zlacker

As another Jewish Israeli I agree this is concerning.

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)?

>>YZF+(OP)
IDF HQ is next to a mall, so Israel is doing the same as Hamas?

>>Hikiko+f2
And where is the Pentagon?

Attacking the Qirya, Israel's HQ, with some sort of accuracy is a legitimate military target. It's a pretty large target. Soldiers wear uniform. There are no civilians mixed into that camp.

This is very different than lobbing rockets at Beer-Sheba, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ramat Gan. The casualties from Iran's attacks, minus one off-duty soldier, were all civilians and the targets were nowhere near anything military. The intentionally aim at population centers.

>>YZF+(OP)
> The entire strategy of Israel's opponents in the middle east is to engage in war crimes.

I think war crimes are a lot more acceptable/understandable if they’re the only way you even potentially have a chance to get back at your agressors. Nobody blames the resistance during the Nazi occupation for what they did.

Israel is very much not in a position they need to perpetrate war crimes to win the war. They have already won. It’s like a cat playing with the mouse it killed.

>>YZF+(OP)
> Where do we place Israel on that scale? Is there more attention on Israel vs. other similar world events?

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.

>>acdha+63
My scale isn't ISIL or Al-Qaeda. My scale is the US, the UK, Australia, France etc. The scale of the western world.

>>YZF+y5
Exactly. It’s fair to criticize Israel for civilian casualties just like all of those countries have been criticized for failing to live up to their stated standards. Countries like Russia or Iran are recognized as being worse but don’t get criticized for being hypocritical because nobody expected them to be good.

>>Aeolun+P2
> Nobody blames the resistance during the Nazi occupation for what they did.

Are you really sure about that? Maybe now, but while it was happening, I'm not so sure everyone was on board. Quite the opposite.

>>YZF+y5
> 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?

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.

>>bluehe+I6
It it absolutely fair to criticize Israel the same way that e.g Canada, the US, the UK, France etc. were criticized during their war on the Islamic State.

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.

>>YZF+G7
You can’t talk about ISIS in isolation from the U.S. invasion of Iraq which gave Zarqawi the ability to grow so much. That had enormous protests, tons of criticism for the massive civilian death toll, and plenty of negative media coverage. By the time the Islamic system was at its height, most of the reaction was muted in the backdrop of Syria’s civil war and the U.S. failure in Iraq leaving few people jumping to commit more troops into unfriendly territory. In contrast, Israel controls Gaza and has no willingness to give up that control and ownership follows that.

>>YZF+(OP)
> Where do we place Israel on that scale

That is, I think, an excellent and pertinent question.

For starters may I suggest applying straightforward quantification on a linear scale and observing the results? See the following two wiki articles / subsections:

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_co... (see chart preceding the Gaza war (follow anchor))

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Gaza_war (Gaza war; see top table (and subsequent charts for more detailed breakdown if interested))

Based on this quantitative data where would you place Israel on that aforementioned scale?

>>acdha+f6
Countries like Russia (and probably Iran) still claim to be paragons of human rights in diplomatic settings - just that most are used to ignoring them because of the immense scale and sheer audacity of their hypocrisy.

>>acdha+Z8
Israel did give up Gaza and gave Palestinians full control of it, and a border with Egypt they controlled, in 2005.

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.

>>Aeolun+P2
This is probably what anti-Soviet groups in WWII thought when they allied with the Nazis and committed atrocities. Most people today don't seem to think they were justified in doing that.

>>wfn+m9
Wikipedia on this topic is incredibly biased to one side or the other. It’s not a valid source in this case.

>>bGl2YW+Hb
Nah, it's just #s, and "both sides", as it were, are presented

>>YZF+da
> Israel did give up Gaza and gave Palestinians full control of it

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.

>>mandma+2e
I'm sorry but you're just wrong. The reasons the UN and others still regarded Gaza as under Israeli occupation are either political or technical. In practice when Israel left Gazans got full control. They had a border with Egypt, not to mention tunnels for smuggling goods under that border. They had enough control to build a large army, tunnels, rockets etc. I.e. they had control. They were able to send people to train in Iran.

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?

>>bGl2YW+Hb
Do you mean the data sources it lists in those two articles are not valid? (I am referring to raw figures and not to actual textual content even). The charts themselves (and the proportions thereof) have been observed everywhere incl. in the mainstream media?

