An Issue Of Valuing The Lives Of Others

[icehorse]

No.
But responses should be reasonable.
War isn't a license to kill with abandon.
Hence the prohibition of war crimes.

So do you think it's reasonable to let Hamas survive? I do not. This is something the world should have taken care of years ago.

 

[icehorse]

I try to avoid loaded questions.
You seem to try to avoid answers.
Perhaps because you infer meaning that's not there.

well we'll see what happens moving forward...

 

[icehorse]

But let's assume your premise that many Muslims believe
as you say. Are you arguing that treating Muslims as
less than human, oppressing & killing innocents, is justified
by what Hitchens says?

Islam (along with most religions, to be fair), is fundamentally dishonest. to the degree that Muslims pursue the political aspect of Islam, I think they are putting themselves in harm's way. If Muslims want to be treated fairly, they should do the same to infidels.

 

[icehorse]

Israel is the king of exploiting victimhood.

I think Muslims give them a run for their money on the victimhood strategy

 

[Revoltingest]

So do you think it's reasonable to let Hamas survive?

It's unreasonable to wage war against Hamas in
a manner that kills thousands of innocent Palestinians,
devastates their home, & drives many into exile.

You remind me of a fundie Christian I once employed.
had. He believed that Israel's mistake early on was to
allow any Palestinians to live, ie, the biblical way was to
kill every last one of them. Then there would be peace.

I do not. This is something the world should have taken care of years ago.

The world should've induced Israel to treat
Palestinians with justice. So that Hamas
would never have arisen in opposition
to Israel's deadly brutality.

 

[Revoltingest]

Islam (along with most religions, to be fair), is fundamentally dishonest. to the degree that Muslims pursue the political aspect of Islam, I think they are putting themselves in harm's way. If Muslims want to be treated fairly, they should do the same to infidels.

Your dissing of Islam is irrelevant to Israel's
oppression & murder of innocent Palestinians.

 

[Revoltingest]

I think Muslims give them a run for their money on the victimhood strategy

Lately, Muslims are indeed the real victims (relatively).
Jews have been killing so many more of them, with help
from Christian fundies of course. The Israel vs Hamas
kill ratio is heading upwards past 3 to 1 with all those
child & infant "terrorists" obliterated.
But the Israeli PR machine here is still king of the hill.
Much of the country fetes & obeys Israel.

 

[Watchmen]

There are consequences for hate speech, this includes hate speech towards Israel such as claiming Israel is “entirely responsible” for all the violence, including that unleashed by Hamas.

 

[Revoltingest]

There are consequences for hate speech, this includes hate speech towards Israel such as claiming Israel is “entirely responsible” for all the violence, including that unleashed by Hamas.

It's rather the opposite of hate speech to criticize a country
for oppression, murder, torture, home demolition, & group
punishment resulting in violent uprising.
Israel must face that its policy of brutal oppression will have
predictable results such as the creation of Hamas.
And further, if USA's government tries to stamp out criticism
of Israel, & support for Palestinians, that attempt will foment
even more hostility here.

 

[icehorse]

It's unreasonable to wage war against Hamas in
a manner that kills thousands of innocent Palestinians,
devastates their home, & drives many into exile.

How do you propose doing it then?

The world should've induced Israel to treat
Palestinians with justice. So that Hamas
would never have arisen in opposition
to Israel's deadly brutality.

Again, tell me your context - when do you think the historical clock should start ticking?

Your dissing of Islam is irrelevant to Israel's
oppression & murder of innocent Palestinians.

Islam is totally relevant, and I disagree with your characterization of Israel's actions.

The Israel vs Hamas
kill ratio is heading upwards past 3 to 1

So, you're a fan of proportional warfare? I guess you didn't answer this last time? But I guess you are.

I have to disagree.

 

[Estro Felino]

It's rather the opposite of hate speech to criticize a country
for oppression, murder, torture, home demolition, & group
punishment resulting in violent uprising.
Israel must face that its policy of brutal oppression will have
predictable results such as the creation of Hamas.
And further, if USA's government tries to stamp out criticism
of Israel, & support for Palestinians, that attempt will foment
even more hostility here.

Honestly I think there is an upheaval of the victim-perpetrator cycle here.

The perpetrators consider themselves victims and call the victims perpetrators. It's sick and twisted.
It's psychiatrically interesting.
But it's still twisted.

Because all terrorists and fundamentalists want to destroy civilized countries where women are free.
They cannot stand that women can show their legs or their breasts.
It's in their terroristic books that they have to destroy all those countries that allow that.
So, since Israel is one of those "evil countries", they have to destroy it.

So...what I am saying is: Terrorists are the perpetrators here. Israel is the victim.

So you cannot blame Israel for defending itself from those who want to destroy it.


PS: Terrorists want to destroy Europe too. Where women can walk half-naked on the street...

