Trump's campaign is going on about a unified Reich, conservative pols are trying to or passing laws that make it criminal to help people get abortions. We are dangerously close, and the last thing that's needed is to get to that line because of some conflict thousands of miles away from the US. If you care more about Gaza than the implications here in the US, fine. But don't be surprised if Biden loses and things get worse because to quote Bunk Moreland, you're giving a ******** when it ain't your turn to give a ********.
That's not what I actually said. What I actually said was 'by the definitions they use.' With that in mind, here's how the US Holocaust Museum defines genocide: Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. These acts fall into five categories: Killing members of the group Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group This is substantially identical to the 1948 UN Convention, as I'm sure you recognize. Acts covered under 1-3 have occurred. Israeli government officials have spoken to intent. Intent can also be inferred by the choice to commit actions for which the officials were advised of the outcome in advance, and in fact which could have no other possible outcome, as the Nuremberg Tribunal (IMT/TMWC) explicitly did when finding people such as Julius Streicher guilty. If I point a loaded gun at you and fire point blank, my intent to wound you cannot reasonably be disputed, because no other outcome could have been expected.
I think I’m probably less supportive of Biden on this issue than you, but that’s quibbling at the margin, but this part nails it. If there’s any issue the world is facing that is LESS amenable to Manicheism, I don’t know what it is. But half the posts here are like that…the endless arguing about when to start the clock on tallying morality is pointless and depressing to me. Everyone that picks their date is also picking what dates and events don’t matter.
99% agreed with this. As I've stated on many occasions, the war was lost on 10/7. There was NOTHING Israel could have done (short of recognizing Hamas as a de facto authority to govern Gaza) to change the outcome. The 1% is military defeat. While IDF has suffered a few hundred dead soldiers, I think the amount of damage (Hamas battalions, tunnels, infrastructure, arsenal of weapons) is going to take a really long time for Hamas to get back to their levels. But overall, yes, it's not a victory in the grand scheme of things.
Right, and the UN investigator has pointed that out--at least the first three categories seem to apply. But the case for genocide is not getting to a certain threshold of those categories in any combination, it's the first sentence, specifically the "with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part" clause. That's the missing piece here, right now. While some members of the Netanyahu government--including possibly Bibi himself--sure seem to be there, there's also evidence of many members of the government, particularly in the IDF and security forces, pushing back and rejecting those motivations. (And in the case of Netanyahu, it seems to be more a suspicion of what he'd like to do AFTER the war is over, rather than using the war to accomplish those goals now).
For the record, I'm against the Israeli operation, for these reasons among others (one other--I don't think they went into with a coherent, achievable strategic goal). I just don't think it's a genocide. EDIT: I should say, I'm against the operation as it seems to be being carried out. In principle, I absolutely support Israel's right to retaliate against Hamas, up to and including destroying the entire organization. I just don't think it's possible for this operation as being carried out by this government to achieve that--totally justified--result.
I am lukewarm at best for Biden on this--in general, I think he's been "better than Trump" on foreign policy, and that's about it. I respect where he's coming from on Israel, but just as with Ukraine he's been too deferential to older norms and outdated concerns, and too slow to recognize the bigger picture. I'm still baffled why his administration seems determined to make the bad situations in Bosnia and Kosovo worse, so compared to the former Yugoslavia his handling of Israel and Gaza looks stellar. But that's my little pet peeve.
That's where I can't agree, and that post attempted to outline why. Even if I am meant not to take officials at their own word, the fact that their decisions would *obviously* have genocidal effect, and that that was known beforehand, speaks to intent. They cannot say, for instance, "we didn't intend to cause a famine that would kill enormous numbers of Palestinians" when literally no one was disputing that sealing off Gaza from the rest of the world would cause a famine. (In fact, the most common response around this thread's predecessor was "meh, fuck 'em, they're brown and Muslim and terrorists from conception, so who cares?"
Honestly, I do care about a genocide more than I do about most domestic issues: as awful as the Trumpanzees' war on women is, I am more bothered by my money going to making sure all the babies in a NICU suffer a slow and agonizing death, or fatally punishing food aid workers for the horrible crime of providing food aid to the thousands of people bombed out of their homes. My complicity in murder bothers me more, yes.
But the IDF is making some of those (not good) decisions, not the Netanyahu administration, no? I think we're seeing a lot of really awful consequences to a lot of poor decisions being made by a lot of different actors with no coherent plan at all. Which is why while I don't think Israel is guilt of genocide, their government and their military will ultimately by shown to be guilty of multiple war crimes. The excuse that this is "urban warfare" only works if it can be shown that they had concrete plans and realistic goals to justify the very high cost My take is that Israel's national security apparatus is winging this whole thing, and doing so in a very haphazard and sometimes reactionary way. The crass populism of the Bibi government, the understandable shift in Israeli public opinion post-10/7, and the corruption of different sectors of the national security state and the military have all combined to create a shitshow where a combination of righteous rage, callous indifference, overt racism and hatred, and unrealistic military goals add up to a situation where war crimes and crimes against humanity were bound to happen.
