The US government, the Associated Press, and the Wall Street Journal have all now concluded that the Al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza was hit not by an Israeli bomb but by an errant Hamas rocket meant for Israel. It also turns out that the hospital building itself is largely intact and the death toll is in the range of 100-300, not "over 500." The rocket exploded in an outdoor courtyard where refugees were huddled.
The lesson here is obvious: don't jump to conclusions and don't believe everything that combatants in wartime tell you. Not everything in the real world moves at internet speed, and it's hardly overtaxing your patience to wait two or three days before forming outraged opinions.
I have a friend in Be'er Sheva, and he told me the latter version of the story last Friday (8 AM EST). Just prior to that, I'd read in the news the first version of the story.
When I was a kid, I remember watching the movie "The Ox-Bow Incident."
It really does pay to wait a bit and get more information.
"The Ox-Bow Incident." Great film! Relevant to much more than the particular events it depicts in the Old West. It's about justice, about race in America, about the divisions of our times, about the Middle East -- all of the above.
I just read the book and Davies, the shop owner, blamed himself for not pulling a gun on the lynch mob to stop the hangings. A lesson for peace advocates bearing witness to decades of Palestinian oppression.
There are some obvious follow up questions to this development:
“The US government, the Associated Press, and the Wall Street Journal have all now concluded that the Al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza was hit not by an Israeli bomb but by an errant Hamas rocket meant for Israel.”
So, are the people who condemned Israel for this attack now going to condemn Hamas in the same terms?
Here, for example, is Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar on Twitter:
"Bombing a hospital is among the gravest of war crimes. The IDF reportedly blowing up one of the few places the injured and wounded can seek medical treatment and shelter during a war is horrific.”
Fine, so will she now proceed to condemn Hamas as “horrific” war criminals? If not, it shows that many if not most of Israel’s critics are not really animated by concerns about horrific war crimes. They’re motivated by something else. Something that rhymes with can-tie-Demi-prism …
“So, are the people who condemned Israel for this attack now going to condemn Hamas in the same terms?”
That makes no sense, as a deliberate attack on a hospital is entirely different than an accident at a hospital.
Please provide the slightest iota of evidence that Israel deliberately attacked the hospital.
In actual fact, we have less evidence that the attack was deliberate by Israel than be Hamas - the attack was obviously not deliberate by Israel because they did not do it.
You're misreading Ogemaniac. Let me explain what they meant:
"Back when people *thought* it was an attack by Israel, lots of people condemned it. But now that we know it was an accident by the other side, it's not reasonable to expect the same kind of condemnations. The key here is that an accident is not the same as an attack, regardless of who was behind it."
Did people think Israel did it on purpose? I thought even people who initially blamed Israel considered it an accident, not a deliberate targeting of the hospital.
Yes, even though she included a caveat, she should have waited before assigning blame.
Other attacks have had collateral damage, though those suffering feel like they were being targeted:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/21/justin-amash-family-members-killed-gaza-church
Justin Amash was a Republican
It was more likely an Islamic Jihad rocket.
Anyhow it should be noted that Israel does bomb hospitals and I believe has bombed this particular one in the past and are bombing hospitals now. Reasons vary. But not in this instance.
BTW, I have been pushing hard against the Hamas lies on this one for days in part because it sucks up air that could be used on focusing on war crimes Israel has actually comitted during this bombing campaign.
If and when Israel bombs a hospital, the world would immediately know. I mean in this instance Israel did not bomb a hospital and more than half the world think they did.
If they do bomb them, it’s because Hamas is using them to as firing and storage stations for rockets. Hamas are cowards and monsters and should be exterminated.
Sources? Context, i.e. was there a rocket launching site on the roof of the hospital and a weapons cache in the basement?
Hamas has won this war already in the sense that they have ambushed Biden's good faith efforts to change the entire narrative on Middle East from hopeful to darkly negative again, for everyone...just like switching a light-switch from on to off...kill a bunch of peace revelers in the desert and Jewish babies and suddenly everyone seems to love darkness.