Can you present one counterexample as regards quantities / proportions of figures please? One source. (More of course if you'd like)

(My implicit point is that the proportions are so one-sided (orders of magnitude in difference; yes plural) that you will not find one; but please do find one (with actual quantities) and we can all check veracity of your source)

P.S. edit here is one of the sources the first wiki article lists (of multiple):

Lappin, Yaakov (2009). "IDF releases Cast Lead casualty numbers". The Jerusalem Post. Archived from the original on 26 March 2013. Retrieved 5 January 2024. =>

- https://www.jpost.com/israel/idf-releases-cast-lead-casualty...

- https://web.archive.org/web/20130326192603/http://www.jpost....

>>YZF+(OP)
The fantasy of using civilians as a means to say this is a war crime is out the window. In order to stop one country from killing your population, most often the revers effect is the same. neither of which are justified. in order to stop the third Reich the majority of Germany was destroyed along with the mass civilian death. Attacking promptly and aggressively carries civilian death in most cases (U.S. attacking japan). This is a cycle that happens in humanity every so often, one can say we tend to take life for granted over-time. Then some big event or catastrophe happens and a group of nations put some international body in place to reduce big wars and conflicts, this usually hinders large scale conflicts for about 50-80 years until that generation forgets and or history is no longer connected to them some way and the same thing repeats again. Remember that The U.S. and some of the European nations carried the actions, in which there-after developed international body's to protect them from a similar attack like nuclear or mass genocide. The one's affected are the ones that repeat the cycle, if they were the victim last time in the cycle then they will be the perpetrator this tine around.

>>YZF+da
If you read your own link, note how Israel has a near-total blockade and maintains military control. I have absolutely no love for Hamas but I also recognize that there are a ton of civilians caught between the hammer of Israeli and the anvil of Hamas with zero opportunity for self-determination. They have no control over Hamas - the last election was in 2006 so the majority of the Palestinian population has literally never once been able to vote – and they have even less influence with the Israeli government. That is a tragedy by any measure, and Israel’s wanton killing and collective punishment is a recipe for continued conflict because it ensures that there’s a constant supply of people who have a personal grudge because they know someone innocent whose life has been tragically altered.

>>YZF+Ye
Sorry, to be clear, you’re saying that proof of their freedom is that they could build tunnels to smuggle goods?

>>bGl2YW+Hb
As they say, citation needed - political inconvenience isn’t the same as bias.

>>tyre+nk
And build and train a large military force. And build an extensive tunnel network in the entirety of the Gaza strip. Complete control over every day to day aspect of their lives, government, healthcare, police force. Elections. Extensive weapons manufacturing. Control of the borders with Israel and Gaza.

So yeah. I think we can say they had control.

>>acdha+6i
> If you read your own link, note how Israel has a near-total blockade and maintains military control

For most of the period since 2005, it has been a joint Israeli-Egyptian blockade, not an exclusively Israeli one. That has recently changed now that Israel has militarily occupied the Gaza side of the Egypt-Gaza border

But I do find it interesting how Israel gets exclusively blamed for something which Egypt also had a hand in - and they weren’t doing it because “Israel made us”, they had their own security reasons - they feared Hamas would support Islamist rebels in Egypt.

It does seem to support the claim that Israel gets “picked on”, when a joint Israeli-Egyptian blockade gets presented as an exclusively Israeli one

>>YZF+un
Israel has been blockading and controlling Gaza since the 90s. To argue that they've had complete control is just historically and factually wrong. Israel has been gradually tightening the screws on the region for decades.

>>Aeolun+P2
> Nobody blames the resistance during the Nazi occupation for what they did.

Because the Nazis lost. Had the Nazis won, alternative history and all that, the argument would probably be the other way around, how, faced with overwhelmingly strong enemies, they "had to" create death camps to "get back" at their aggressors.

Not a great argument, I think.

>>skissa+Vn
Yes, Egypt has some control (imports still require Israeli approval) but they also do not have a great reputation internationally. Israelis are objecting to being seen like Egypt when they aspire to being seen like a western democracy rather than an authoritarian state.

>>YZF+J2
So you agree that your argument is nonsense.

>>acdha+f6
> Exactly. It’s fair to criticize Israel for civilian casualties just like all of those countries have been criticized for failing to live up to their stated standards.

Russia doesn't target civilian population to the extent Israel does. There is a reason only Israel is charged with genocide, and not Russia. Don't get me wrong, both the countries' governments are run by bunch of homicidal dictators, but only Isreal systematically does enough war crimes and human rights violations to fit the criteria of genocide.

>>fzeror+Ms
Nobody has complete control over anything but the true story is that Israel withdrew in good faith wanting to give Palestinians a chance to build their own lives. Israel did exactly what all the good people here want it to do so badly. Stop the "occupation". Since the outcome of that doesn't fit the narrative (10's of thousands of rockets on Israel, suicide bombing attacks, Hamas taking over, leading to Oct 7th) then we need to do some mental gymnastics to somehow claim that despite Israel no longer occupying Gaza it somehow still was.

