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War is Hell. So, apparently, said the American Civil War general William Sherman. It’s true whoever said it or didn’t say it. Legalised killing and its accompanying horrors. How is it anything but Hell? Can you put civilised rules around Hell?
Curtis LeMay was the US Army Air Force general who commanded the incendiary bombing of Japanese cities in WWII. In Richard Rhodes’ The Making of the Atomic Bomb, LeMay is quoted as saying: “We knew we were going to kill a lot of women and children when we burned [a] town. Had to be done.”
Then, of course, came Hiroshima and Nagasaki. How in the world can that be justified? It’s claimed, probably correctly, that without the atomic bombing the war would have gone on and resulted in many more American and Japanese deaths than were killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The end justifies the means?
We tend to think that it is morally reprehensible to pursue an objective through immoral means. But, clearly, it depends on the merit of the objective set against the degree of immorality of the means. Trespassing onto my neighbour’s property and borrowing a ladder without his permission in order to save a cat up a tree passes muster in the morality stakes, I think. Particularly for cat lovers. There are many less trivial examples, obviously.
Ending the war against Japan was the desired end. You can argue that dropping atomic bombs on two Japanese cities was “proportionate” in all of the circumstances. Of course, there is no settled unanimity about that, which goes to show how subjective the rules of war can be in practise.
Stephen Coleman in Military Ethics considers the morality of torture. He uses the storyline of an uncooperative captured terrorist who the authorities believe has planted a nuclear bomb in Paris; which will go off in a matter of hours unless it is found and defused. The situation is akin to what Michael Walzer (Just and Unjust Wars) calls a “supreme emergency” in a war.
Coleman squibs the issue to an extent by noting that the conditions In the storyline, while justifying torture, are unlikely to be met in real life. In real life there might be doubt about whether the right person is in custody or whether there is a ticking bomb at all. Perhaps, but can those in charge take a chance when the costs of inaction are potentially catastrophic?
As with most of these ethical dilemmas there is no right answer. No hard and fast rule. What would you do if on the balance of probabilities (a judgement calls in itself) you thought you had the perpetrator in custody and thought that he might well have planted the bomb? Make a quick decision because in a few hours 100,000 or more men, women and children might be dead and many more horribly injured. Niceties work better in a world without baddies.
In war, the condition of a supreme emergency is satisfied if a state is attacked, if it faces imminent defeat, and if such a defeat would be utterly catastrophic. These are hard conditions to meet. They would undoubtedly have been met if either or both of Germany and Japan had been on the brink of victory. Coleman suggest that Britain in late1940 faced a supreme emergency which justified indiscriminate bombing of German cities. Consistently, he argues that the rationale for such bombing faded once imminent defeat became unlikely. Thus, must one ineluctably reach the conclusion that Churchill was a war criminal? Of course, I don’t agree with that and Coleman doesn’t bring himself to say it; not in so many words, “it is clear [after 1942/43] that the conditions of a supreme emergency no longer hold, and thus the continuation of terror bombing throughout the rest of the war cannot be justified.”
In the case of the Israel-Gaza war, Israel doesn’t face a supreme emergency. It was attacked; defeat would be utterly catastrophic; but it was never and isn’t in imminent danger of defeat. That might change if it were attacked by allies of the Gazan Palestinians; particular by Iran and its proxies. That’s by the way.
However, while not yet facing a supreme emergency, Israel was attacked as was the United States by Japan. There is no basis for thinking that the Hamas terrorists running Gaza will stop their aggression, just as there was no reason to believe that Japanese aggression would stop at Pearl Harbour. Israel is therefore entitled to wage war until it has won total victory, as was the United States. Winning a war is costly on both sides. It’s Hell. Civilians die.
Israel must be proportionate and thus minimise civilian casualties in Gaza. At the same time, it is entitled to go on shooting and bombing until it has won the war. Sadly, there is no upper limit in the rules of war on the headcount of dead civilians. The saving option for Hamas is to surrender. Then the humanitarian rules of war will have something to say about their treatment and, most definitely, about the treatment of civilians within Gaza.
The moral dilemma presented here is a classic case of deciding which has ultimacy in a given situation – the one or the many? Choose the allied bombings and you choose the one. Choose the dying civilians and you choose the many. There is no correct answer because it is the purest expression of a fallen world. Moral dilemmas such as this are proof that we need not just God, but a trinitarian God within whom all dilemma is resolved.
