly familiar to the history of Isreal, but I don't think it's fair the Isrealli citizens of today pay for supposed mistakes of their ancestors from 70+ years ago. A ceasefire now would only benefit the Hamas and let them regroup with more weapons and ammo, and build new milittary outposts. I defend a indefinite ceasefire, but after Hamas is destroyed, of course. This war would already be over if Hamas surrendered already, but it seems they prefer to extend the suffering of their people. It just proves they don't care for their people, they care for power. And if by apartheid system you mean border controls, so every country has such system because no serious country allows indiscriminate entry of foreigners in its borders without aplying some criteria first. And in Isreal, 20% of the population is of Arab descent and they enjoy full citizen status. Go ask them if they're unhappy with the "Israelli regime" and if they'd rather go move to the Gaza strip.
It has nothing to do with “easy to judge”. There’s lots and lots of evidence. Documents, videos, articles and even actual ex-IDF soldiers speaking out. IDF soldiers are always “happy to trigger their gun” since day one. Not just now. Certainly soldiers are humans to but these soldiers are killing innocent civilians. They’re smiling, joking, stealing everything from the Palestinians. They’re recording themselves. The videos are all over Instagram. They let children and other people signature their bombs with cruel words like “kill them all” which I can give a source for as well. There’s in no way defending their atrocities. No matter how bad you want to. Like I said, you’re an Israel-supporter and by your other comments in others thread, a possible Zionist. I already told you; Israel is the core reason as to why Hamas even exist.
If there's any misconduct among the IDF, of couse they should be called out and disciplined. I'm not saying it is a good thing to abuse vulnerable people during a war. But, let's be honest, in all wars this kind of stuff happen. A bunch of guys are there in the open, with no law enforcement to contain them, under a high stress situation for it is a war and they might die at any moment. Of course they might regress to erratic behaviors. Maybe it's fueled by rage for their people being attacked by Hamas? Maybe they're taking out it on the citizens? I don't know. I've never been a soldier to know.
You just love to spread immense misinformation. You should actually educate yourself in this particular matter if you want to write and speak on the slogan. Don’t just blabber your personal opinion, give sources. Your personal opinion doesn’t matter, actual evidence does.
According to Wikipedia article for "From the river to the sea": "Many Palestinian activists have called it "a call for peace and equality" after decades of Israeli military rule over Palestinians while for Jews it is seen as a call for the "destruction" of Israel. Islamist militant faction Hamas used the phrase in its 2017 charter. Usage of the phrase by such Palestinian militant groups has led critics to claim that it advocates for the dismantling of Israel, and the removal or extermination of its Jewish population." So it's not as clear-cut as you suggested. It says some Palestinians define is as a call for peace, but even if it was taken as such in the past, nowadays I have the impression it's mosly used as a defense of the destruction of Isreal. If it was just for the peace of Palestine, they'd use a more specific sentence because the way it's pharsed it includes the Isreal territory in their intentions of "freedom". But they want to be free from what? Free from the Israeli people presence? The article you linked kind of confirm what the Wikipedia article said: each side has an interpretation of what this sentece entails, but I'm more interested in the practical usage of the sentence today, and in my opinion it's mostly anti-Isreal.
Not only that, do you know that Israel has made a slogan exactly like that too. So by your definition; Israel wants to exterminate all Palestinian people (and they’re currently doing so with the genocide).
From the same Wikipedia article: "The Palestinian phrase has also been used by Israeli politicians. The 1977 election manifesto of the right-wing Israeli Likud party said: "Between the sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty."" It seems a variation from "from the river to the sea" was used by a specific Isreali right-wing party in 1977. It was strictly a position of said party in 1977, so we cannot pin it on Isreal of 2024.
Israel flat out said they do NOT want a two state solution.
In the article you linked, this is an opinion of Isreali Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he got spooked by what occured on October 7th. Who know's what the next Prime Minister will think about it? Israel was explicitly in favor of the Two State Solution in 1937 and 1947, but in both cases the Palestinians refused. Now that missiles are launched from Palestinian territory into Isreal, don't be surprised if Isreal takes a more conservative approach in the name of its national security.
Also explain to us; what is a Hamas flag? I have never heard about it nor seen one. I have only seen the Palestine flag. So tell us, show us and give us actual evidence with reliable sources.