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.

>>YZF+G7
The was on ISIS wasn't waged exclusively or even mainly by the West. It was waged on the ground primarily by the local armed forces - Iraqi army in Iraq, YPG militias in both Iraq and Syria etc - who were actively resisting the attempts to take over their communities by force and in some cases outright genocide them. The West provided active military support including air strikes and occasional on-the-ground assistance, but you can't reduce the reasons for that war to "a few westerners beheaded"; you have to look at the totality of crimes against humanity perpetrated by ISIS on its occupied territories to get a comprehensive casus belli on behalf of the opposing forces primarily responsible for all the destruction.

>>YZF+eA1
Nobody has "complete control", sure, but there's a reason Gaza doesn't have an airport (destroyed by the IDF) and can't receive aid by sea (intercepted by the IDF).

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...

>>jakela+zN1
Thunberg's flotella isn't a very good example of Israel preventing aid. The flotella carried a symbolic bit of aid, and Israel didn't reject it, they just insisted that it go through proper channels rather than violate a blockade which is in place for justifiable security reasons.

>>dlubar+RS1
Saying that Israel gets to determine the "proper channels" for people and aid to enter Gaza is a tacit admission that the strip is occupied by Israel.

>>jakela+2V1
Post Oct 7, of course there's an occupation now that Israel has boots on the ground.

>>dlubar+KW1
October 7 was not the start of Israel intercepting aid in international waters: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/6/9/freedom-flotillas-a-...

> The movement, founded in 2006 by activists during Israel’s war on Lebanon, went on to launch 31 boats between 2008 and 2016, five of which reached Gaza despite heavy Israeli restrictions.

> Since 2010, all flotillas attempting to break the Gaza blockade have been intercepted or attacked by Israel in international waters.

>>ath3nd+sl1
This is entirely incorrect. Putin's arrest warrant is for the mass kidnapping of Ukrainian children. The legal definition of genocide explicitly calls out such a situation as an example. There are other reasons why your comparison is flawed.

>>YZF+eA1
You keep repeating things that are simply not historically true. We know factually that Israel was blockading and enforcing their will in Gaza as early as 1991.

I don't see a need to engage with you further, especially as you increasingly use dog whistles to tacitly support the actions of Israel while repeating clear propaganda. Your arguments are not helping as much as you think, and only increasingly turning people against Israel as their actions become more and more obvious.

>>jakela+4Z1
I don't quite get the point you're getting at; we're all in agreement that there is a blockade. The flotella doesn't really add anything to our understanding of the situation - we already knew there was a blockade and that unauthorized ships wouldn't be allowed to pass.

That doesn't imply much about aid; it's not a total blockade and there are mechanisms for importing aid. One can argue that the aid distribution mechanisms are bad, and it might be reasonable to propose various changes (different aid mechanisms, a relaxation of the blockade, etc), but it wouldn't really make sense for Israel to make exceptions and allow certain unauthorized ships to just circumvent its blockade.

>>dlubar+L62
Read further up the thread. There are definitely people here who don't agree that Israel is occupying Gaza.

>>YZF+J2
Frankly, you need to understand some things - people, especially on this site are beyond conversations - they are guided by their beliefs. Those beliefs are not going to change - they will die with them. Humans are very violent in their minds. And pretty much the intensity of that insanity is the only signal that is a warning for imminent global conflict, that has been postponed for some time.

>>glandi+l6
Fair point. Collective punishment has a way of making people feel like that, which is of course entirely the point. Of course, collective punishment isn’t any less of a crime.

>>YZF+eA1
> It's really pretty simple. Palestinians want to destroy Israel.

Read it again. Note how effectively this statement conveys a deeply dehumanizing generalization of Palestinians.

I advise all readers to take careful note. Even the most well-manicured extremists will eventually tell you who they really are.

>>dlubar+RS1
“Didn’t reject it”.

They bombed the first boat. In international waters.

Extremist ideology makes people say some strange things, but the intellectual contortion dlubarov asks the reader to endure in order to see Israel as a bonafide example of “proper channels” is tantamount to lobotomy.

>>cog-fl+77k
The devil is in the details. From the river to the sea is different. There are some moderate Palestinians and then there are Hamas and other extremists. So the goal of destroying Israel has different interpretations. Moderates just want Palestine instead of Israel and Jews out "back to Europe" ( or whatever the came from) and extremists just want to slaughter (aka October 7th but their buddies Hizballah and Iran failed to help them, the "Khaiber, Khaiber" crowd that wants what ISIS did to Yezidis )