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ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

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Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#151

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

candiodari wrote: post #138
runarberg wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These allegations of Hamas violations of international humanitarian laws—even if true—does not devalue the lives of Palestinians, nor does it give Israel an excuse for further violations. https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/hrbodies...

[flagged]

> The only real violations of international law apply to an army purposefully going, unprovoked, into a civilian area and starting to shoot everyone. Hamas does that, as they've proven on many occasions (including their own civilians), Israel doesn't.

Israel has been shown to do this on multiple occasions. Take, for example, them doing exactly this to their own surrendering hostages, which they mistook for surviving, surrendering Palestinian civilians as they combed through the rubble of their bombings. Or maybe there was no mistake.

Given Israel's assault on the free press in Gaza (ranging from shutting off power and communications to literally shooting and bombing press workers), we may never know the true extent of these cleansings, especially when it really is "just" surviving, surrendering Palestinian civilians.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#152

Post by dlubarov »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #149
dlubarov wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their nationality certainly is not Israeli. One could say Palestinian, or Gazan, since Hamas' rule of Gaza makes it more of a separate state in practice. If one were to take the view that neither Palestine or Gaza are states (a semantic question which I don't take a position on), then they would be stateless people with no nationality. Even if you want to make the argument that Israel is occupying (Hamas-controlled p…

> Their nationality certainly is not Israeli. One could say Palestinian, or Gazan, since Hamas' rule of Gaza makes it more of a separate state in practice. If one were to take the view that neither Palestine or Gaza are states (a semantic question which I don't take a position on), then they would be stateless people with no nationality. Israel treating their Palestinian-born subjects as stateless would be illegal, s…

If you want my interpretation, it's that Gazans are effectively citizens of Gaza, which Hamas is the de facto government of. (Palestinians in the West Bank are a separate matter.) Gaza should have been a place of freedom, independence, and self-determination since 2005, but Hamas' aggression has unfortunately made that impossible for now.

I was never commenting on legality. It seems unreasonable to expect a country to essentially give up on its own defense, whether or not such defense is deemed illegal and/or leads to more deaths overall.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#153

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

dlubarov wrote: post #152
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their nationality certainly is not Israeli. One could say Palestinian, or Gazan, since Hamas' rule of Gaza makes it more of a separate state in practice. If one were to take the view that neither Palestine or Gaza are states (a semantic question which I don't take a position on), then they would be stateless people with no nationality. Israel treating their Palestinian-born subjects as stateless would be illegal, s…

If you want my interpretation, it's that Gazans are effectively citizens of Gaza, which Hamas is the de facto government of. (Palestinians in the West Bank are a separate matter.) Gaza should have been a place of freedom, independence, and self-determination since 2005, but Hamas' aggression has unfortunately made that impossible for now. I was never commenting on legality. It seems unreasonable to expect a country t…

I appreciate your interpretation, and I don't want this to sound dismissive: The point is that Israel doesn't get to eat their cake and have it, too. Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel, or they treat the Palestinian-born subjects under their rule as citizens with all the same rights as the Israeli-born subjects under their rule. Apartheid and genocide aren't legal options, despite Israel perpetrating both.

> Hamas' aggression has unfortunately made that impossible for now.

On the contrary: as the world has expressed on multiple occasions in multiple ways, Israel's genocide of Palestinians is what continues to make that difficult. After all, the world sees how Israel abused Palestinians for decades before October 7th. Israel can't say the world didn't warn them as they spiral into the same pariah status as Russia and North Korea.

> It seems unreasonable to expect a country to essentially give up on its own defense

The "abiding by international law means essentially giving up our defense" claim was put forth by Israel and judged not to be the case. It was expected, both when the law was drafted, and when the case was brought against Israel, given their frequent repetition of the now-debunked claim. It just wasn't credible: neither the court nor most countries or people actually believe Hamas is going to somehow conquer the state of Israel. Indeed, it's inconceivable that over their entire remaining existence Hamas will ever deal out even a small fraction of the damage Israel has dealt to innocent Palestinian civilians over the course of less than 1 year.