On another note, we in the west tend to look upon war as a moral decision. Not to say that this is wrong, in fact it reflects well upon our culture. However it is naive. War is an extension of politics, and is best understood that way. For Israel there is not just a moral imperative to protect and defend itself, but there is a genuine political emergency which requires actionable force of arms. To do any less would be political suicide. This is the part that the relativists don’t understand (amongst many other things). The proportions of politics go well beyond simple body counts.
For that silly question asked of Israelis – “How many dead children will be enough”. The question should be asked of Hamas – “How many dead children will be enough before you surrender so it can cease.”
In war as it should be in self defense, the rule is destroy the enemy’s will and ability to fight. In self defense one has to play nice and use ‘reasonable’ force. IMO, ‘reasonable’ is destroy the attacker’s will and ability to fight, after all, one punch from an attacker can be fatal, so best he/she gets fataled first.
I am not so sure that referencing the second world war is very wise. Firstly the Second World War was a conflict between states, and during which most of the accepted formalities of war were observed. Further the civilian populations of both Germany and Japan were integral to both those countries prosecution of the war. The civilians might not be wearing a uniform but they were in the factories building the bombs. So far as we are aware that is not the case in Gaza. Hamas we are told repeatedly is armed and trained by Iran . Many have gone so far as to say that Hamas is a terrorist organisation ruling Gaza as its fiefdom and without authority. In that instance civilian Palestinians have no role in the war. More over according to UN security council resolutions the welfare of Palestinians in Gaza is ultimately the responsibility of Israel as the occupying power. The allies were under no such obligations, moral or legal during the Second World War.
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The other problem is to accept that a state of war exists at all. When did it commence, certainly not on October 7, as Israel has been bombing parts of Gaza intermittently since the second Intifada at least. If that is a state of war then Hamas’s attack on Israel is a continuation of an existing state of war, and entitled to target civilians of Israel in the same manner that Allied forces targeted civilians of Germany and Japan during WWII.
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But as I have said before body count and proportionality are relevant, they are relevant to the court of popular opinion. And while Israel might think that world opinion doesn’t matter, it provides the moral basis for nuclear engineers, for arms dealers and even rogue states to arm the Palestinians with WMD’s. And when that happens Israel has lost. So there really is an upper limit, or many upper limits, and in the minds of a lot of bystanders Israel has already crossed those limits.
Occidental you say: “Moreover according to UN security council resolutions the welfare of Palestinians in Gaza is ultimately the responsibility of Israel as the occupying power.”
According to the International Committee of the Red cross: ‘In international humanitarian law, a territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the adverse foreign armed forces.”
I think we can fairly say that Hamas through election and the gun still wields authority in Gaza. Maybe in time Israel will have authority over Gaza, if it continues to degrade the power of Hamas and, subsequently, takes over the administration of Gaza. That is not now.
You say: “When did it [the war] commence, certainly not on October 7, as Israel has been bombing parts of Gaza intermittently since the second Intifada at least.”
Exchanges of fire must be distinguished from a state being attacked as in Michael Walzer’s delineation of a supreme emergency. Russian and Ukraine forces have exchanged fire in and over disputed regions since at least 2014. Yet no-one doubts that Russia attacked Ukraine in February 2022. There have been exchanges of fire in the Sino-Indian border dispute. Yet if China were to cross into Indian territory and kill 180,000 of its citizens (comparable to the number of Israelis killed on October 7) then, I think, that would be an escalation worthy of being called an “attack.”
“I think we can fairly say that Hamas through election and the gun still wields authority in Gaza.”
Much of the news seems to view Hamas as a foreign occupying power over peace loving Palestinians, then in the next sentence reports body bag counts by Israel the occupying power. Everything is a gift to poor passive perpetually plundered Palestinians with no ability to excercise personal volition. That’s the myth.
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“You say: “When did it [the war] commence, certainly not on October 7, as Israel has been bombing parts of Gaza intermittently since the second Intifada at least.”’
Those “When did the war commence” questions go hand in hand with claims we should view it in context – Yes, we should. The context is the constant war on military, diplomatic, and in paradigmic catch-phrase terms such as “genocide”, “aparteid”, “colonialists” to demolish the legitimacy of the state of Israel and abort it by genocidal slaughter of Jews.
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The pretence is sickening.
Peter the ICJ, the UN, governments of all the permanent members of the UN security council, and almost all governments in the World (including Australia) regard Israel as the occupying power of Gaza. The only government to my knowledge that does not regard Israel as the occupying power is the Israeli government. But whether or not it is really doesn’t matter in a practical sense, I merely mentioned it to distinguish its situation from civilians in two distinct belligerent nations.
