431–440 of 1001 posts
I see an increasing number of politicians taking the position: "I supported Israel's government's actions when they first attacked, given the goals of destroying Hamas' leadership and freeing hostages, but now that it has turned into a brutal siege with mass civilian casualties on a horrific scale, I'm strongly against their actions." E.g. Macron, Angus King, and many people I know personally. And I think we need to…
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> way way way, worse that Gaza are going on right now Yeah, all those three are bad; Sudan in particular. I wouldn't say Yemen and Syria are worse than Gaza. > You seem to only care about Israel. The reason I'm screaming about Israel is especially because we (the US) are aiding and abetting it. If we were funding Sudanese rebels the way we're funding the IDF, and welcoming their generals to the White House like we do…
So because you think the US is involved, that's why the UN (which is not the US) should send peacekeepers?
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On the other hand - when Israel struck the parking lot of that hospital a couple of weeks ago everyone was so confident that the IDF was lying when they said that there was a command bunker just underneath the entrance of the hospital. Not only did that end up being completely true, but the IDF killed Muhammad Sinwar in that strike. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/world/middleeast/gaza-hos...
You understand that you just said "they're the monsters for using human shields, but not us for shooting through the human shields", right? Make no mistake, its 100% a war crime to use civilians as human shields. But that doesn't magically absolve the IDF of also committing a war crime. And if they can't meet their military objectives without committing war crimes, maybe that's a sign. In any case, bombing a hospital…
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The destruction is fully visible in satellite footage. Associated Press has “before and after” comparisons.
Israel lobbied for restrictions on the resolution of satellite footage of the occupied Palestinian territories, so it tends to be a lot more blurred than images of anywhere else. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyl–Bingaman_Amendment
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This article having flags turned off ain't organic either.
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It just makes everything worse.
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The problem is not the narrative. The problem is Hamas.
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It's true that Netanyahu is and was opposed to a Palestinian state and that dividing the Palestinians between Hamas and the PA was strategic in that regard. However he misjudged Hamas as not having motivation or ability to attack Israel. A by the way is that since 2007 Israel has attacked Hamas in Gaza and Hamas attacked Israel as well so it's not exactly like they were pals. It was more of the devil we (thought we) know kind of situation.
But there is a previous there which is the failure of the Oslo accords due to Hamas' suicide bombing campaign on Israel. Hamas bombed the peace process to death (alongside with hundreds of random civilians) and also directly cause the rise of the right in Israel and the change of opinion in the Israeli public from accepting the idea of a two state solution to a belief that Israel can not accept that solution. Dividing the Palestinians as a strategy came after the Palestinians showed Israelis that living side by side is impossible. And if the Israelis needed further proof we got the Oct 7th attack.
It's also worth mentioning that short of re-taking Gaza (which we see is not simple) Israel didn't really have a lot of choices once Hamas took and established itself in Gaza. Maybe the right thing to do was to retake Gaza immediately in 2007. I'm sure the world, including you, would scream bloody murder occupation if that happened. Otherwise there's not a lot that could have been done. The civilian aid that made its way into Gaza and Hamas' hands was also a result of international pressure on Israel under the idea that if there was some sort of stability/prosperity in Gaza that would lead to peace. What happened in practice is Hamas channeled all of that into its military efforts and we see where that led us.
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> The downvotes and flagged comments in this post are clearly not "organic" FWIW the downvotes and flags in threads like this, including this thread, do seem largely organic to me, and well within the range of what one expects from a divisive and emotional topic. People often use words like "clearly" in making such descriptions (I don't mean to pick on you personally! countless users do this, from all sides of all is…
With respect, allowing political posts that clearly violate the HN guidelines will normalize such posts, incentivize them in the future due to karma, and attract the type of people that want to soapbox to the community.
There's long precedent here, going back at least to 2008 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869). Here's a memorable (to me at least) case from 2012: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4922426.
If you want to understand how we think about and approach moderation of political stories on HN, probably the best set of explanations is https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so.... If you (or anyone) familiarize yourself with those explanations and then still have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. But do please read some of that stuff first because the questions (and therefore the answers) are nearly always the same.
p.s. All that said, I appreciate your watching out for the quality of HN and I understand the concern.
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Well, maybe not. Did the UN send peacekeepers when Russia invaded Ukraine? Do they send peacekeepers to stop the war in Sudan? Intervening in an active war is not what peacekeepers are for. Why are Palestinian refugees still in Gaza when the whole place is a war zone? Certainly some would stay, but mostly they are trapped. Under the circumstances, for Gaza, having Israel as a neighbor is worse than having Russia as a…
True. But what's happening in Gaza is not an active war. Its oppression of a civilian population by a powerful military force.
But certainly we've let other genocidal atrocities go by without intervening, such as Rwanda in '94. So you have a point there.
> which countries will accept refugees from Gaza? Obviously not the US with the current administration. Why not France, Germany, or other European countries?
Good questions. At this point as far as I know they can't even get out because Israel has closed the borders, much less apply for asylum. Also, countries accepting them as asylum seekers would be acknowledging that Israel is the aggressor. AFAIK France is one of the few countries that has said that Palestinians can apply for asylum.