So Seriously, Just what does the the Pro-Palestinian supporters want, or expect? Now or even over time...
1. One a unitary State from the Jordan to the Mediterranean? No, never...Jews, Christians, Druze and many other sects would be ethnically cleaned...at best, murdered at worst. (my starkest memory of Hamas winning the 2006 election was them throwing their PLO counterparts off of buildings and dragging other opponents through dusty streets dead behind motorcycles). Need I add that while I was in Israel for Christmas, there were many Arab countries that forbid my entry simply because I had an Israel passport stamp?
Without Hamas demonstrating that they are not a death cult there is not much to discuss. (Oh, yes, and Hamas destroying all the left behind Israeli greenhouses, that also sticks in my memory).
2. No, East Jerusalem will never be the Palestinian state capital. From the high ridge above the Garden of Gethsemane, across the narrow valley to the bricked-up Lion's Gate in the Walls of Jerusalem, East...yes, any land West from this geographic feature, absolutely not. No part of the Old City may exclusively be ruled by...Arabs.
I am going dangerous ground here, but currently, Arabs and Islam has a streak of aniconism and cannot be trusted with historical sites. This is not unlike certain sects in Medieval Catholicism...so No, no East Jerusalem, which means no Old City at all...and it is to be also noted that between 1948 and 1967 the Jordanian Army completely destroyed and leveled the Jewish Quarter in the Old City.
I say the above as a Non-Jew and pretty much an atheist...or at least non-religious person...(but the Taliban destroying the Buddhist rock carvings or the Jewish Quarter of the Old City are equal crimes to me).
3. No complete sovereignty for Gaza alone. If, with the decade long Israeli blockade of Gaza, they could smuggle in these many armaments, what could the do with open ports?
***************
So give and defend your positions on Hamas/Gaza and your vision of a future as I have given you mine.
Best Wishes, Traveller
PS Stop the Settlements East of Jerusalem as currently constituted, certainly, Also be very, very careful with water rights
“So Seriously, Just what does the the Pro-Palestinian supporters want, or expect?”
Maybe we should just take them at their word?
A BLM chapter infamously posted a tweet last week with an image of a paraglider and a Palestinian flag. More protests and students groups than I can keep track of have done the same (either by posting a similar image or displaying it on a sign). And that image, in my opinion, transcends politics. It is simply a celebration of slaughter. The paraglider, of course, is a reference to Hamas agents who paraglided into a music festival in Israel and proceeded to kill people. By posting that image, those groups are rejoicing in the murder of hundreds of human beings. BLM and other segments of the Left are now explicitly pro-genocide.
If that sounds extreme, consider the chants of “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”. It’s been heard everywhere recently from rallies to college campuses and even to high schools. And there is no way for that aim to be achieved without the ethnic cleansing of Jews.
This moment is an inflection point. Even someone like me, a person who is constantly expressing his cynicism about the modern far left, is still astonished at these recent developments. A mask has slipped, and Leftists are now openly advocating not only for expanded access to healthcare and more affordable housing, but also for death to all Jews.
So if the last week does not completely discredit the modern Left, what will? Maybe it’s actually the Left that could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it? Trump, after all, is finally facing accountability. What about the university professor who stated how “exhilarated” he was when Hamas murdered hundreds of unarmed women and children?
So, as I said, maybe we should just take them at their word? What do pro-Palestinian supporters want or expect? They’re literally screaming their desire to kill all the Jews. So maybe we should believe them?
And what do Pro-Isreal people want? I've seen plenty of people posting similar images and comments about killing all Palestinians, including Isreal's current Minister of Nationl Security (Itamar Ben-Gvir).
So why do you only care when one side does it? BOTH sides are wrong.
Right now people are pissed, but most pro-Israel people want some kind of two state solution with a demilitarized Palestinian state with Israeli control of its borders to prevent smuggling of weapons.
Then why do they so consistently vote for parties that allow settlement growth making such a two state solution impossible? In a democracy one would expect there to be more connection between what the people want, and what the government wants.
