Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#641

Post by betsushikime » Tue, May 18, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

sequoia wrote: post #587

bronzeage wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gaza is literally not occupied by Israel. Israel withdrew all troops and even banished their own citizens from Gaza. All the Palestinians had to do was not be absolute savages and attack Israel after being given their land with no strings attached. Every single restriction put of Gaza was a direct result of the Palestinian's abuse of the disengagement to fire rockets and kidnap soldiers. All they had to do was simply…

@dang how do you “report” comments? BronzeAge: a lot of the facts you are reporting are true and you’re sharing an important perspective that’s missing in this conversation but your comment is turned into complete garbage by the fact that you’re dehumanizing the Palestinians and making yourself look like a genocidal idiot. Stop!! If you have useful criticisms and perspective to add (as you clearly do), add them, and…

I can't reply to bronzeage's comment above so I'm adding my comment here.

> Gaza is literally not occupied by Israel.

That is according to Israel and I believe also the US. Everyone else, including the UN, most world governments, international organisations etc consider Gaza to be still occupied, despite the "disengagement".

In practical terms, the "disengagement" means nothing. Gaza is penned in and the Palestinians have nowhere to go. The IDF goes in anytime it likes.

More accurately, Gaza would be described as a vast prison, but I think "occupied territory" is a milder and less shocking description, so actually kinder to Israel. In truth, what Israel is doing to Gaza and its inhabitants is unprecedented in world history and will drag Israel's reputation to the gutter for generations to come.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#642

Post by betsushikime » Tue, May 18, 2021, 5:54 PM UTC

gataca wrote: post #574

betsushikime wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the coverage of the conflict is one-sided and popular opinion is on the side of the Palestinians. The reason for that is that the conflict itself is one-sided. Gaza is occupied by Israel. Further, Israel has the overwhelming advantage in military power and the Palestinians suffer the overwhelming majority of casualties every time there is conflict. In the 2008-09 war, the total number of Israeli citizens killed…

How do you explain the same exact global reaction in 2006, when Hezbollah started a war by kidnapping and killing Israeli soldiers on the border and firing missiles into Israel? Massive protests, 'Israel is committing war crimes/genocide', followed by international condemnation. OP that you're responding to is exactly correct - there is zero outrage against the Syrian or Yemen Civil war (where Iranian-funded troops h…

I don't remember the reaction to Hezbollah's attack. I remember the incident, but not the reaction in the news. If you felt that was one-sided, then I will defer to your opinion and accept that I don't have an explanation for it, other than the fact that news organisations are very often prejudiced and their reporting is dictated by their political affiliations.

Regarding Syria, Yemen, Armenia and Ethiopia, perhaps you are right that the atrocities committed there are not given the same atttention in the news (it depends on where you are; in my country, Syria received the same amount of coverage, mainly because we received a large number of refugees from the war).

However, even if those atrocities were given the same attention as the atrocities committed by Israel against the Palestinians, that would not necessarily mean that the latter atrocities would somehow be considered less severe, or that public opinion would turn against the Palestinians. Is that what you would expect?

I should also say that the Palestinian issue has been going on for more than 40 years now without resolution and it's natural that there is more attention paid to it, if nothing else because everyone would like to see the end of it.

In any case, realistically speaking, the occupation is a cause célèbre and there's nothing anyone can do about that, except perhaps ending the occupation.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#643

Post by ls612 » Tue, May 18, 2021, 5:57 PM UTC

virtue3 wrote: post #528

baybal2 wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is different but related. China has no ability to influence GPS accuracy within its borders. FYI: And even far outside of them too

I don't think so Tim. https://spacenews.com/pentagon-report-china-amassing-arsenal...

The current ASAT weapons can only hit targets in low earth orbit, and the GPS sats are way above that. Anything that high up that is military run also likely has capability to maneuver to avoid something shot from the surface (which will take a lot of time to get up that high even if it has enough energy).

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#644

Post by betsushikime » Tue, May 18, 2021, 5:57 PM UTC

gataca wrote: post #632

names_are_hard wrote: post #610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that there should be more outrage about other tragedies, "Better than Syria" is not the standard that I want to hold my country to, so I don't engage in such arguments. We (Israel) consider ourselves to be a western nation, with western ideals and standards. And so it is reasonable that we'd be called out if we fail to live up to the standards of the crowd we want to hang out with. I'd be disappointed i…

I wasn't referring to Israeli actions vs Syria, which are clearly not comparable, but the difference in reactions. If you think that the protests calling Israel an illegal state are just trying to hold Israel to a higher standard then you are clearly misinterpreting what is happening. They're chanting "From the river to the sea" not "Hold yourselves to a higher standard".

Just to clarify, my comments here are no endorsement of calling Israel an illegal state in any way, shape or form.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#645

Post by garaetjjte » Tue, May 18, 2021, 5:58 PM UTC

austinprete wrote: post #431

GekkePrutser wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's weird though as a reason. KAL007 was so far off course that the distortion of SA wouldn't have mattered. It only distorted location by a couple hundred metres at most.

I read the GP as saying that SA GPS was originally made available as a result of the KAL007 crash, so presumably they didn’t have access to GPS at all on the flight? Then much later the SA restriction was removed, unrelated to a plane crash.

