There is a majority of Mizrahi jews (ie: not white) in Israel as compared to "white" jews, mostly from European countries.
So your comment is fucking stupid.
This honestly wouldn't surprise me, Delta is quite skilled at this and we almost never hear about their ops. US wants hostages to end the war faster but not admit being there, so easy to just let IDF take credit, despite them shooting hostages instead of rescuing them.
So that's a no on the evidence? And criticism is one thing, but immediately jumping to "the US must have done this, because the IDF doesn't have commando teams that do hostage rescue, or something" is another. I'm really not sure where you get the idea that Israel needs the US to do special forces shit like ten feet from the Israeli border.
I'm glad more hostages are free, but for me it doesn't sit well the result... 200 people dead to save 4. At least the IDF are improving, luckily this time they didn't kill the hostages.
Who is organizing these rescue operations? Homelander?
Hamas is already willing to agree to the US peace plan, so the only thing preventing the rest of the hostages making it to their homes is political will, and with much less risk.
Yup, see the person below you saying almost exactly that in more clinical - but clearly sincere - terms.
Edit: When I say they are "sincere" that is not to say there is any merit to what they are saying. I'm pointing out that they actually believe this garbage is justification for the mass slaughter of children.
Obviously it’s good to minimize collateral damage and casualties wherever possible. But I see no issue with this result.
If a country values the lives of their citizens they will rescue them and spill any blood needed. Conversely, a nation that values its cut will try to minimize the harm that could come to them and keep hostages far from where they are.
Hiding hostages in a highly populated residential area, without any means of self defense or even evacuation safe zones, is not called valuing the citizens. It's called using them as leverage, something terrorists love doing to civilians.
What did the spilling of blood on oct.7 did to Palestinians? Make them live in hell for over 8 months? Make thousands die? And for what, for massacring Israelis? What do you think Hamas has done in oct.7 that would make you think they "value their citizens" - coz to me it only looks like they just wanna kill jews.
What makes you think they don't think that? In the end palastine was occupied by Israelis. It said a good government spills blood for its citizen, how can you be so god damn stubborn to not see that this point holds just as valid for palastine and Hamas. Of course you can cherry pick one thing that is not protecting citizen but I believe you can do the same thing with Israel. Like the US is constantly fucking up its own people, I'm sure you can cherry pick an event in Israel too. How much thought went into the citizens as they came up with the idea to plant Israel in the middle of a Jewish hate triangle where they are threatened and attacked on a so regular basis, they need stuff like the fucking Iron Dome in their cities?
If a terrorist holds hostages in amongst hundreds of INNOCENT PEOPLE it's fine to massacre them all. When you could have just got all your hostages released by accepting peace. Cool moral compass you have there
I agree, Hamas is a criminal terrorist organization that does not value the lives of Palestinians. I mean a criminal terrorist organization hiding hostages amongst civilians in a heavily populated area they are worse than the example you gave because they intentionally put those civilians at risk of harm.
I see, so the civilians who have had their friends and families killed, been violently forcibly kidnapped, had their taken from their family friends and homes abused, starved and raped don’t deserve their freedom?
Sounds like the victimized Palestinian people need to band together and overthrow Hamas. That might be a better strategy than celebrating their victories by dragging the dead bodies of those lovely white ladies you mentioned around town in the back of trucks.
Hey friend, you seem to have deleted your comment.
Further on down the thread.
It’s ok, I included a screenshot. Incidentally, the reason I took that screenshot is because there are many, many posters who will change their comment after the fact or delete their comment altogether to disingenuously try and shape the comment thread after the fact.
Anyways for the record I didn’t report you to the mods when you had your other comments removed.
Are semitic people white? If so, so are the Arabs.
Hamas kidnap kills then kidnap a bunch of israeli people
hide them among civilians and within even their refugee camps
IDF frees some of them
Lots of civilian casualties
Pro-Pal peeps, oh no, look what the IDF did
I'm glad the hostages were saved, and can't wait for hamas to lose.
This echo chamber doesn't want to hear about the fact that Hamas is a murderous terror group that intentionally endangers Palestinian civilians to further its religious and political cause.
Because it is victim blaming bullshit to justify the genocide against Palestinians. Whatever Hamas is doesn't justify the atrocities committed by Israel especially since Oct. 7 but also the Decades before. Did you know more than 500 Palestinians were murdered in the Westbank since Oct. 7? There is no Hamas there, but now that the Israeli fascists can get away with it, they enjoy their impunity as they murder, rape and pillage.
There was a ceasefire on Oct. 6. Then Hamas and other Palestinian fighters started the present conflict in Gaza on Oct.7. I won't recount how because Lemmy doesn't like to hear when what they perceive to be a victim group commits unthinkable atrocities. But then they took these hostages back into Gaza, and hid them in tunnels under civilian infrastructure. This is fact. Hamas started the present war, but everyone only blames Israel. I believe this qualifies as what you call victim blaming bullshit.