 

[Revoltingest]

How do you propose doing it then?

I've proposed before that Israel must begin
treating Palestinians with justice. Of course,
the best time to do that is before war ensues.
At this point, it should defend, but without
murdering so many innocent Palestinians....who
aren't merely collateral damage...they're the
targets.

Again, tell me your context - when do you think the historical clock should start ticking?

Deal with circumstances as they are now.
No historical starting point justifies Israel's
brutal oppression of Palestinians.

Islam is totally relevant, and I disagree with your characterization of Israel's actions.

Your criticism of Islam doesn't justify mass
bombing & killing of innocent Palestinians.
Islam's only relevance is Christians & Jews
treating Muslims as sub-human.

So, you're a fan of proportional warfare?

No.
I said "reasonable".
It is not reasonable to murder civilians
out of vengeance & no regard for their
humanity.

I guess you didn't answer this last time? But I guess you are.

I answer questions that I see.
That is if they don't appear rhetorical.

You seem to be repeatedly miffed at
questions not being answered.
You can always ask a 2nd time if I miss one.

I have to disagree.

Of course.
You & I have very different values & beliefs.

 

[Revoltingest]

So...what I am saying is: Terrorists are the perpetrators here. Israel is the victim.

Hamas is a terrorist organization.
Israel is a terrorist state.
Don't support terrorism & murder.

So you cannot blame Israel for defending itself from those who want to destroy it.

I don't blame Israel for defending itself.
You'd know this if you'd been paying attention in this thread.
I blame it for brutal murderous vengeance that it chooses to inflict upon innocent Palestinians.

 

[Estro Felino]

I don't blame Israel for defending itself.
You'd know this if you'd been paying attention in this thread.

Good.

I blame it for brutal murderous vengeance that it chooses to inflict upon innocent Palestinians.

Honestly I have never heard Netanyahu say that he wants to harm innocent Palestinians.
Just those who side with terrorists and harbor them.

That said, even Assad and Gaddafi have been called "wicked" by certain American elites, just because they wanted to fight terrorists like ISIS....
so it's something old.
That repeats itself.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Again, this sounds like a very careful slicing and dicing of history and context. So - for example - what historical time range are you using to come to these conclusions? What if you started your time line at at different place?

Since I'm talking about Israel's policies, I'm using the last 75 years (especially the period since Israel's expansion of its borders after 1967) as the historical range, the time since Israel announced its independence and became a full-fledged state.

Unilaterally giving up Gaza didn't seem to pay off for Israel.

One can't "give up" what wasn't theirs in the first place. Israel "gave up" Gaza but kept it blockaded and ensured it remained an open-air prison, not to mention that illegal settlements and violence against Palestinians have both been problems in the West Bank.

It sounds like your perspective is that "if only" Israel acted differently, everything would be fine. And that Hamas and Palestinians are purely reacting. Again, I think you have to do some real historical editing and tap dancing to make those views stick.

My perspective is that if Israel showed more initiative toward reform, the status quo would be fundamentally different from how it is now. "Everything would be fine" is how you worded it, not what I said. There would most likely still be problems, but they wouldn't be as widespread or violent as they are now.

You just switched the goalposts. When Bush was running for office, he did not run on a "if terrorists attack us, I'll start a war" platform.

He had already started two wars when he ran for his second term in 2004, and Netanyahu's government contains ideologues who have openly made anti-Palestinian statements and endorsed illegal expansion of settlements.

I didn't know that @SkepticThinker had already pointed out these facts to you, though:

The median age in Palestine is 19.6 years old. Children make up almost half the population. The last election was 18 years ago. Hamas received 44.45 of the vote in that election. Most of the people alive today did not vote for Hamas.


I pointed this out to you just a few days ago.

So you had already been aware of the above, yet you still claimed, in the context of the current bombing of Gaza and the thousands of Palestinian deaths, that saying Palestinians were civilians would be a "stretch." This leads me to believe that you've already made your mind up about them regardless of evidence to the contrary and are trying to justify not seeing them as civilians, an argument that contributes to depicting the bombings as more palatable or acceptable.

I have made my points, and I don't see much use in pursuing this further given the above and the explicit anti-Muslim sentiments I'm observing in your arguments about this—which seem to try to portray civilians as somehow culpable in their own oppression and the deadly bombing on their residential areas despite the facts (not opinions, but facts about the average age of the Gazan population and the date of the last election) that @SkepticThinker and I cited.

Have a good thread.

 

[Watchmen]

It's rather the opposite of hate speech to criticize a country
for oppression, murder, torture, home demolition, & group
punishment resulting in violent uprising.
Israel must face that its policy of brutal oppression will have
predictable results such as the creation of Hamas.
And further, if USA's government tries to stamp out criticism
of Israel, & support for Palestinians, that attempt will foment
even more hostility here.