Though KAL007 deviated from course not because of some INS fault but just because autopilot didn't switch into INS following mode at all. Most likely crew just forgot to flip the switch, so GPS availability wouldn't have helped anyway.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#646

Post by sudosysgen » Tue, May 18, 2021, 6:12 PM UTC

DSingularity wrote: post #626

benja123 wrote: post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Christian population in the Christian towns of the Westbank (Bethlehem) and in Gaza have been decreasing steadily for the past 70 years - this has nothing to do with the occupation of the Westbank and Gaza and everything to do with persecution by the local population. This trend is not confined to just the Westbank and Gaza and is in fact a trend that is occurring across the entire Middle East where in the past 1…

If by persecution by the locals you mean the Jewish Israelis — sure. But if you are trying to imply that the Muslim Arabs persecuted the Christians get out of here. By wide margins the European Christian crusaders killed more Arab Christians then any other ethnic group. Palestinian Christians and Muslims have coexisted for a long, long time. To the point that the holiest of Christian churches are often entrusted to M…

Indeed. The majority of Palestinian Christians left due to their ethnic cleansing by Israel in 1948.

It's not Hamas that destroyed a Christian church and orphanage a week ago. It was an Israeli bomb.

There were two or three attacks of Christians in Palestine by Muslims, however them being religiously motivated is doubtful and the perpetrators were condemned and prosecuted by everyone, even Hamas.

The vast majority of persecution of Christians in Palestine for their religion was by Jewish extremists, overwhelmingly. Let alone ethnic persecution of Christians.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#647

Post by banannaise » Tue, May 18, 2021, 6:12 PM UTC

golergka wrote: post #615

banannaise wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bombing civilian buildings is not a way to decrease casualty numbers on both sides of a conflict. The more peaceful alternative to bombing civilian buildings is not sending leaflets and then bombing civilian buildings , it is declining to bomb civilian buildings . Using slightly less violence than is available to you does not make you the good guy, especially when the violence you use is drastically higher than the v…

> civilian Citation needed. If a building is used for warfare, it is not civilian building.

> If a building is used for warfare, it is not civilian building.

Citation needed! Show that all the buildings Israel has bombed were being used for warfare.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#648

Post by URSpider94 » Tue, May 18, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

virtue3 wrote: post #528

baybal2 wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is different but related. China has no ability to influence GPS accuracy within its borders. FYI: And even far outside of them too

I don't think so Tim. https://spacenews.com/pentagon-report-china-amassing-arsenal...

At this point, destroying the positioning network/s would be mutually assured destruction. Pretty much every country relies on those networks equally for controlling their own vehicles and weaponry.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#649

Post by virtue3 » Tue, May 18, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

ls612 wrote: post #643

virtue3 wrote: post #528

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so Tim. https://spacenews.com/pentagon-report-china-amassing-arsenal...

The current ASAT weapons can only hit targets in low earth orbit, and the GPS sats are way above that. Anything that high up that is military run also likely has capability to maneuver to avoid something shot from the surface (which will take a lot of time to get up that high even if it has enough energy).

"China already has operational ground-based missiles that can hit satellites in low-Earth orbit and “probably intends to pursue additional ASAT weapons capable of destroying satellites up to geosynchronous Earth orbit,” says the Defense Department’s annual report to Congress on China’s military capabilities."

The problem with defending a satellite is the missile really only needs to get kinda close. And yeah, relativistic speeds and distances in space are huge, but I would find it hard to believe we could defend our satellites in any meaningful way against a nation-state level threat.

Re: Why is the Gaza Strip blurry on Google Maps?

#650

Post by names_are_hard » Tue, May 18, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

gataca wrote: post #632

names_are_hard wrote: post #610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that there should be more outrage about other tragedies, "Better than Syria" is not the standard that I want to hold my country to, so I don't engage in such arguments. We (Israel) consider ourselves to be a western nation, with western ideals and standards. And so it is reasonable that we'd be called out if we fail to live up to the standards of the crowd we want to hang out with. I'd be disappointed i…

I wasn't referring to Israeli actions vs Syria, which are clearly not comparable, but the difference in reactions. If you think that the protests calling Israel an illegal state are just trying to hold Israel to a higher standard then you are clearly misinterpreting what is happening. They're chanting "From the river to the sea" not "Hold yourselves to a higher standard".

Fair enough, I think there are a lot of protestors (in real life as well as on Twitter) that have entirely unrealistic goals, hoping for an ideal situation but not really thinking through what the ramifications of their plan would be. I've seen this among "Greater Israel" Israelis as well - I once had a long chat with a settler in the Jordan Valley region about how he envisions annexation working out, the best he could come up with was "all the Palestinians will voluntarily move to Canada, which will take them in because Trump is going to broker a deal". Not exactly the strongest answer to accusations of ethnic cleansing.

To be clear, anyone hoping for "from the river to the sea" is not in touch with the reality in the region. The only way that could happen is with a terrible war that would make the current war look like a small scuffle. I'm pretty sure there's no diplomatic path from where we are today to a one state solution of any kind that doesn't take several generations, and we're not moving in the right direction.