The war started in 1947, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people, any hand waving about some other starting point, is intentional revisionism by the Zionists to cover the scope and scale of their crimes. Which has now grown to a scale rivaling any genocidal you wish to name.
Regional tension has been going on for far longer than that, but Hamas is the elected government currently in Gaza. They began the current fighting. End of story.
It's only 200 people. How many people am I worth? 200 kidnappers? 199kidnapers and I kid? 198 kidnappers, 2 kids, 3 moms, 5 elders and cousin Vinny? Couldn't they just get the victims out and catch the kidnappers instead?
Edit: Essentially asking the same questions as JayTreeman.
Edit 2: It appears my comment was reinstated after I provided a source to counter the misinformation report. I would expect better of the mods to do some due diligence before just censoring comments. There is enough of this in the MSM and it does nothing to further allow people to see what is happening. Thank whichever mod undid the action, hoping it was little_cow but not sure.
The Israeli military had US support in rescuing four captives from Gaza in a "complex daytime operation" in Nuseirat that killed over 200 Palestinians.
The Palestinian government media office in Gaza said the death toll from Israel's attack on central Gaza had reached at least 210, with 400 more wounded.
The Palestinian health ministry confirmed that a large number of dead and wounded Palestinian had arrived at Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital. It said that most of them were children and women.
"I came from the camp to here in the hospital on foot. I can't describe how we fled. I saw dead children and body parts strewn all over as we fled. No one was able to assist them. I saw an elderly man killed on a animal-drawn cart.
"Nuseirat was being annihilated. It was hell."
210 people killed 4 rescued. Mission accomplished everyone. Don't forget to thank Biden for his direct military involvement in this operation.
50 civilians killed indiscriminately per 1 hostage freed. And that's not counting everyone that's already been killed in this war.
I think anyone with a shred of morality is heavily conflicted by this. Saving hostages? Great. Killing 50x as many people as those saved? Not great. Not great at all.
It naturally leads itself to the question we're all thinking -- was it worth it?
And I think many of us have the same answer, although we may not like it -- no. It pains me to say it, but it would've been better to let them stay hostage for longer while developing a plan which wouldn't kill civilians.
Unfortunately, the alternate option was not "let them stay hostage a while longer". It was "let the hostages die". And maybe that would have been the more ethical call. But let's not delude ourselves that they could have been kept alive any other way.
Many people are saying if it had been Trump he would have gotten the hostages out in 24 hours. It would have been a perfect operation. The best you've seen.
I'm struggling with everything on this article. On the one hand anytime a hostage has been freed, that's good news. On the other, at what cost.
40 000 dead. That's the easy stat. Amputations are also incredibly high. Most of them kids and performed without anesthetic.
This is the first time the IDF has rescued hostages.
So I'm sitting here with my initial feeling of 'oh, that's good news' ,and then I think about the wider picture and context, and it doesn't seem so good anymore.
So you think we should negotiate with terrorists? Give them something to make them stop what they're doing today, and they definitely won't commit more terrorism later in the hope of getting more things later.
Spain did successfully negotiate with ETA, and there is no more ETA today. Colombia's government negotiated with the FARC, and the immense majority of the FARC have gotten peacefully integrated in their country's parliamentary system.
If I looked into those organizations, I would bet they were probably at the point of talking reasonable concessions, and probably resembled a proper government, albeit radical or militant.
That would require Hamas to care about Palestinians. Their leadership is a bunch of wealthy shitheads living it up in the UAE. They hold a dictatorship over Palestine and refuse to have elections.
To actually get Hamas there, you probably need to target the rich people giving orders.
Nah, that was the one that Egypt fucked up. There had not been an actual agreed upon hostage transfer since the first one. Hamas also won’t give actual information on the hostages. This whole thing is just war crimes the whole way down.
Three months ago the IDF also rescued 3 hostages by killing many civilians. They bomb entire neighbourhoods to rubble as a distraction mechanism for their teams to go in.
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.
I could be wrong, but I haven't seen any independent verification that Hamas has been using hospitals and schools for bases, but I'm positive that there's been debunked Israeli reports that schools and hospitals have been used as Hama's bases.
Same thing for human shields. IDF admits to using Palestinians as shields. To my knowledge, there's no Hamas equivalent.
This 'war' isn't about Hamas anyways. If it was, there wouldn't be 1000 people killed in the west bank. Hamas isn't in the west bank. Why is the IDF letting people kill Palestinians in the west bank?
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.
The media isn't taking the numbers at face value, unless you're also making the claim of the UN and UNICEF because they use the same numbers. The fact is, given the wide destruction, the actual numbers are much worse. If you can't admit that last point then I assume you're not familiar with what percentage of homes have been destroyed or how many dead journalists and their families have been murdered.
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.
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).
Again, the UN has looked at the numbers and found them to be reasonable. And we would have more numbers if the IDF didn't kill a record number of journalists (and their families).
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.
Maybe the Palestinians themselves devalue their own lives compared to Israeli lives.
