- I'm a Jew in USA, and served in the military for more than a decade.
- I used to get annoyed by the Palestinian protests I'd see in the years before this, and generally sided with Israel, and the operations its military performed in counter-Shia-militia operations etc in the region, and was outraged at the Oct 7 attacks.
This is large-scale, continued, intentional CIVCAS.
This Haaretz article is very troubling. To the extent it's accurate, there's not much question that it reflects war crimes.
A few thoughts:
1. The article itself says there is an ongoing investigation into some of these accusations. I hope that, to whatever extent this is happening, it's not widespread, and anyone committing war crimes is very visibly and publicly tried in court.
2. There is clearly something broken with the GHF and the new aid delivery - dozens dead every day for weeks. We really need some answers on what's going on.
3. From Haaretz today:
> The U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation on Saturday urged Israel to investigate reports that soldiers opened fire towards unarmed Palestinians near aid distribution sites, detailed in a Haaretz expose, calling the allegations "too grave to ignore," while denying that any such incidents occurred within its facilities.
> GHF Interim Director John Acree stated, "There have been no incidents or fatalities at or in the immediate vicinity of any of our distribution sites."
I do want you to consider the context here on Hacker News though. You and me have context, we understand the history, we understand at least something about wars and how they are fought. Most people here do not.
The problem isn't whether firing on civilians with no reason when they come to get food is wrong or right. We all know it's wrong. The soldiers in Gaza know it's wrong. We all know this is a war crime.
Most cases of war crimes during war are not prosecuted at all and not visibly. This is true for US wars in the middle east. It's true for the war the West wages against ISIS. It's true for Ukraine and Russia. It's a sad but unfortunate reality of our world. The current political climate and government in Israel are also not the best for the kind of outcome you are describing.
Iran and Hamas firing missiles and rockets into population centers is a war crime too. So is their embedding and use of civilians. The entire strategy of Israel's opponents in the middle east is to engage in war crimes.
Where do we place Israel on that scale? Is there more attention on Israel vs. other similar world events? Why? Do we see similar public debate and discussion of the morality of those wars in other countries? Again, where is Israel on that scale (not of idealistic fantasy world of justice but in the real world)?
I’d flip that around: why shouldn’t we expect Israel to be better than a terrorist group like Hamas or the deeply evil Iranian government? When some Americans complained that they were being held to a higher standard than Al-Qaeda or ISIL, they were rightly criticized for betraying our national aspiration to leading rather than trailing the world, and the same is happening here. Israel has rightly set its standards higher than its neighbors when it comes to democracy and civil rights, but that entails criticism where it fails to live up to that self-selected standard.
I feel like you're moving the target now. Those are your words above.
But yes, if your scale is that of the western world then harsh criticism of Israel's war crimes should be expected and welcome.
I don't mean to put words in your mouth, maybe you did mean something along those lines and I'm misinterpreting.
Let's get some scale here. - Probably more than 160K killed in this war. Maybe half civilians. - Siege and constant bombardment/destruction of cities like Mosul. - Millions of civilians displaced. - Many war crimes by western powers.
This was in response to what? A few westerners beheaded? Terrorist attacks killing a few dozen people?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_against_the_Islamic_State
Can you really say honestly that the amount of criticism Israel is attracting due to its war in Gaza and the circumstances are comparable? This might just be me but I don't recall huge rallies against the war. I don't recall much negative media coverage. I don't recall anyone held accountable for war crimes. I don't recall the ICC being involved.
Yes, the US bombings of random weddings in Afghanistan with Predator drones and air to surface missiles, or bombing hospitals has occasionally drawn some weak protest. Nothing at the scale of the anti-Israeli sentiment.
This isn't what-about-ism. It's not ok to bomb a wedding and it's not ok to fire into a crowd of people trying to get food. But there is no comparison of the sentiment and focus.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_disengagement_from_the...
Yes, everything can be litigated to the beginning of time, WW-2, WW-1, the Romans. But the fact still stands that all those "moral" countries didn't hesitate to lay siege, starve people, bomb civilians, for tbh little reason. I don't recall hearing even crickets protest.
Why can't the "Islamic State" have their own country? Sure their culture of beheading and kidnapping Yazidi as slaves is a bit weird but come on.
From the very first paragraph in your own link:
> Since then, the United Nations, many other international humanitarian and legal organizations, and most academic commentators have continued to regard the Gaza Strip as being under Israeli occupation ...
"Full control" - except over their border, their imports, their airspace, their electromagnetic frequencies, their coastline, their construction industry, etc etc.
> WW-2, WW-1, the Romans. But the fact still stands that all those "moral" countries didn't hesitate to lay siege, starve people, bomb civilians, for tbh little reason.
... If you're taking the Romans and WW-2 as your baseline for morality, that would start to explain things.
This anti-Israeli argument that somehow Israel dismantled its settlements and left but yet still "occupied" Gaza is nonsense. It does not stand any minimal scrutiny.
Yes, as a result of Gazans making a choice to engage in war with Israel there was a blockade over that territory. That's about it. Do you expect Israel to allow them to import tanks and jets?
So yeah. I think we can say they had control.
The "tightening of the screws" is a result of Palestinians deciding to wage war against Israel, build rockets, fire them into civilian populations.
It's really pretty simple. Palestinians want to destroy Israel. They have and had no interest having a "Singapore" in Gaza.
I'm not sure how you get to the 90's. We are talking about the disengagement in 2005.
I lived in Israel during this time and I know very well what the mood was. I've also seen interviews with people who were in the loop who say Ariel Sharon (who architected the withdrawal) sincerely wanted to see Palestinians succeed and use this as a blue print to also end the conflict in the west bank. International donors even bought equipment from Israel (like greenhouses) so they can leave it for the Palestinians who promptly proceeded to destroy them.
The latter happened as recently as this month; the IDF commandeered a boat delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza and arrested its passengers in international waters. https://mondoweiss.net/2025/06/israeli-forces-commandeer-aid...