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I used the term war as a catch all for conflict. The so called rules of law are also described as the laws of armed conflict. Those laws or principles apply in Ukraine from 2014, India and China in 1962, and any other occurrence of a state using its armed forces in combat. So again if you defend the Allies deliberately killing civilians in the WWII you should also defend Hamas killing of civilians on October 7. Much like your views on ADF personnel (your “rough men”), once you give a leave pass to one side of a conflict it necessarily extends to the other side.
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A better outcome in my view is to at least argue for and support the proposition that unrestrained (Hamas) or willfully negligent (Israel) killing by either side is abhorrent inhuman and indefensible.
If Israel is the occupying power, then Hamas is just as much Palestinians of Gaza as all the others. Hamas is composed of their fellow citizens who Gazan citizens have chosen as their government, their military, representatives and implementors of their ambitions.
“Killer” Katz, I have been trying to find your post where you advocate killing all Palestinians. There are a lot of articles in Quadrant and even more comments. But we know your mind on this subject. As I mentioned some time ago the congruence between your views on race, identity, and on getting rid of cultures or people, with that of Nazi’s is fascinating. The irony is quite delicious. I was actually musing on the similarities between Gaza and the Warsaw Ghetto. I mean Israel has not been taking train loads of Palestinians to the ovens but it is the conquering power, enforces a siege of Gaza, and enters to hunt down its enemies who it regards as subhuman. It prevents anyone entering Gaza from sea land or air, but leaves the day to day administration of the city to the local militias much like the Nazis did in Warsaw. History seems to repeat in the most ironic ways.
“I have been trying to find your post where you advocate killing all Palestinians.”
You can’t find any because I’ve never written or thought that. That demolishes the premise of stupid equivalences in your comment.
180,000 comparable to 1,400? This asinine inflation of the value of the lives of people in small nations compared to large was pioneered at the beginning of the conflict by disgraced general David Petraeus when he declaimed the Hamas attack was far worse than 9/11 and equivalent to 40,0000 US casualties. Really? By that metric the life of one Aborigine is worth thirty whitefellas or maybe three hundred. This calculus is just so obviously wrong. Stupid, self-defeating rhetoric, unfit for an intelligent readership.
Apologies to Petraeus, he was not the first. Secretary of State Blinken likened it to ten 9/11s several days earlier and free speech enemy and Anti Defamation League of B’nai Brith head Jonathon Greenblatt compared 700 known casualties early in the attack to 40,000 dead Japanese in Nagasaki. It’s all very tacky and from the Jews it sound self-obsessed. Given the similarities one wonders whether everybody has the same tasteless style-guide.
The short definition of Genocide is the “intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part”. Isn’t that what happened on October 7th with some 1400 people murdered and in some cases horribly butchered? Isn’t that what happened during WWII by the Nazis with an estimated 6 million dead? What about the countless pogroms against Jews throughout history. It’s the intention that matters more than the number in defining genocide.
People need to understand what the Jews are up against in todays world, it’s not just Hamas they have to worry about.
The following article is written by Chaim Lax who is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared on August 22, 2022
With this quick guide to the top five anti-Israel terror groups, you will be better able to understand each individual organization, while also appreciating the different threats that face the Jewish state every day.
1. Hamas
Founded: 1987
Ideology: Sunni Islamic fundamentalism
Background:
The Islamic Resistance Movement, also known as Hamas, was founded at the beginning of the First Intifada (1987-1993) by members of the Muslim Brotherhood and religious members of the PLO, who sought to replace Israel with an Islamic Palestinian state.
In response to the Oslo peace process of the 1990s, Hamas launched a wave of attacks against both Israeli soldiers and civilians, including suicide bombings. With the collapse of negotiations in 2000 and the start of the Second Intifada, Hamas ramped up its terrorist attacks against Israelis in the West Bank, Gaza, and pre-1967 Israel.
In 2006, Iran-backed Hamas contested the Palestinian legislative elections and gained the majority of seats. Following the election, Hamas engaged in violent confrontations with Fatah, ultimately gaining full control over the Gaza Strip (Fatah maintained control over the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank).
Since then, Hamas has launched thousands of rockets at Israeli civilian centers and engaged in four large-scale terror campaign against the Jewish state — in 2008, 2012, 2014, and 2021.