You should just stop right there. If your logic depends on saying "they actually don't value their lives as much as others" then please stop and ask "what the hell is wrong with yourself?". People who think like this probably value their life least of all. /s
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.
What is it that I disbelieve exactly? You're here trying to convince others that a group of people don't value their lives as much as you do. I believe you when you say that you don't value groups of human lives equally, I just don't share that view.
Those who are immersed in islamist ideology think quite differently from people of christian heritage
I'll be honest, I didn't bother reading the rest of the wall of text after this. Enjoy your crusade and may you die as you have lived.
50% of the population of Gaza was under 18 based on Israeli numbers for Gaza prior to October. This means 50% of the population wasn't even alive when that vote happened since it happened 18 years ago!
Fun fact about that vote; Hamas represented themselves as significantly more moderate in the run-up to the election only to drop that the moment they got elected and murder all their political opposition. They have since continued to murder outspoken political dissidents and quash any efforts for new elections.
A twenty-year-old election that was run on lies tells us nothing about the feelings of the people of Gaza in the current day. It doesn't tell us how much they support Hamas now and it certainly tells us nothing about how much they value their lives.
Though your twisted rationlisation tells me a lot about how you value their lives.
Maybe what I said was too harsh, sorry. It's just what seems the logical conclusion in the following sense:
The Hamas and its militants are Gazans themselves.
They have an ideology stipulating that self-sacrifice is a good thing if the cause is holy.
Such ideology comes from the religious upbringing that apply to most Gazans (even those not affiliated to Hamas)
So, in accordance with their beliefs, they see no problem using their own citizens as sacrifices for their goal of destroying Israel.
I'm not saying everyone from Gaza will happily throw away their lives for such a "holy cause". I'm just saying that there are those who believe this and would commit self-sacrifice, and in my view, it's an act of devaluing their own lives.
This would be unthinkable in the western countries, because of the christian values spread across its population that dictates self-sacrifice/suicide is a sin.
No, no it doesn't. Suicide is a sin but Christianity absolutely glorifies self-sacrifice for the religion. I mean you've heard of martyrs right? It became a core tenant of the religion in the early roman days that dying for the faith gets you straight into heaven. Glorifying dying for the faith is a massive part of Christianity too. In Islam committing suicide is a sin unless you're self-sacrificing yourself for the faith and dying for the faith also gets you straight into heaven. Just like in Christianity. They're both Abrahamic faiths and have a lot of the same roots.
So yeah what the fuck are you talking about? They are no more self-sacrificing than anyone else. They're just fucking people. They're all just people. Why can't we just treat them like people?
Imagine how much resources hamas spent on keeping these hostages and how many lives could be saved if they just released them all before the ground operation was started.
What leverage? You're saying hostages are needed to save hamas members? Well that seems to be working pretty well huh? Remind me again why they were taken in the first place?
You should become a negotiator.
What negotiations? It was a perfect opportunity to show that your cause is a good one, and not to Israel. Instead they kept the hostages... For what purpose? To have "leverage"? Well let's see how that will help them with anything. Maybe there will be more news about released hostages that you could again associate with Israel trying to release its civilians, not with hamas doing right things.
I repeat: that violence did not serve the purpose and it was never meant to. It's useless to justify their actions based on their sufferings alone. It's obvious hamas never seeked anything except violence.
Everything hamas did was useless for Palestinians. Israel isn't stopping because they have the ability. Hamas doesn't, they won't win in a military fight and hostages are useless for them. They could start doing something proper like releasing hostages (woyild decrease support for Israel hugely) but they won't because they think it would help them survive (not even Palestinians).
Hamas had a chance to increase its abilities over time, but instead they chose to spend resources on useless attacks.
I see. I disagree. Hamas's actions are utterly deplorable but also entirely expected. This is what oppressed people do.
I also think you're wrong that Hamas have done nothing for Palestinians. They've never had as much international support as they do now.
Someone's argument above stated that Israel was not going to stop even if all hostages are released. Now you are saying that hostages are a real need for a peace deal. It almost seems like someone is running out of reasons to keep them.
We could also argue if a peace deal (aka keeping the hostages) will be worth all the victims. Or we could just admit that the only way hamas is ever going to use hostages is to try to keep themselves alive.
Israeli forces returned fire, including with airstrikes, he said. An Israeli special forces commander was killed during the operation, a police statement said.
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."
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.
That's just lack of education on your part, though. Neither the Cambodian Genocide nor the Rwandan Genocide would be a genocide according to you, but in reality these were two of the worst genocides in the last 50 years.
Come to think of it, neither would the Bosnian Genocide according to you, because it mainly targeted males for execution.
then cry genocide
The people who are "crying genocide" are those of us in the international community who know what a geenocide is, including experts in international law.
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.
It's possible that they are not flagrantly killing civilians in that manner but are just looking the other way more than they might normally do because they are Palestinians and care less about collateral damage due to race.