If, however, one isn't interested in discussing the legality of Israel's behavior (in an HN submission about precisely that), and the topic is reduced to whether Israel will say "whatever, I do what I want" a la Putin or Cartman, then I will submit a bet that they will, and leave it at that.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#154

Post by runarberg »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #151
candiodari wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> The only real violations of international law apply to an army purposefully going, unprovoked, into a civilian area and starting to shoot everyone. Hamas does that, as they've proven on many occasions (including their own civilians), Israel doesn't. Israel has been shown to do this on multiple occasions. Take, for example, them doing exactly this to their own surrendering hostages, which they mistook for surviving,…

I’m also thinking about the Jenin hospital raid[1] where the Israeli army stormed a hospital wearing civilian clothing (i.e. hiding among civilians) and extra-judicially killed three wounded (and as a result inactive; i.e. unprovoked) operatives.

I’m also thinking about the massacres during the great march of return[2], where Israeli soldiers fired indiscriminately at unarmed protestors. In the protests, and the ensuing conflict, Israel killed 223 people, by far majority of whom were unarmed civilians. You can argue that mass demonstration is provocative, but the response of indiscriminately killing unarmed protestors is not a proportionate response.

And finally, I’m also thinking about the flour massacre[3], where the Israeli army purposefully went, unprovoked, into a civilian area and started to shoot everyone. At least 118 civilians were killed and 760 were wounded when the Israeli army shot at people trying to gather food after having been deliberately starved by Israel the months before.

The parent (who I’m trying not to engage with) is also just wrong when they claim no international law is broken by Israel. They currently have one ICJ case ruled against them, that of the illegal border (or apartheid) wall in the west bank, which the ICJ ruled illegal in 2004[4] and demanded they take down (which Israel hasn’t). The have several condemnations by a pletora of international humanitarian organizations. There are two ongoing ICJ cases against them, one for genocide, and their leaders stand recommended for indictments at the ICC.

There are many more examples than the three above of Israel blatantly violating international humanitarian law. Which is why the UN general assembly overwhelmingly voted to press charges at the ICJ to find out what the consequences of these gross violations should be[5].

1: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/30/middleeast/israel-undercover-...

2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%932019_Gaza_border_...

3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour_massacre

4: https://www.icj-cij.org/case/131

5: https://www.icj-cij.org/case/186

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#155

Post by dlubarov »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #153
dlubarov wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want my interpretation, it's that Gazans are effectively citizens of Gaza, which Hamas is the de facto government of. (Palestinians in the West Bank are a separate matter.) Gaza should have been a place of freedom, independence, and self-determination since 2005, but Hamas' aggression has unfortunately made that impossible for now. I was never commenting on legality. It seems unreasonable to expect a country t…

I appreciate your interpretation, and I don't want this to sound dismissive: The point is that Israel doesn't get to eat their cake and have it, too. Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel, or they treat the Palestinian-born subjects under their rule as citizens with all the same rights as the Israeli-born subjects under their rule. Apartheid and genocide aren't legal…

> Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel

Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one.

Indeed my point was never about law; this thread began with your argument which seemed to be about utilitarian ethics. So the ICJ order isn't related to my point, unless we consider the ICJ an arbiter of morality.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#156

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

dlubarov wrote: post #155
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate your interpretation, and I don't want this to sound dismissive: The point is that Israel doesn't get to eat their cake and have it, too. Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel, or they treat the Palestinian-born subjects under their rule as citizens with all the same rights as the Israeli-born subjects under their rule. Apartheid and genocide aren't legal…

> Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one. Indeed my point was never about law; this thread began with your argument which seemed to be abo…

> Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one.

Not Gaza, Palestine. That includes Gaza and the West Bank, which has been under Israeli apartheid for a long time. There is rarely an unrestrained right to self-defense of a country engaging in apartheid and genocide, against those upon whom they are perpetrating it. Does Israel grant Palestinian-born subjects in the West Bank (a territory Israel dominates) freedom, self-determination, safety? Does it treat them equally to Israeli-born subjects? No, and that's illegal (and apartheid).