Between 2006 and 2011, Hamas also held the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit captive in Gaza, using him as a bargaining chip to achieve the release of hundreds of imprisoned Palestinian terrorists. It currently holds two Israeli civilians, as well as the remains of two IDF soldiers.
Notable terrorist attacks:
The 1996 suicide bombing of a Jerusalem bus that killed 26 people (17 civilians and 9 soldiers).
The 2001 suicide bombing of the popular Sbarro restaurant in downtown Jerusalem; 15 people were killed, including seven children.
The 2001 suicide bombing outside the Dolphinarium Disco in Tel Aviv by a Hamas-affiliated terrorist; 21 people were killed, mostly teenage girls waiting to enter the club.
The 2002 suicide bombing of a Passover seder at the Park Hotel in Netanya; 30 people were killed and 140 were injured.
The 2002 bombing of a cafeteria on Hebrew University’s Mount Scopus campus; nine people were killed, including four American citizens.
The 2003 suicide bombing of a local bus in Jerusalem’s Shmuel HaNavi neighborhood; 23 people were killed and 130 were injured.
A 2014 Jerusalem car-ramming attack by a member of Hamas that killed a three-month-old girl and would later claim the life of an Ecuadorian woman.
The 2015 shooting attack that killed Rabbi Eitam Henkin and his wife Na’ama.
Listed as a terrorist organization by: The United States, the European Union, Canada, New Zealand (only Hamas’ so-called “military wing”), the United Kingdom, and, Australia
2. Hezbollah
Founded: 1982
Ideology: Shia Islamic fundamentalism
Background:
Hezbollah (the “Party of God”) was founded at the behest of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which wanted an obedient terror proxy in southern Lebanon.
Inspired by the Iranian revolution, Hezbollah’s stated goals were the creation of an Islamic republic in Lebanon, the removal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon, and the ultimate destruction of the only Jewish state.
Due to its Iran-aligned worldview, Hezbollah has also undertaken attacks against Western targets in Lebanon and around the world.
Between Israel’s 1985 withdrawal to a security buffer zone along its northern border and its 2000 departure from all of Lebanon, Hezbollah conducted a campaign of continuous attacks against Israeli forces, as well as rocket attacks on Israeli civilians.
In 2006, Hezbollah initiated a 34-day war with Israel that saw missiles reach as far as Haifa, and led to the deaths of 44 Israeli civilians. Since that war, Hezbollah has continued to occasionally attack Israeli forces along the Lebanon-Israel border.
To this day, Hezbollah still poses a threat to the Jewish state, having amassed a large arsenal of sophisticated weapons. According to Israeli intelligence, Hezbollah has approximately 130,000 rockets and missiles threatening Israel’s civilian centers. These weapons are stored in civilian buildings like homes, mosques, schools, and hospitals.
Aside from being a terrorist organization, Hezbollah also holds 16 seats in the Lebanese parliament.
According to some experts, Hezbollah’s influence and strength — it is more powerful than the Lebanese Army — allows it to act like a state-within-a-state and control the levers of power in Lebanon.
Notable terrorist attacks:
The 1984 car bombing of the US embassy annex in Beirut, which killed 11 people.
The 1988 hijacking of a Kuwait Airways Flight. The 16-day hostage situation ended with the murder of two passengers.
The 1994 suicide bombing attack against a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This resulted in the deaths of 85 people.
The 2005 assassination of Rafik Hariri, Lebanon’s former prime minister.
The 2012 bombing of a tour bus full of Israelis outside the Burgas airport in Bulgaria. Six people were killed in this attack.
Listed as a terrorist organization by: The United States, the European Union (only Hezbollah’s “military wing”), Canada, New Zealand (only its “military wing”), the United Kingdom, and Australia
3. Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ)
Founded: 1981
Ideology: Sunni Islamic fundamentalism
Background:
One of the most radical Gaza-based terrorist organizations to threaten Israel’s existence, PIJ was formally founded in 1981, after its creators were expelled from Egypt due to their connections with the organization that assassinated Egyptian president Anwar Sadat.
Although it was founded as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, the PIJ later came under the influence of the Islamic Republic of Iran. To this day, Iran is the largest state sponsor of the PIJ.
PIJ does not recognize Israel’s right to exist, is opposed to the peace process, seeks to destroy Israel through jiahd, and is determined to establish an Islamic Palestinian state.