You are right that most Israelis tell pollsters that they want a two state solution. But then if you look at the follow up questions it turns out the Palestinian state lacks most of the features of a state. After all, even in your short description, the Palestinian state sounds a like like Gaza. It should be pretty hard to confuse Gaza for freedom, although too many people do.
So basically apartheid forever, eh?
BTW, I'm not going to deal with your whole post but half of the greenhouses were destroyed by Isreali settlers before they left. After that, the project was an initial success before Isreal did what they could do destroy it, including the IDF desctoying some of the greenhouses during Operation Cast Lead (there was looting of some of them by Palestinains but I can find no evidence that Hamas was involved). BTW, Isreal has also destroyed 800.000 Palestinian Olive Trees since 1967.
None of this is to defend Hamas who is obviously a terrorrist organization. But let's not pretend that Isreal is the good guy here.
I'm sorry what was your position here? You said a lot of things that Palestinians would never get. That is not particularly brave, people unlike you have to accept that people like you get to have things that nobody else would get to have. Are you saying that Palestinians who do not get sovereignty in Gaza will get to be citizens of Israel? Or is your proposal that the Palestinians accept Apartheid.
It is quite easy for pro-Palestinian people to say what they want at you r level of specificity. They want Israel to stop abusing Palestinians.
As for your memories do you remember that after they pulled out of Gaza Israel left Palestinian products to rot on the border thereby tanking the Gazan economy. This was punishment for making it necessary to pull its 6,000 settlers out of Gaza. When you heard about the greenhouses being destroyed did you learn that greenhouses only made sense in Gaza because the 6,000 settlers had access to an obscene percentage of the water available in Gaza?
Doesn't exactly this happen in every single conflict involving Israel? Some supposed Israeli attrocity is hystrionically promoted causing demonstrations and outrage among the pompous and shallow and simple minded and upon investigation it turns out to be completely made up.
Every single time.
Being pro-Palestinian means being committed to incompetence.
And being pro-Arab isn't much different. How many times have Middle Eastern countries demonstrated that any idiot anywhere on Earth can yank their chain at any time and cause an international incident by burning a Koran? Or something similar.
Being anti-Israel was an incredible gift for the incompetent after WWII gave anti-semitism a bad name, a simple just-so story a complicated problem so you don't have to think about it.
When Israel assassinated a Palestinian-American journalist Israel put out a firefight that happened somewhere else to create a fog as to what it had done. This is hardly new. I remember during one of the previous Israeli incursions Israel announced that some of its troops had been ambushed the day after a cease fire. Newspapers were full of people saying that shows what Hamas is like, only a vile group like Hamas would sign and violate a cease fire agreement like that. Later it turned out the ambush happened in Gaza City. Hamas members who were cornered by a military group sent into Gaza City the day after the cease fire was signed decided not to be taken.
The point is that your comment seems to be based on the idea that what Drum is describing above is special to Palestinians or Arabs. That means your comment is based on nonsense.
Sources?
Oh, he'll never have sources for that and even if there's a grain of truth in it somewhere it will be trivial, if not completely the other way around.
I don't know which part of the widely publicized event you are not aware of. Here is the NYTimes account which seems to bend over backwards to be fair to Israel, but really doesn't much information to justify being fair to it. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/20/world/middleeast/palestian-journalist-killing-shireen.html
The Israelis do claim that they didn't realize that the unarmed people with large Media signs on their outfits were media.
Or were you OK with the assassinating of a journalist followed by a PR campaign to evade responsibility but only asking about the case of the ambush in Gaza city. It is harder to find stories on past incursions to Gaza because there have been so many of them.
