The IDF revealed on Friday, what it described as intelligence showing a Hamas command center located under a the Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. In a briefing, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told members of the foreign press corps that there are areas in the hospitals that are used by Hamas to direct its military operations.
Even if true, does it justify bombing and killing everyone in that hospital?
That’s the thing
Hamas is awful for putting military installations near civilian infrastructure, and the Israeli military is awful for bombing indiscriminately despite their advanced military tech and resources.
We don’t need to pick one or the other
Im not sure if i would blame Israel. If someone was barricaded next door to you taking people off the streets, taking pot shots over the fence and holding human shields you would want something done too. Unfortunately, while any action taken should miniseries danger to non-combatants they are literally in the line of fire.
They tried blockades and cutting power, but everyone complained at that too. What are you meant to do when your opponent is deliberately trying to make you kill civilians to get rid of them?
If only there were some middle ground between “doing nothing” and “leveling the entire building from orbit”. Perhaps something like sending in ground troops who can separate the terrorists from 6yo children.
Take precautions and don’t indiscriminately bomb civilian population creating the next generation of people that will fight you.
You know what would keep you from killing civilians?
A ceasefire.
What should Hamas do? Put their bases out in the open and announce where they are? They would be blown up within minutes.
This looks so fake, holy shit. Apparently Hamas has a red barrel room straight out of every video game.
It’s a representation of a Garry’s Mod level. I don’t doubt Hamas has bases in tunnels but the base depicted looks so obviously faked, the rooms in it look straight out of a video game. It’s like the Israeli government told a video game addicted intern to make up a Hamas bases in Garry’s Mod to send to the media.
“This is an illustration of Shifa hospital and the underground facilities. I want to repeat, this is only an illustration. We will not share here the true material that we have in our hands. This is only an illustration.” - The dude doing the press conference.
Not only is it not fake, it’s been known for some time, and Amnesty did a whole piece of how Hamas tortures dissidents there.
I don’t see anything there about Hamas punkers looking like an graphic design intern, who plays an excessive amount of FPS games, quickly threw the design together in Garry’s Mod.
I’m not sure how you think this is criticism.
Are you saying you’d be happier if the IDF released a Blizzard Cinematic of the tunnels? Why?
The “underground terror network” propaganda everyone keeps pushing really loses it’s momentum when someone brings up the severe lack of cement in Gaza due to Israeli trade restrictions. Speculative evidence of tunnels under hospitals does not allow justification of bombing those hospitals.
Fun fact: The shortages in Gaza are because Hamas keeps all the money and supplies for their “war effort”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/gaza-plagued-poverty-hamas-no-shortage-cash-come-rcna121099
This is because, as their charter states, Hamas views all Palestinians as martyrs to the cause, and not only doesn’t care if they live or die, they actively encourage civilian deaths. Sometimes at gunpoint.
Also the tunnels are not speculation. They are the entire reason the ground assault is happening. They’re extremely well documented, and tunnel networks have been in the area for literally thousands of years
Are you copying and pasting the same reply as someone else? I swear I keep seeing this exact reply on anything to do with Israel / Palestine, but it doesn’t show up in your post history (as far back as I could be bothered going anyway).
or PIJ’s own rockets which have misfired
Still hasn’t been verifiably proven by either Hamas nor the IDF what actually happened. Even Al jazeera’s own video was contradictory to what the IDF claimed because it showed the missile launching from Israel which makes no sense.
And then a Rabbi gets stabbed to death outside her home in Detroit.
Unrelated and most likely not a targeted murder according to the police
UNHRC have found this to be true
Not saying this isn’t true but source plz? I can’t find anything talking about this mostly because right now they are focusing on the humanitarian crisis, so its all the new articles.
hey that means we should just bomb it down!
No this is why they’re doing the ground invasion.
Although they did collapse some tunnels with “sponge bombs” that have expanding foam rather than explosives.
Do Israeli leaders know that when a terrorist uses “human shields,”, you aren’t supposed to kill the “human shields”? You’re supposed to prove you’re better than the terrorist by valuing civilian life.
“Human shields” in quotes because they seem to think Hamas using tunnels makes all of Gaza a human shield. But if you value human life on the x and y axis and kill civilians on the z axis, you’re still a war criminal. Real life is 3D.
Not quite - you are meant to respond in a proportional way and minimise civilian casualties. It sucks, but civilians die in war and this must be minimal.
Level the whole building - non proportional, didn’t minimize casualties, probably a war crime (as it is a military target it may be considered acceptable).
Blockades to remove hamas strength and stop aid supplies that aren’t getting to civilians anyway- proportional and minimises as opposed to what else can be done.
Restricting resources then invasion - legal to remove a threat, proportional, minimize casualties.
Interestingly this is the exact same response a police force will do if someone blockades themselves inside a building with human shields and takes pot shots at everyone walking past - starve, remove strength and resources, get as many hostages out as you can then invade it.
Using civilians as a human shield in a state-state conflict is a war crime, however if hamas is considered a terrorist organization rather than a state it is no longer war and not technically a war crime. I believe other laws come into play however, its been a while.
I don’t have a problem with crushing the Al-Qassam Brigades or crushing Hamas leadership structure. I do have a problem with the loose definition of human shield and pretending the health ministry is the Al-Qassam Brigades.
I root for team civilian but even if I had a special place in my heart for Israel, I think what they’re doing is counterproductive. Every civilian killed means two terrorists a few years from now.
From what I understand, putting militarily installations in places of worship, schools, hospitals and similar, is a war crime even in non-international conflicts.
Been a few months since I looked at the finer details - something about the rules of war only applying in state-state war as state-non state is a conflict, not a war and as such could not be done for a war crime. However could be done for crimes against humanity which would follow a different process. Things like Somali pirates were excempt from war crimes as they were a non-state actor even though they targeted civilian shipping and went against military forces.
Either way - it is globally acknowledged it shouldn’t be done and hell should be brought down on the perpetrators from the international level. Hamas was also the elected government (i think) so it is a state-state war.
That’s not what the geneva convention says. The right of self defense takes precedence. So according to international law those locations become valid targets. They are not “supposed to keel over and die”, that’s not valuing their own lives.