The first PIJ attack against Israel came in 1986, prior to the First Intifada, and its use of violence continued through the 1990s into the Second Intifada. After the Israeli disengagement from Gaza in 2005, PIJ largely focused on indiscriminately firing rockets at Israeli civilian centers.
Since 2005, PIJ has been the target of a number of short Israeli military campaigns focused on reducing the terror organization’s capability to harm Israelis. These campaigns took place in 2012, 2019, and 2022.
Although its activities are mainly focused in Gaza, PIJ headquarters are based in Syria. There are also smaller PIJ cells in the West Bank, largely concentrated in Jenin and Nablus.
Notable terrorist attacks:
A 1990 ambush of an Israeli tour bus in Egypt. Nine people were killed and 17 were injured.
A 1995 double suicide bombing at a bus stop in central Israel, killing 20 soldiers and one civilian.
A 2002 suicide bombing at a bus stop in northern Israel, killing 13 soldiers and four civilians.
A 2003 suicide bombing at the Maxim restaurant in Haifa. 21 people were killed, including four children.
A 2006 suicide bombing at a Tel Aviv restaurant that left 11 people dead and 70 injured.
A 2007 suicide bombing at an Eilat bakery that killed three people.
Listed as a terrorist organization by: The United States, the European Union, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and Australia
4. The Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades
Founded: 2000
Ideology: Secular Palestinian nationalism
Background:
The Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades was founded at the beginning of the Second Intifada (2000-2005), as a loose network of armed units that were connected to Yasser Arafat’s Fatah party.
While initially focused on attacks against the Israeli army and Jewish communities in the West Bank, the Brigades expanded their terrorist activities to target all of Israel’s territory in 2002.
Although some members of the Brigades joined the Palestinian Authority security services in exchange for amnesty in 2007, the organization continues to carry out terrorist attacks against Israel to this day.
Notable terrorist attacks:
A 2002 shooting attack on a bat mitzvah celebration in Hadera that left six dead.
A 2002 suicide bombing in downtown Jerusalem that left one dead and 140 injured (reportedly the first-ever attack by a female suicide bomber).
A 2002 suicide bombing at a bar mitzvah celebration in Jerusalem that left nine dead.
A twin suicide bombing on the Tel Aviv Central Bus Station in 2003 that left 23 dead.
A joint suicide bombing attack with Hamas against the Ashdod Port in 2004 that left 10 dead.
A 2022 shooting attack in the central Israeli city of Bnei Brak that left five dead.
A 2022 shooting attack at the entrance to Ariel that left one person dead.
Listed as a terrorist organization by: The United States, the European Union, Canada, and New Zealand
5. The Popular Front For The Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)
Founded: 1967
Ideology: Marxism-Leninism, secular Palestinian nationalism
Background:
The second-largest party in the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the PFLP was founded in 1967 when a number of left-wing Palestinian organizations united under the leadership of George Habash. Since then, the PFLP has been engaged in a wide array of terrorist activities, including hijackings, suicide bombings, and shootings, with the goal of replacing Israel with a secular Arab state.
As a core tenet of the PFLP’s ideology, it does not recognize the Jewish state’s right to exist. Thus, it opposed the Oslo peace process in the early 1990s, and largely maintains this position until the present day.
Since its inception, the PFLP has maintained ties with a number of state sponsors, including the Soviet Union, Syria, China, and, most recently, the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Furthermore, in the past few years, the PFLP has developed ties with a number of Palestinian NGOs as well as organizations that support the anti-Israeli Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Notable terrorist attacks:
The hijacking of an El Al flight in 1968. Some passengers and crew members were held hostage for 39 days in Algeria.
The hijacking of four international flights in 1970. Three of these flights were diverted to Dawson’s Airfield in Jordan, where the empty planes were blown up in front of the media.
The 2001 assassination of Israel’s tourism minister, Rehavam Ze’evi.
A suicide bombing at Tel Aviv’s Carmel Market in 2004 that left three people dead.
The PFLP claimed responsibility for the 2014 attack on a Jerusalem synagogue that saw five people (including a responding police officer) killed during prayer services.
The 2019 killing of 17-year-old Rina Shnerb by a roadside bomb as she hiked with her family near the Jewish community of Dolev.
Listed as a terrorist organization by: The United States, the European Union, and Canada.
I hope this gives people a better perspective on what Israel is trying to do in cutting off the head of Hamas in order to establish a basis for a secure Israel. Only then can the question of a Palestinian State be negotiated once and for all. It is the only solution and Israel must make considerable concessions. But will it ever happen?