Here is a story about the incident I was talking about. It has the basic facts, but it is bizarre the way they are presented because of the PR twists I referred to. In the article Hamas is still trying to push off blame for the attack based on the early misreporting that it was an ambush outside of Gaza. But by the time this story comes out it is clear that the ambush occurred in Gaza city where Israel was carrying out military operations, although the article takes seriously that Israel sending troops into Gaza city during a cease fire should be OK, although what Hamas soldiers are supposed to do when confronted with Israeli soldiers trying to blow up the tunnel they are hiding in isn't clear.
https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50573/hamas-defends-gaza-ambush-blamed-for-ending-ceasefire/
It should be noted that not all tunnels in Gaza tunnel into Israel. The tunnel in question in the story is a defensive tunnel meant to allow Hamas to better prepare for an invasion.
I wish some non-US sources would verify this claim. While I personally find the information credible, unfortunately the world outside the US and Israel is going to be skeptical absent further confirmation along these lines.
French intel says Palestinian rocket likely cause of Gaza hospital blast,
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/21/french-intel-says-palestinian-rocket-likely-cause-of-gaza-hospital-blast
Gaza hospital blast was caused by misfired rocket, says European military source,
https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20231020-gaza-hospital-blast-was-caused-by-misfired-rocket-says-european-military-source
Even the BBC was like "it looks like perhaps it might have not been Israel"
Al Jazeera?
"An Al Jazeera camera, located in western Gaza and facing east, was broadcasting live on the channel at 6:59 p.m. local time on Tuesday night, according to the timestamp. The footage appears to show a rocket fired from Gaza traveling in an upwards trajectory before reversing direction and exploding, leaving a brief, bright streak of light in the night sky above Gaza City. Just moments later, two blasts are visible on the ground, including one at Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital.
By verifying the position of the camera, CNN was able to determine that the rocket was fired from an area south of Gaza City. CNN geolocated the hospital blast by referencing nearby buildings just west of the complex. Footage taken from a webcam in Tel Aviv pointing south towards Gaza, that CNN synched with the Al Jazeera live feed, shows a volley of rockets from Gaza shortly before the blast."
https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/21/middleeast/cnn-investigates-forensic-analysis-gaza-hospital-blast/index.html
You don't need to take anyone's word for it. Even a smaller bomb dropped from an aircraft would have left a bigger crater and more damage in general. You can tell that without believing anyone or verifying any claim.
Over the years, Hamas has received hundreds of millions of dollars from some of the surrounding countries. Instead of using the money to improve the lives of the Palestinians, Hamas bought weapons and used them to kill their neighbors.
That tells me all I need to know about who is wrong and who is right.
I'm not the most politically astute person, nor the most moral, but it appears to me that Hamas is the terrorist arm of a group of people who, rather than wanting to improve the lot of the Palestinians, are instead bent on simply killing Jews.
My friend in Be'er Sheva is an intelligent, peaceful guy who left his university job in the States to live in Israel because he wanted to make the country into a more democratic place.
I asked him what he thought Hamas hoped to accomplish with their murder escapade into Israel?
He said that the people who control Hamas hope that Israel will respond with something so horrific (I assume he's talking about the way that Sri Lanka solved their Tamil Tigers problem*), that the Arab states in the region will go to war with Israel.
He's one of the smartest guys I know, and his analysis seems perfectly logical to me.
*...the Sri Lankan military’s campaign in 2009 completely crushed the Tamil Tigers. An estimated twenty thousand civilians were killed along with the Tigers’ founder and leader, his entire command staff, and virtually all the organization’s officers and rank-and-file. A terrorist group can be destroyed in this way, but it comes with a tremendous loss of civilian lives.
"Over the years, Hamas has received hundreds of millions of dollars from some of the surrounding countries. Instead of using the money to improve the lives of the Palestinians, Hamas bought weapons and used them to kill their neighbors."
While I agree that investing in people would be the far better use of the money, I'm not sure it would make much difference. Estimates suggest that Hamas receives $300-400 million in funding per year via various sources. Even if they gave that money as a direct handout, it would amount to about $150 per person per year. Just as a comparison, the city of Houston, which has a similar population size, has a budget of over $6 Billion.
