Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

wired.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

401–410 of 610 posts

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#401

Post by edanm »

jacquesm wrote: post #153
petertodd wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What future would that be? A future where they stop killing Israeli's and slowly build up the trust to restore normal relations and trade. Gaza was given the chance when Israel decoccupied Gaza in 2005. They decided to vote in Hamas in a democratic election instead. > Gazan citizens do not have a say in much of anything, they're either combatants, captives or hostages depending on what your perspective from outside…

Between killing Rabin and the settlements this isn't going to stop for decades to come unless something changes, and for that to work both sides will need to want to solve it. I don't see that happening, and you seem to think that only Gaza citizens have the power to stop the conflict. But for that to work they'd have to have something to work with and that just isn't happening. De-occupation is clearly not sufficien…

I think it's true, to some extent, that only Gazans have the power to stop the conflict. (I say Gazans and not Gaza citizen, because I think it's Hamas that has the power, not the actual citizens, which is part of the reason we're in this mess.)

Israel does a lot of bad things, like the settlements in the West Bank. No question about that. But if Israel were to stop with those tomorrow, I honestly don't think it will make a difference. See e.g. what Israel did with Gaza - it forcibly removed its own citizens, left Gaza entirely, and what we got in return was Hamas.

On the other hand, if the Palestinians agreed to a peace treaty whereby they get some land and give up their right to destroy all of Israel, the war would be over. Period. This was offered to the Palestinians several times, and they refused several times.

I'm not saying Israel is faultless, far from it. But at the end of the day, Israel is in a situation where the other side wants something that Israel can't agree to - they want Israel gone. That's the heart of this conflict and something you just can't negotiate around.

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#402

Post by edanm »

enterprise_cog wrote: post #239
petertodd wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if Israel stopped killing Palestinians and normalized relations with Gaza? Israel could choose a different path. Hamas slaughtered over a thousand Jewish civilians three weeks ago. They've been continuously launching rockets into Israel since then. They have been able to do that because Israel had chosen to partially normalize relations, eg by allowing trucks to import goods into Gaza, allowing the import of c…

Oh, so if only they went back to a total lockdown of Gaza and treated it like a more maximum security prison, then this wouldn’t have happened? What if they didn’t treat it like a prison, or Palestinians like subhuman prisoners? Do you think that maybe then they wouldn’t want to go on raids and kill people? That those 1400 soldiers and civilians would still be alive?

What should Israel do differently? Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005. They immediately elected Hamas and started shooting at Israel.

What specifically should Israel do to "not treat Gaza like a prison"? Allow more goods in, which would specifically mean that Hamas gets even more weapons? What other steps would you want Israel to take, given that they left Gaza and gave it into Palestinian hands to run?

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#403

Post by edanm »

jacquesm wrote: post #231
petertodd wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if Israel stopped killing Palestinians and normalized relations with Gaza? Israel could choose a different path. Hamas slaughtered over a thousand Jewish civilians three weeks ago. They've been continuously launching rockets into Israel since then. They have been able to do that because Israel had chosen to partially normalize relations, eg by allowing trucks to import goods into Gaza, allowing the import of c…

I don't particularly value an Israeli life any higher than I do a Palestinian one. Palestinians have died in larger numbers, just not as suddenly and that's what makes the difference in terms of the response but dead is dead, no matter whether you're the statistic of the day or a victim in a large scale attack. Hamas has given Israel a good reason to strike back but not indiscriminately and in retribution you have to…

First, I want to emphatically agree - an Israeli life isn't worth any more than a Palestinian life.

> Hamas has given Israel a good reason to strike back but not indiscriminately and in retribution

I want to argue against your framing here, because that is not how Israelis see things. At least the normal ones don't think of it as "striking back in retribution" or anything like that.

The thing is, Hamas has declared war on Israel. They slaughtered 1400 people, took hostages, and are actively and continually firing rockets at Israel. There's been 3 weeks of rocket attacks. Luckily Israel has lots of defensive capabilities to block these kinds of attacks, but they are actively waging a war in the hopes of killing as many Israelis as possible.

So the situation from Israel's perspective is - we are bordering a semi-state, whose government is intent on destroying Israel, have shown themselves capable of killing many Israelis, and is continuing to wage war. What should Israel do? The only response that most Israelis come to, which is what any other country in the world would do when faced with a similar situation, is to attack the enemy country until it doesn't have the capability to hurt you anymore.

It's not some kind of "tit for tat" terrorist attack. It's literally a bordering country intent on destroying you and actively trying to do so.

And btw, people seem to think that Israel is all-powerful or something here and can just choose whatever response it wants - but several other countries are actively threatening to join the war and attack Israel all at once. It's as if Mexico invaded the States, killed thousands of Americans, was firing rockets at American cities, and Canada was threatening to join in the war. What kind of response would make sense in this context?

I mean that sincerely - what do you think Israel should do given this current situation? Because I sure as hell don't have a better idea than "try to destroy Hamas before they kill me".

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#405

Post by hackerlight »

dlubarov wrote: post #376
jacknews wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, and in fact they will just create more radicals, and push the existing ones to even more barbaric extremes. I'm starting to feel radical myself, and I have no connection at all to events, other than being able to spot a bully obviously about to carry out systematic barbarism in retribution.