BTW I am not Jewish but I do support their right to be in that area of the world.
TL;DR but in answer to your query about “Nazis”, why for the love of God do you want to bring them into things? What we are told, and in Canada and most of Europe are not legally permitted to question, is that Jews were imprisoned and gassed with cyanide or in some cases with carbon monoxide. Many were also shot. Major revisions have been made in the official claimed number of victims at Auschwitz, from 4 million to 1.1 million with many estimates being even lower. The six million figure stands above all such petty quibbling. In any case there is no equivalence between the two events, other than that both involve exaggerations.
I should add that I do not accept that the allies in World War Two were either morally or legally entitled to target civilians of Germany or Japan. It follows that my view is Hamas’s attack is similarly unjustifiable to the extent that it targeted civilians. Modern media has merely shown in detail the horrendous costs of such actions and why they are indefensible.
War, played by whatever rules, will not end war, because it does not address the ultimate cause of war. Even some species of ants wage war between colonies, and I believe that there may be a species of ant that actually captures other ants to use as slaves in their nests.
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Picking sides in human conflicts and labelling one side as “good” and the other “bad” is part of the problem. Is it not fortunate that we are always on the “good” side?
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In the West most of us have grown up with the belief that National Socialist Germany and Imperial Japan were bad (They started the War!), and that narrative has not diminished, as we see in Peter Smith’s article. Actually, according to the media, the Nazi threat is in the ascendency, and that is presumably why the states are passing laws forbidding the public display of NS symbols in a sympathetic or positive way. Apparently, it was the presence of a half-dozen or so people at a Melbourne protest giving a fascist-type salute (why or to whom is not clear) that initiated the flurry of anti-fascist legislation. Are there not many thousands of Australians who are offended by the public display of the Israeli national flag? Or by the Palestinian national flag? Aboriginal activists are offended by the sight of the Australian national flag, and no doubt there are many that are offended by the ubiquitous display of the Aboriginal national flag! Are we not a nation of waring factions? Please remind me which of us is “good” and which of us is “bad”; I do find it hard to keep up.
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OBTW, even the Japanese war flag, the rising sun, is not banned in this country. Demonising Imperial Japan is curiously absent in Australia and other Western (non-Asian) countries, I wonder why?
“OBTW, even the Japanese war flag, the rising sun, is not banned in this country. Demonising Imperial Japan is curiously absent in Australia and other Western (non-Asian) countries, I wonder why?”
Do tell us.
Sindri: It appears to me that there has been a differential treatment of the defeated German and Japanese partners of the Axis powers, by the Allied victors. It would appear likely that the reason that Japan has retained its Imperial status, ie: Emperor, flags, and memorials that include what the Allies determined to be war criminals, is that the victims of Imperial Japan were Asian, whereas the victims of Germany were Europeans and Jews. In other words, there is a racist/cultural prejudice at work. What has been named as the “Holocaust” has become an entrenched trope within the countries of the Allied powers, and serves to continually garner support for the Zionist/Israeli agenda. How many Chinese died at the hands of the Japanese, either directly or indirectly, we don’t know, or care that much about.
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So, it appears that there is a racist/cultural/national bias that is operating to keep the anti-Nazi propaganda alive and thriving. Now, this month, the Federal Parliament wants to make it a Commonwealth offense to publicly make a fascist-like salute or gesture, 78 years after the end of WW2! Is there really a threat to Australia by advocates of German National Socialism?
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In conclusion to the answer to your question, Sindri, the observation should be added that there never has been a significant Chinese lobby of influence within the Western powers, comparable with that of the Jewish lobby of influence, and that has affected public and governmental opinion/bias/prejudice to go easy on Japan. There are other factors of course, but at the moment Japan is an unsinkable aircraft carrier on guard against our seemingly de facto enemy, China.
Sorry, old boy, rubbish. It’s difficult to know where to begin.
First, there was no “differential treatment”. Japanese war crimes were extensively prosecuted by the IMTFE, and even subsequently by domestic and ad-hoc courts. A number of people were sentenced to death. Yes, I know, Hirohito was not prosecuted, but to equate his liability with that of Hitler is preposterous.
Secondly, you seem to be unaware that Germany maintains many memorials to its war dead; it just doesn’t, reasonably one would think, accompany them with Nazi insignia.
Thirdly, your attribution to racism of our supposed indifference to the suffering of Chinese victims of Japanese militarism contains within it an unestablished assumption, that “we” are in fact indifferent to it. Speak for yourself.