Trading economics posits that the per-capita GDP of Gaza was not quite $3100 in 2022: https://tradingeconomics.com/west-bank-and-gaza/gdp-per-capita That $150 then would be not quite 5% (4.8) of the per-capita GDP. Huge? No. Insignificant? Also no.
"While I agree that investing in people would be the far better use of the money, I'm not sure it would make much difference."
Let's say you receive $150 out of the blue. You can choose to buy your kid a handgun, or a few books. Your choice.
Choices do make a difference.
Or avocado toast!
That is exactly it.
I see your point. After all Israel does not spend money on weapons because they are not evil, It is only Hamas that believes it should be armed.
I am not saying this is true, but there is some truth in it.
"If the Palestinians lay down their weapons, there will be peace. If the Israelis lay down their weapons, there will be a massacre."
What is true is that if the Palestinians lay down their weapons there will be peace for Israelis. There is no evidence there will be peace for Palestinians. After all, in the West Bank Abbas has consistently cooperated on security with Israel, which is the equivalent of what you are saying. Israel's response has been to say great, then we can take more territory in the West Bank. But things were more peaceful for Israelis during this time.
Baruch Goldstein was able to massacre Palestinians at prayer in Hebron because the Palestinians had been disarmed. Ultimately Israel responded to the issue by limiting the movement of Palestinians in Hebron. That is the result of a massacre that Israel made possible was that Israel rewarded the act of terrorism.
"Over the years, Hamas has received hundreds of millions of dollars from some of the surrounding countries. Instead of using the money to improve the lives of the Palestinians, Hamas bought weapons and used them to kill their neighbors."
Would you apply the same logic to the money Ukraine has recently received?
Of course not. Ukraine is being invaded by its neighbor. Where was the Israeli invasion of Gaza... until Hamas attacked them, murdered over a thousand Israelis, and kidnapped about 200 more?
"Of course not. Ukraine is being invaded by its neighbor. ..."
Currently Russia is just trying to hold the area they have already taken. At what point does this become a fait accompli like Israel's seizure of Palestinian land in 1948.
"Would you apply the same logic to the money Ukraine has recently received?"
No, of course not, because Ukraine isn't using the money from the US to kill their neighbors, they are using it to defeat (not even kill) invaders who left their own country to destroy Ukrainian homes, kill Ukrainian citizens, rape Ukrainian women, kidnap Ukrainian children, and attempt to destroy Ukraine's political system and replace it with the hell that Russia serves.
To give you an idea of how Russia thinks of Ukraine, Putin said that, if the US stopped giving Ukraine money, Ukraine would have "one week to live".
This sounds like genocide to me.
In light of this, I'm astounded at the restraint that the Ukrainians have shown in dealing with Russia. I can tell you, the Ukrainians are operating on a higher level of morality than I typically am.
"I'm astounded at the restraint that the Ukrainians have shown in dealing with Russia."
While I share your admiration and support of Ukraine, I don't share your astonishment here. Russia has thermonuclear warheads. Ukraine has none. Can you spot the difference?
1) Modern Israel began by stealing land from their neighbors.
2) Today they say they want to live in peace with those neighbors. But the impediment to that is rather obvious (see point 1).
3) Failing to have peace, Israel now treats those neighbors oppressively: walls, checkpoints, restrictions on business and trade, numerous daily humiliations.
4) People subject to such oppression are more likely to become radicalized.
5) After the Holocaust, the impulse to create a new country just for Jews was totally understandable. But this has no hope of success long term. Israel can survive only by inflicting more and more extreme oppression against Palestinians, and this will sooner or later cause all of their decent allies - eventually including the US - to turn away from them.
And your solution is what?
There is no solution. That is my point.
The Palestinians think the land is theirs because their forebears lived there for centuries. The Israelis think the land is theirs because religion. The fact that the US supports the Israeli side of that dispute is madness.
Religion poisons everything.
"...The Israelis think the land is theirs because religion. .."
Actually they think it is theirs by right of conquest.
In which case the fact that the US supports the Israeli side of the dispute is still madness.
That's an extraordinarily simplified and one-sided view to what's going on today.