I guess you misread the quote. “Entirely responsible.” Words have meaning and these two words completely absolve Hamas of any responsibility for any of the violence. Is that your position? Hamas is 100% innocent?

 

[Debater Slayer]

There are consequences for hate speech, this includes hate speech towards Israel such as claiming Israel is “entirely responsible” for all the violence, including that unleashed by Hamas.

I would agree that "entirely responsible" (italicizing mine) would be an inaccurate statement, but who has made that statement in this thread? I searched the thread for that exact wording and found nothing.

 

[Revoltingest]

Good.

But it's bad that you don't pay attention,
yet I must address your wrong assumptions.
Be engaged. Be interesting.

Honestly I have never heard Netanyahu say that he wants to harm innocent Palestinians.

Watch what politicians do.
That trumps what they say...or don't say.

Just those who side with terrorists and harbor them.

Which terrorists...Israel or Hamas?

 

[InChrist]

Israel is a terrorist state that attacks & kills more
Palestinians than Hamas does Israelis.
Why terrorist?
Group punishment, torture, & other tools designed
to strike fear in the populace as a means of control.

Hamas & Israel have different tools at their disposal.
They use what they have. What matters isn't the tools.
It's the results. Israel is the deadlier & more oppressive.

I've no worries.
But I have values & concerns.

Israel is the king of exploiting victimhood.
Hitler! The Holocaust! We suffered!
See the video below.
They're always given as reasons to victimize Muslims.
Past injustices don't give permission to oppress & brutalize others.

Whataboutism, eh.
USA finances & defends Israel's evil.
This is worth addressing.
You can start your own thread about Africa & China.
But remember that we object to terrorism there....instead of supporting it.
That's the big difference.

I blame Israel for perpetrating horrible crimes.
I give it responsibility for creating conditions
that result in Hamas's existence, & reacting to
oppression by also committing horrible crimes.

That was a stupid video; quite a derogatory caricature.

I’m not so naive as to think Israel always does right and never wrong. But Israel is not by any means a terrorist state. I think you need to get your information and understanding of the Israel-Palestinian situation from more accurate and reliable sources. Amnesty International and others spouting the same lies are definitely corrupt, slanted sources.
“Now, most serious, sober observers of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including some who have served in high ranking positions in the Palestinian Authority, candidly acknowledge that the predicament that Israel and the Palestinians find themselves in would not exist but for poor decision-making by the Palestinian leadership over the past 80 years. The familiar and indisputable but oh-so-tiresome facts are that the Palestinian leadership has been repeatedly offered, and just as repeatedly rejected, a Palestinian state in return for simple peace. These offers would have meant no Israeli settlements, no occupation and no basis whatsoever for cries of "apartheid”.

Amnesty International, however, is neither sober nor serious when it comes to Israel, a point which it illustrated once again this week by releasing a report with the measured, grounded title, "Israel's Apartheid Against Palestinians: Cruel System of Domination and Crimes Against Humanity."


“Amnesty points out that the security fence and checkpoints that Israel began constructing in July 2002 have caused hardship and humiliation for Palestinians. They surely have. But it requires only a small helping of honesty to acknowledge that the reason that Israel was obliged to do this was because for 20 months, beginning in September 2020 and continuing through 2004, its civilians were subjected to a bombing campaign that blew 1,100 Israelis to pieces and maimed 5,000 more. That is the rough equivalent of 40,000 Americans blown to pieces and 175,000 Americans maimed on American streets. Was this construction of a security fence to prevent Israelis from being shredded really a "crime against humanity?"


When Hamas used Gaza as a launching pad to fire thousands of rockets at Israeli civilians in 2009, 2012, 2014 and 2021 and Israel chose to try to stop the rockets rather than wait for Hamas to run out of them, was this really a "crime against humanity?"

Amnesty's Lies About Israel Only Hurt Its Own Credibility

The kind of over-the-top proclamations by agenda-driven organizations like Amnesty do less damage to Israel's reputation than to their own.

www.newsweek.com

Although, our perspectives differ, I have no doubt that you have values, sincerely care, and have concerns for what is right.
I think there is hope, though, for real understanding. Please watch this short video by an Arab- Israeli…

 

[Revoltingest]

I guess you misread the quote. “Entirely responsible.” Words have meaning and these two words completely absolve Hamas of any responsibility for any of the violence. Is that your position? Hamas is 100% innocent?

I'll clarify.
Israel is 100% responsible for the conditions imposed
upon Palestinians. And the inexorable result is revolt.
The desperate & powerless will use what tools they have,
eg, terrorism, sabotage, resistance. Thus Israel is 100%
responsible for circumstances that led to Hamas's s attack.

This is very much like USA being responsible for circumstances
leading to 9/11, ie, by running roughshod over Muslims.

If a country accepts early on that it will be responsible
for inevitable results of acting badly, then it just might
decide to avoid terrible consequences.