Fourthly, take a deep breath and stop attributing your imagined grievances about how Germany is treated to those scheming Jews. “The “Holocaust” has become an entrenched trope within the countries of the Allied powers, and serves to continually garner support for the Zionist/Israeli agenda”. Spare us, please.
Fifthly. I tend to agree with you about the lack of any real necessity to ban nazi symbols in Australia, only because I have an old-fashioned view favouring free speech, no matter how rancid the speech or stupid the speakers. That includes of course my right to rubbish unreconstructed nazis like your friend Horst Wessel, aka “David Isaac” (does he get a giggle from his volkssturm mates, I wonder, using a jewish screen name here?).
But I do wonder why you are so exercised about the banning of nazi insignia.
Cheers, S.
And by the way, how do you display Nazi symbols “in a sympathetic or positive way”?
Sindri: I wish to belatedly respond to the points your raised:
“First”: I’ve dealt with that issue further down the comments list, as a response to Occidental.
“Secondly”: German soldiers fought and died for their country, under their national flag. I think it is owed to them that their graves and memorials should reflect that. That same national flag was on the rudder of the Zeppelins that ferried passengers across the Atlantic, and was waving over the stadium where the world enjoyed the 1936 Olympic games, etc.
“Thirdly”: By “we” I was generalising about the majority opinion in the West. I acknowledge that you are to be excluded from the “we”.
“Fourthly”: Your advice regarding deep-breathing is sound. However, I think you are without grounds to say: “stop attributing your imagined grievances about how Germany is treated to those scheming Jews.” I have never attributed, insinuated or implied that “scheming Jews” were ill-treating Germany. But it might be correct to say that Zionists are at the vanguard of the anti-Nazi/pro-Israel sentiment that appears to be growing in the West. Some might perceive that there is in effect a “Holocaust-card”, that always trumps a debate about the Israel-Palestine situation, and to that hand there is now added the “October 7 card” Apparently it is “Never Again”, again!
“Fifthly”: There have been a myriad of “neo-Nazi” type groups in Australia, they come and make noise and go. I remember Ross “The Skull” May who sometimes would show up at Sydney’s Domain on a Sunday, to exercise his “free speech”. He would immediately draw the crowds from the other speakers because of his entertainment factor. One of the things he hated and would rally against was Japanese Motorcycles, which he wanted banned! Some of his notoriety I found in an article online: “He was jailed for throwing eggs at feminist Germaine Greer, fined $400 for writing “Kill all Jews” on a Brisbane Jewish memorial, and campaigned against Gough Whitlam in 1974, while dressed in Nazi regalia.” He was not adverse to throwing a punch, but never managed to lead a torch-lit parade of Brown Shirts through the city. My point being that there is no necessity to bring anti-Nazi legislation into law. We perhaps both agree that such bans would create more harm than good.
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Personally, in the small world I grew up in, dressing up and play-acting as a German soldier was no different than dressing up and pretending to be a Viking or native American warrior. As far as assembling plastic models, as boys were wont to do, definitely the Wehrmacht, Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe models were the “cool” ones. Tiger Tanks, the battleship Bismarck and the Stuka dive bomber, etc.
Cbattle1 There is a world of difference in the crimes of Nazi Germany and those of Imperial Japan. At no time did Japan attempt to exterminate a race of people. That Nazi’s were also happy to exterminate other races or groups just goes to show how casually indifferent they were to humans generally. Of all the war crimes the Japanese committed and no doubt there were many, nothing they did or any one else has done compares with the organized industrial slaughter of a race of people by the Nazi’s. My own view was the one thing the Allies (intellectually) got right was their attempt to destroy the German nation, by partition. Nazi Germany in my view and I am sure in the minds of many is in a class all by itself.
The Morgenthau Plan, really the brainchild of Harry Dexter White, which aimed to deindustrialise and depopulate Germany was only partly implemented before wiser heads realised the Bundesrepublik would be needed as a bulwark against the Soviet. The infamous Feb. 1941 text: ‘Germany must Perish’, written by Theodore Kaufman, is the most disgusting piece of genocidal propaganda I’ve ever read, calling for forced sterilisation of the entire German people amonst other things. And note the publication date, well before even a whiff of ‘holocaust’ and before Operation Barbarossa. The three people I have named were all Jewish Americans so I think you can safely say that there’s nothing special about any genocidal plans the Germans may have had,
Kaufmann was a nobody, a mad crackpot who had no official position whatever. He also, by the way, advocated the sterilisation of Americans so they wouldn’t have to fight in another foreign war! His pamphlet had no resonance at all in the US. It was pounced on gleefully by the Nazis, of course, who gave it wall to wall publicity as evidence that there was an international jewish conspiracy to destroy the white race – bunkum of course, though currently enjoying a good run here at QoL.