I think it's great to put events into context. There are understandable historical reasons for Palestinians and Arabs to feel the presence of Israel is an injustice to them. But if you want to consider history, then you need to consider the history of the Jews as well. The land that is now Israel was once the land of the Jews, who for millennia were expelled from virtually everywhere they once inhabited. The story of "stolen land" is more complicated than you suggest.
Your line of thinking leads to the inevitable destruction of Israel as a fate the Jews will deserve for the unjust taking of Palestinian land. Which in my mind leads back to the genocide of Jews. That's a time loop I think we should try to avoid.
The only enduring chance for peace, imo, is a two- (or three-) state solution, when all parties can recognize the rights of the others to exist. Each side must put aside some "justifiable" grievances of the past and be willing to commit to a more equitable future.
Needless to say, we are a long way from realizing that possibility. Meantime, we should try not to lose sight of our shared humanity. That goes for supporters on both sides.
At this particular moment, I'd be more willing to consider the injustices suffered by Palestinians if the pro-Palestinian side, yourself included apparently, were as vocal in condemning the evil acts of Hamas and in showing some sympathy for those slaughtered and kidnapped in the attack two weeks ago.
Your "stolen land" allusion applies equally well to the indigenous Americans.
The most specious argument of them all (and I'm not saying you used it, Mr. Harbin) is that the Old Testament gives the jews ownership of Palestine for all perpetuity. The conservative "settlers" who have been confiscating land for decades believe this with all their heart.
And speaking of genocide, what we are seeing here is the 'final solution' for the Gaza problem. If a two- (or three-) state solution were on the table then Gaza could well be one of them except the current residents are being forced to evacuate the place entirely at this very moment.
If you were able to sit in judgement over the Spanish, English and other Europeans as they "settled" the Americas, one would hope that you might raise at the very least some concerns about their the consequences of their arrival and methods on the existing population (consisting of millions of people).
We don't have much choice but to throw our hands up in the air over "settler" actions that occured several thousand years ago.
We do have a choice how we react to similar actions occuring on our watch. And the fascist, batshit crazy orthodox settlers in Israel/Palestine deserve our worst judgement.
I remember the Camp David Accords as they were being hammered out and then signed and actually had hope that things would come to some sort of peaceful arrangement in the Middle East. As you point out, the Israeli settler movement wouldn't put up with it and there's no stopping them now what with Netanyahu's full support.
So you seem to be implying that at some time in the future, we'll be privileging the Palestinians who were expelled from their ancestral lands, which they occupied for the last two millenia? And have been enduring oppression and further land theft for the last century or so? We'll be building a Nakhba Museum every week?
Just asking...
"Modern Israel began by stealing land from their neighbors."
What about the land that was purchased by Jewish settlers?
What about the public land that was owned by the Ottomans and thereby owned by the British when they defeated the Ottomans? Some was promised to Arabs, and some to Jews. Is that Israel stealing land from neighbors?
What about the land that the UN partitioned under international law?
What about the land that was captured in purely defensive wars? Do we just give that back to the aggressors, so they have no disincentive to keep trying?
I am not saying Israel is right. I am saying it is a lot more complex than your single sentence.
Shorter Steve C: "Actually, Israel only stole SOME of the land."
Several things come to mind here. First, we seem to be in a media world now where all reporting is about who-said-what and actual evidence counts for little to nothing. Although expert opinion now says that all of the physical signs at the Al-Ahli hospital are consistent with a failure of a rocket fired from Gaza, the icing on the cake should be the fact that the accusers of Israel have not bothered to offer a scintilla of evidence that it was an Israeli air strike, other than immediate statements from "Palestinian health officials" -- which means "Hamas."
That said, it is painful to see that it's the corrupt, extreme Likud government in Israel, led by the deplorable Bibi Netanyahu, that must now be showered with U.S. support. And I agree that some of the rhetoric coming from Likud officials is deeply damaging to any prospect of peace.