Most search results confirm what I said. And remember: this is not an exact science, but a subjective assessment. Certainly there are university students that didn't notice that bias because their institution was more politically neutral, or said person was not enrolled in humanities courses so the political activism was not very close to their day-to-day lives. But, in general, the bias is real and is only getting more intense as political polarization is on the rise globally.
It's a well-known fact that the Earth is round and I can show you evidence with about two seconds of Googling.
You established that a well-known fact like the Earth being round is easy to prove in mere seconds by Googling. I did exactly what you suggested and the search results are plentiful with links in the first page confirming that there's a left-leaning bias in USA universities. In the suggested images they even list survey results showing most students lean left.
Maybe the Palestinians themselves devalue their own lives compared to Israeli lives. Just look at when they agreed to a ceasefire and traded hostages for prisoners: each hostage was worth multiple prisoners released by Israel.
This is also noticeable when Hamas use their own population as human shields, exemplified by when they hide their soldiers and weapons in hospitals and schools. Or when they blend in with civilians on purpose by not using any combatant uniform like the IDF do. They really don't care for their own civilians. These are only useful for acting as human shields and, if they're killed or injured, strike a pose for NatGeo-style photos in their attempts to appeal to western sentiment.
Likewise, there's no independent verification when the Hamas minister of healthcare periodically announces the number of casualties, but the media tends to take it at face value as it was the crystalline truth. When this is most likely an inflated number to keep Israel in the worst light possible, and to exert political pressure for the USA to stop supporting Israel with weapons of war. It's all with the intent of the Hamas getting away with it.
The Hamas has a history of lying and deception in order to support the narrative in their favor.
There's the incident of Hamas accusing Israel of bombing an hospital last year, which the media widely reported as truth before checking, but in the end it was in a building a block away from the hospital. Since this embarrassment the media has been more careful before confirming anything coming from Hamas official sources.
Also the Hamas had a guy that multitasked as an News Reporter, Combatant, Healthcare Professional, Bloodied Victim. This was reported in social media, a guy from Hamas appearing in photos doing all those things in different occasions. Give this guy an Oscar already!
The Hamas does not hesitate to manipulate facts to confirm their intended narrative. Their track record is tarnished at this point. But, to be honest, an organization that takes hostages as a leverage to negotiate a ceasefire in a war they themselves started, from this point it was already very clear they'd do anything to achieve their goals. From using civilians as human shields to lying without shame, these things are just the cherry on top of the heinous acts they committed as the catalyst of the war. They were not trustworthy from the start.
And what you say about "IDF using Palestinians as shields" makes no sense. That's what the Hamas do, actually. The Hamas see their civilians as disposable sacrifice for a religious end. If an IDF soldier took a Palestinians civilian literally as a human shield in order to avoid being shot by a Hamas militant, the militant would shoot both of them without hesitation, because they see their civilians as sacrifices in a religious sense. Just an addendum, the Islamic State leaders used to say "we love death like you love life" as a point of comparison of the radical islamic worldview compared to the western worldview. That's the kind of thinking that drives the Hamas, and that's why they're not ashamed to call for the extermination of all Jews as if it's the most normal thing in the world.
About the deaths in the West Bank, I'm not too knowledgeable about this to comment further.
I can't see how the UN and UNICEF can get to an accurate number for the number of casualities, as most bodies are in a zone of war. And just because a building was blown up doesn't mean there were civilians inside. Most civilians are in tents in refugee camps. I'm not trying to say there's no casualities in a war, but that it's impossible to count all bodies right now because of the warfighting, and there's probably bodies under rubble as well. Only when the war is over it'll be possible to get an exact number.
When I see how easily the Hamas uses their own population as sacrifices, I have doubts they really value their lives. Remember: the Gazan population elected the Hamas with more than 60% of the votes. It's not too farfetched to say a significant part of the Gazans think like the Hamas in terms of sacrifice, and by extension, how they value their lives.
You don't believe me? Those who are immersed in islamist ideology think quite differently from people of christian heritage (even if they're not christian themselves, but they inherit a set of values). For the islamists, self-sacrifice if a good thing if done for a holy cause. That's what motivated the plane terrorists from 9/11: their religion made them believe that what they were doing was just. And as a reward, they'd have the company of multiple virgins in paradise.