Bootsy, let me lay out a hypothetical. Let’s say the German people in 1945 were 100% brainwashed and collectively decided to fight the Allies down to the last man, woman, and child. Would the Allies have been wrong to genocide the German people? Or let’s take Reconstruction…let’s say for the sake of argument that in 1871, Grant decided to launch a military campaign against the Klan, and let’s say the Klan had very widespread and fanatical support such that the only way to win the war would have been to genocide white southerners. Would that be wrong? To me, it feels like you don’t entertain at all that the things Israel is doing that make it a genocide is reasonable in the sense that the choice is to genocide or be genocided. Wasn’t Hamas’ ultimate goal to genocide Israelis? I think it was. Given that context, could genocide be legitimate self defense? There is a poster here so committed to nonviolence that I think he said he wouldn’t kill a home invader who was raping his wife. I respect his beliefs, but I can assure you almost nobody agrees with that.
If there were true genocide, Israel would start with the Palestinians who live as citizens within Israel's borders. They wouldn't be going to massive efforts to warn Gazans before attacks. It's a war, so people -- including babies -- are going to die. But not because IDF soldiers are putting them in ovens or bashing them against walls. The only people who have advocated genocide are the leaders of Gaza, who have steadfastly maintained that their goal is to wipe out every Jew. Somehow that gets lost in the pro-Pal propaganda.
Tyffanee, we’ve all seen the quotes from members of the Israeli govt advocating genocide in Gaza. I don’t think it’s the official Israeli position because if there’s an official position that has a longer time horizon than 24 hours, I haven’t seen it. But there’s no doubt that some Israelis with govt positions have advocated genocide. Don’t piss on me and tell me it’s raining. I can tell the difference.
You realize that if Trump wins, he’d easily give Bibi the green light to torch Gaza, right? but man, saying that about domestic issues that do affect us, goodness me.
Off topic, but am I losing my goddamn mind, or is it getting harder and harder for people to even agree on reality? It feels to me sometimes like I’m the guy in 1984, but I’m being fed bullshit from both sides (albeit one much more than the other.). It shouldn’t be this hard to maintain a foothold in reality.
Not necessarily. Depends on what the aims are. When the Serbian government of Slobodan Milosevic was carrying out a proxy genocide against the Muslims of Bosnia, there was a lot of "ethnic cleansing" of the Drina valley region bordering Serbia. Many of the expelled Muslims ended up in "safe areas" like Goradze, Zepa, and Srebrenica. Other Bosnian Muslims escaped across the river--to Serbia. Serbia didn't carry out a genocide against the Slavic Muslims who lived in Serbia, mostly because they didn't need to. They already controlled Serbia, and had hegemonic control over the country and it's minority populations. But in order to gain control over the parts of Bosnia they wanted to incorporate into Greater Serbia, they needed to forcibly expel or kill the Muslims who lived there. They did not need to kill or expel the Muslims of Serbia--not even in the Sandzak, where Muslims were the majority (or at least a plurality)--in order to control Serbia, so they didn't. Again--I reject that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza. But I don't agree with your premise. In fairness, the claims here aren't that IDF soldiers are lining up civilians and shooting them. More that there's been a calculated disregard for civilian life, which some claim represents a deliberate strategy. I reject the notion that there is a coherent plan to make life for Gazan Palestinians so awful that the ones who survive will leave, but the case others are making is close to that than an actual policy of mass extermination. It seems to me that several leading Israeli leaders have called for genocide if not by name. But it does not appear to be an actual policy, and the tactics the IDF are using don't indicate that any such policy or plan is in place. Just my two cents.
This is pretty crazy indeed...I guess having a fascist government in place that will deny brown and black people like me our humanities is the price to pay to satisfy single issues voters. Not to mention setting women back to a second class citizen status and destroying the environment along the way..... The most "ironic" part of it, the same fascist government will have no qualm wiping out Gaza, like some right wing members of the Bibi government have advocated (and some posters here as well).
I knew what? Because that’s exactly what looks like is happening, Hamas made a gamble at the expense of the people of Gaza and it’s paying off.
I unfortunately disagree, I have a feeling a lot of reactionary people are either going to vote third party or sit this one out. Hopefully not enough to affect the outcome.
I think it's HIGHLY likely it will be worse. Less convinced that public opinion will be frozen in place. Or that the Biden administration will not have adjusted it's approach.