About the pro-Palestinian left: it seems that young U.S. progressives who know nothing about the long history of the Levant are eager to map the Israel-Palestine conflict onto the American social justice template consisting of "oppressor/oppressed" or "colonization" narratives. This is naive and simplistic. It's even more preposterous to imagine that Hamas or other Salafist groups have anything in common with an American progressive worldview. To the contrary, Hamas is clearly a fascistic group that should be viewed as politically as far right as one can imagine.
Further on my comment above, some of my points are also well-summarized by Michael Tomasky in the New Republic:
https://newrepublic.com/post/176351/biden-netanyahu-drag-us-world-war-iii
In times of war it is very difficult to determine who is really responsible for what was bombed, unless bombs have country identification on them.
Of course Israel will deny responsibility and so might the US by claiming it was not Israel. Joe had just signed a pact with the devil- Israel. Tough call here.
See above comment. Video from Al Jazeera pretty much nails it down.
With rockets, one can usually tell which direction they came from. If from the east, Israeli, if from the west, Hamas. Pretty simple.
Sure seems like there's a lot of people who don't understand how decades of apartheid would generate a lot of hostility.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/06/israel-imposing-apartheid-on-palestinians-says-former-mossad-chief?fbclid=IwAR2Oez2RDsoC4vhdHTdSQLi9k1iedTzqSGUGS2AqU3Wk2S9Gkkrs0Lppx2g
Yes. Plenty of sympathy for the folks who have been putting down the "Arab terrorists" for something like a century, and have the biggest military in the Middle East, and could easily fund additional arms and ammo purchases with no help from their Uncle Sugar.
Also, the United States seems geared to providing aid for a "military solution", as opposed to the kind of pressure needed to force the parties to deal honestly with each other for a lasting peace. Not to mention that Hamas is a criminal problem, which should be dealt with by policing, not something you'd conduct a "war" against.
Well, the U.S. doesn't have a great track record, does it? In 2001 a band o' bros, mostly Saudi nationals plus a few from Egypt, UAE and whatnot, crashed some planes in the U.S. Did we bomb the crap out of Saudi Arabia? Well, no, because essentially none of the people in Saudi Arabia had anything to do with it. Now most of these perps were living in Florida but we didn't bomb the crap out of Florida for the same reason. We did, however, bomb the crap out of Afghanistan even though essentially none of the people living there had anything to do with 9/11. And then we bombed the crap out of Iraq for good measure. 900,000 dead, according to the Costs of War project at Brown University.
In a way the facts do not matter that much now. The vast majority of the Islamic World and a significant portion of the Western and rest of the world now believes that the Israelis did it and not much is likely to change their minds. A Hamas win. Bastards.
Kevin, you've omitted multiple important details.
For example
- the fact that the NYT was willing to show a photo beneath their headline that showed very impressive damage – impressive because it was a photo that had NOTHING to do with the actual incident...
- the fact that it was TWITTER (and social media in general) that rapidly clarified what was going on in spite of what the NYT et al claimed
- the fact that, EVEN AFTER this debacle, the MSM continue to insist that it is the tech internet that is responsible for spreading misinformation, not they themselves.
All three seem like rather important additional details...
The same trustworthy institutions verified Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
Nah. It hit a parking lot built with brick pavers. This is why European intelligence thinks the casualty rate was below 50. You can see the vehicles that were burned. I think the majority of injuries were adjacent to the parking lot where lots of shrapnel had spread outward.
Unfortunately, war will always include casualties of non-combatants. That was supposed to be the reason why Israel warned Gazans to leave the northern section. Yet, forced deportations are a war crime and a crime against humanity.
If you go by the rules of warfare, Israel's only option would be to suffer a very high casualty rate in urban warfare.
Considering the IDF said to evacuate the building because they were going to bomb it, have bombed it in the past, have bombed other hospitals, have lied about such things it's really not that outrageous to assume the IDF did it in this case before knowing more.
Interesting how there's all this focus on this one incident, while the IDF continues to bomb such facilities and it gets comparably little attention.