In the western countries, due to the inherited christain values, people value life and reject self-sacrifice. Suicide is considered a sin, because the person is throwing away the body given by God, which is a holy thing. That's why the USA and other west-aligned countries pressure Israel to preserve the life of innocent Gazans: that's what best aligns with their moral values. If a bank is being robbed with the use of hostages, the police will do its best to preserve the life of the innocent, even negotiate with the robbers if necessary.
That's a way of thinking that's the polar opposite of the muslims. For them, if the cause is holy, self-sacrifice is allowed and encouraged. They're indoctrinated in these values since they're children. What the Hamas is doing is exploiting the western values for their benefit. That's why they took hostages, because they knew it would be a huge leverage against Israel. And that's why they're always flaunting the number of casualities (which are obviously inflated, because it helps their goals), in an attempt to reach the western countries' moral values and turn it into pressure for Isreal accept an indefinite ceasefire agreement, even a bad one.
Consider this: if the roles were reversed: Gaza had immense millitary strenght and Israel was the poor country, the Gazans would invade Isreal in a heartbeat and would care much less about Isrealli innocent civilians: for them the cause is holy, so it is justified to kill indiscriminately.
Both statements can coexist without any contradiction.
If no numbers can be trusted (due to loggistical concerns I cited in my previous comment), how can Hammas be so sure of the numbers it gives to the press? Not only would Hammas' numbers be innacurate if they were acting in good faith, but they'd be outright fake in case of bad faith on their part (most likely scenario).
I'd take this with a grain of salt because it's just the tale of one man. But if it's true, it's sad becuase it would represent the wheel of hatred turning.
I know right? I've always thought calling it genocide a flagrant exxageration. When I think of genocide, it comes to mind images of some evil dictator using poison gas in a population, chemical weapons, an atomic bomb, etc.
To be a true genocide, it must be an indiscriminate elimination of the population of a nation or an ethnicity. It's not the case of Isreal, which is targeting specifically the militants of Hamas. Just because there are civilian colateral damage in the process does not make it a genocide automatically, because the civilians are not what the IDF is after. They're after Hamas militants. Gaza has a very high population density, and the Hamas militants don't use any uniform to differentiate them from the civilians. They do it on purpose to make the IDF hesitant, and get them by surprise. They hide themselves in buildings that they know the IDF would be hesitant to attack, like hospitals, schools and mosques. They play dirty, and then cry genocide when the IDF respond to their missiles sent to Israel's territory.
Dictionary definition: "the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group."
If Israel really wanted the destruction of all Gazans, they'd not send their soldiers to a prolonged war. They'd rather send their own missiles and everything would be destroyed in seconds. They have that capability, but they didn't use it. If it's really a genocide as you suggest, it's the dumbest one of all time, because they're risking their soldiers when they can attack safely and decisively from a distance.
So, the ideal solution for you is a return to the status quo, but with the Hamas getting away with it. Plus a bonus: multiple prisoners released just for returning the hostages to their homes, from where they should never have been kidnapped from in the first place. And, the cherry in top, the Hamas still having the capability of launching missiles whenever it pleases. What a great deal! (for the Hamas only, of course)
In the end of the day, it's the law of the strongest. It's no accident that Israel hoard a lot of weapons of war and build defensive systems like the Iron Dome. It's a show of power for a very simple goal: deterrence. I don't think Israel really though of using all their weapons, but just having them makes every one the enemy nations that surround them to think twice before attacking them. Well, Hamas did not think twice. And they cannot say they didn't saw it coming.
Israel accepting a ceasefire deal would be nice for saving lives and all, but would leave them vulnerable for future missile attacks from Hamas. A nation will always think of its own citizens first. Maybe the Hamas already counted with this reaction of Israel, and though that other Arab countries would form a coalition to fight Israel simultaneously. Well, it didn't pan out. Deterrence worked after all.
TorrentGalaxy Goes Offline With Mysterious Message to Users ( torrentfreak.com )
Israel committing genocide in Gaza, new study concludes – Middle East Monitor ( www.middleeastmonitor.com )
Israeli military rescues four hostages alive from Gaza, including Noa Argamani ( www.nbcnews.com )