The "self defense exception" was cited by Israel, and the court judged that their illegal actions go beyond legal self defense. If we take a moral perspective rather than a legal one, it would be immoral to substitute Israel's judgement for that of the ICJ, a less biased and more informed body. From a utilitarian objective standpoint, we arrive at the same conclusion: It's unlikely Israel has some magical higher understanding that all other countries lack. Plus, legitimizing claims by defendants like Putin, Bibi, Sinwar, Kony, Gallant, or Haniyeh et. al, that they somehow know better than the court, would kinda defeat the purpose of the court.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#157

Post by weatherlite »

stanfordkid wrote: post #150
weatherlite wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How was the Nakba a genocide?

It was ethnic cleansing, violent forced displacement paired with massacres of 750,000 people. My mistake — not genocide.

You're correct it was not genocide. The other side carried out quite a few massacres of its own and tried to displace the Jews (or worse) - so it was pretty much just a war.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#158

Post by dlubarov »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #156
dlubarov wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Either they treat Palestine as an independent country with all the same rights as Israel Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one. Indeed my point was never about law; this thread began with your argument which seemed to be abo…

> Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one. Not Gaza, Palestine . That includes Gaza and the West Bank, which has been under Israeli apartheid for a long time. There is rarely an unrestrained right to self-defense of a country en…

It seems like you're veering into a different topic with the assertion that West Bank is an apartheid system. If we're talking about Gaza still, Hamas is the de facto government there, having won the election and the subsequent war. The PLO's declaration and aspirational claim of Gaza doesn't change the reality of Hamas' rule.

From a moral perspective, it seems like you're saying the ICJ would be a better arbiter of morality than Israel, but my point didn't involve an appeal to any authority; that just doesn't seem necessary when discussing morality.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#159

Post by tsimionescu »

weatherlite wrote: post #148
tsimionescu wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, and neither did Hamas.

Yes it did. Which events I listed are you disputing?

You adjusted your post to note that the ten thousand dead was an adjustment. Even so, it's an adjustment in the wrong direction - Northern Ireland is tinier than Israel, not larger. And the correct comparison is Irish Republicans in Northern Ireland ~ Palestinians, British loyalists in Northern Ireland ~ Israelis. You can view the greater UKs role in the conflict as similar to the USAs role in the Israel-Palestine conflict. Of course, none of these comparisons are remotely 1:1, but they are close enough.

Going for a less shallow dismissal of your points then:

> Did the IRA kill around ten thousands of Brits in one day and kidnapped a few thousands (I'm adjusting to population size here) ?

The IRA in total killed some 2000 people, representing some 0.2% of the Protestant population of Northern Ireland. Hamas killed in total ~2600 people since 2008 (where I found simple data on Wikipedia), which represents about 0.04% of the population of Israel, taking a very small estimate for the total population. So, in percentages, the IRA was about 5 times as vicious as Hamas (edit: accidentally wrote 50 earlier).

> Did the IRA have the sworn objective to eliminate England?

Yes, the IRA had the objective to eliminate British rule in Northern Ireland entirely, which is quite similar to Hamas's goal of eliminating Israeli rule in all of Israel. I'm not sure if the IRA was as happy to kill any loyalist civilians as Hamas is in killing Israeli civilians, to be fair.

> Did the IRA join forces with another terrorist organization and a superpower bent on destroying England to encircle England from all directions and join the war?

I'm not sure what superpower you refer to here (are you calling Egypt a superpower? Edit - oh, you mean the USSR...). Regardless, Ireland did have some amount of implication in the Troubles, though of course immeasurably less. I'm also not sure why it's more legitimate to bomb civilian buildings or not based on whether those civilians were once supported by outside countries, 50 years ago.

Re: ICJ orders Israel to stop military operation in Rafah

#160

Post by [deleted] »

dlubarov wrote: post #158
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are you saying that as an independent country, Gaza's sovereignty can't be violated? This isn't absolute; there are exceptions like self-defense, whether we're look at this from a legal perspective (UN article 51) or an ethical one. Not Gaza, Palestine . That includes Gaza and the West Bank, which has been under Israeli apartheid for a long time. There is rarely an unrestrained right to self-defense of a country en…

It seems like you're veering into a different topic with the assertion that West Bank is an apartheid system. If we're talking about Gaza still, Hamas is the de facto government there, having won the election and the subsequent war. The PLO's declaration and aspirational claim of Gaza doesn't change the reality of Hamas' rule. From a moral perspective, it seems like you're saying the ICJ would be a better arbiter of…

[deleted]
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