What would you suggest Israel do instead, given the ongoing threat Hamas poses?

Build an impenetrable DMZ, keep improving missile defence systems, continue forming alliances with neighboring Arab states, stop settlement expansion in West bank, crack down on settler violence, expel right-wing zealots from positions of power, iterate for 20-60 years, let the next generation figure it out. Get hostages out as a condition of a ceasefire agreement.

Things were looking optimistic during the Oslo talks, I don't see a reason why we can't get back to that state of affairs with enough steady work over a 30-year timeframe.

The alternative, an invasion, is also a multi-decade investment, by the way. You can't just remove Hamas and not occupy for decades if you don't want another Hamas to emerge.

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#406

Post by kingofpandora »

invalidname wrote: post #355
kingofpandora wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember that an advisor to Natanyahu tweeted that the Al-Arabi Hospital was bombed by Israel because it was being used by Hamas. No, I'm not saying that the hospital was actually bombed by Israel; I'm saying that everything that Israel bombs is labelled with the "used by Hamas" tag as justification for what this really is. No one actually believes that all or even most of the buildings destroyed in this campaign was…

I wouldn't count on anything coming from the circle of Netanyahu. He is the absolute worse. But Israeli mainstream press is generally better sourced. Notice that Israel also used phone tracking to check that civilian population moved away from the target. No county that ran a campaign of this type in the past used such an approach to avoid civilian casualties. I think the bombings are very problematic. But from curre…

> I wouldn't count on anything coming from the circle of Netanyahu.

It's not about whether I trust them or not (I don't!). It's that everyone is following the same playbook. Israel can do whatever it wants and blame Palestinians with impunity.

Every teenager shot on the street is a militant. Every house that is flattened was used by terrorists. Every journalist that was dies while working was actually killed by the Palestinians themselves.

The power imbalance is not just military in nature. Israel has command of the message as well and the is frighteningly effective because it's just plausible enough.

>Notice that Israel also used phone tracking to check that civilian population moved away from the target. No county that ran a campaign of this type in the past used such an approach to avoid civilian casualties.

What about all the people who can't charge their phones because Israel only allowed 4 hours of electricity per day before the most recent campaign? Or whose phones were lost when their homes were destroyed?

This is a great example. The IDF can make claims about how they "avoid civilian casualties" but why do you believe that it's anything more than for show?

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#407

Post by stavros »

jacquesm wrote: post #365
stavros wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm afraid the sarcasm didn't come across well. The article makes it sound like Israel was just peacefully minding its business when Hamas attacked, forcing it to retaliate, which we all know is not the case.

You really should add a /s if you feel the need to be sarcastic on sensitive subjects such as these, and maybe better still to not do it at all because it just invites more sarcasm or even worse.

It seems like it, from the responses. Thanks Jacques.

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#408

Post by kingofpandora »

edanm wrote: post #395
kingofpandora wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember that an advisor to Natanyahu tweeted that the Al-Arabi Hospital was bombed by Israel because it was being used by Hamas. No, I'm not saying that the hospital was actually bombed by Israel; I'm saying that everything that Israel bombs is labelled with the "used by Hamas" tag as justification for what this really is. No one actually believes that all or even most of the buildings destroyed in this campaign was…

> No one actually believes that all or even most of the buildings destroyed in this campaign was "used by Hamas" if you are being honest with yourself. It's obviously collective punishment and revenge with a little bit of show ("we dropped leaflets" or "we sent warnings by SMS") for those who need it in order to go to bed at night. Sorry, no. I don't believe that. Granted, I'm Israeli, and have far more trust in the…

So you look at the aerial and satellite photography and you really believe that every last building was justifiably destroyed as a legitimate military target?

If that's the case, then the government propaganda has done its job. There's nothing more to say.

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#409

Post by true_religion »

kingofpandora wrote: post #408
edanm wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No one actually believes that all or even most of the buildings destroyed in this campaign was "used by Hamas" if you are being honest with yourself. It's obviously collective punishment and revenge with a little bit of show ("we dropped leaflets" or "we sent warnings by SMS") for those who need it in order to go to bed at night. Sorry, no. I don't believe that. Granted, I'm Israeli, and have far more trust in the…

So you look at the aerial and satellite photography and you really believe that every last building was justifiably destroyed as a legitimate military target? If that's the case, then the government propaganda has done its job. There's nothing more to say.

I’m not sure you can bomb things in a city and not get collateral damage. Also, the poster admitted that they get things wrong.

It’s only natural to err on the side of false positives when the alternative is allowing your enemy to live and kill your people later.

This shouldn’t be seen as any sort of approval for this war. I would prefer no war, to the natural consequences of having one.

Re: The destruction of Gaza's internet is complete

#410

Post by heyheyhouhou »

snird wrote: post #398
heyheyhouhou wrote: post #397

[flagged]

[flagged]

It's important to understand the context, this did not started this month, it started 70~ years ago by strangling people in a confined space.

Also it's important to separate Hamas than Palestinian civilians. They did not have any democratic chance to elect what they have. Why do they pay for it?

What Israel is doing is not smart and is going to create an endless conflict. Hate creates more hate.

Post reply on HN