Your hero Hitler’s meisterwerk, on the other hand, was the foundational document of the Third Reich. I think I know which was “the most disgusting piece of genocidal propaganda”.
And predictably you’re spouting Goebbels’ propaganda. What he gleefully wrote in his diary, however, was a little different: “This jew did us a real service! If he had actually written it for us, it couldn’t have been better!”
David Isaac what is the point of your post? You have mentioned a number of individuals who held certain views. The world has something like 8 billion people, and therefore 8 billion different views. I was responding to the differences in attitudes generally between Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany. One was a war mongering nation the other a heinous psycopathic monster masquerading as a country, the likes of which had never been seen before in the annals of human history. For some reason you think it is relevant to mention three Jews who had extreme views, big deal, so what.
What a question? You’ve answered it yourself really by describing Germany as a ‘heinous psychopathic monster’ with no parallel in history, such as,for instance, the Bolshevik regime in which Jews played a pre-eminent part in the destruction of the Russian, Ukrainian, Baltic and Polish middle and upper classes. You would have it that the destruction of the German nation was really a good thing because those guys were just the worst. Your thinking seems to be of a piece with Morgenthau, White and Kaufman.
As is the case today, Jews were very prominent in the administration of the USA back then, especially under Democratic administrations. Morgenthau was a German Jew and the Treasury Secretary under FDR for eleven years. White was his aide and eventually made it to the post of Assistant Secretary. So we can safely say that they’re not just some individuals, counted amongst 2 (not 8) billion others at the time or a few Jews. These people were ethnically motivated haters of Germany and Germans.
As for Kaufman, his is a strange case. @Sindri claims above that he had little impact in America and, as he writes, Goebbels certainly made use of the genocidal content of the book to galvanise Germany against the Jews and their allies. Whilst ‘Germany must Perish’ was reviewed in ‘Time’ magazine I don’t think the review was terribly favourable. The back cover claims a mention in the ‘New York Times’ quoting it with ‘A plan for permanent peace among civilized nations!’ So the book was well-publicised and its ideas, whilst not widely accepted at least in their most extreme form, may have pushed the Overton window to the point where White’s more moderate plan for national destruction was acceptable.
Occidental: The circumstances that faced the Third Reich and Imperial Japan were very different, and so there were different actions and outcomes. The Japanese did target Chinese, in what could be described as “Sinophobia”. Lee Kuan Yu, former long-term leader of Singapore, described how the Japanese rounded up the young Chinese men of Singapore after “liberation”, putting them into trucks; Lee told one of the Japanese soldiers that he had to go back and get his suitcase/bag, and, amazingly, he was allowed to do so! Of course, Lee did not return to the truck to join his mates, and he never saw them again. Japan used slave-labour extensively throughout the “Greater East-Asian Co-prosperity Sphere”, and then there was the germ-warfare experiments using Chinese as guinea pigs.
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True, the Japanese did not set up any modern highly efficient industrial-scale killing infrastructure, they were more tradition-bound, making use of bayonet and sword; using bullets if time didn’t permit.
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The original plan was to deport Jews and Romany from the Reich, but the world wasn’t all that keen to receive them.
In Japan, the aboriginal inhabitants had long since been exterminated, except for a remnant in the far north where the conditions did not favour settlement by the rice-cultivating Japanese people.
Germany soon found that it had powerful enemies attacking from West, East and South, and the option of deporting unwanted people to Central Asia or Siberia, an option that Joseph Stalin enjoyed, was not available, and the “War of Annihilation” ground on.
As Australians will know, Japan had no problem with working their slave-labourers to death.
So, the conditions and circumstances were different for the Germans and Japanese respectively, but had they been identical, I am sure the Bushido-lead conquest of the Imperial Japanese would have been up to the task in parity with the Nazi regime.
Notwithstanding five paragraphs of historical anecdotes you have accepted that Imperial Japan never implemented a scheme to exterminate a people. Going back to your original question as to why the two countries are treated differently, you now have the answer.
Occidental: With respect, I do not agree with the answer you have proposed, and beg to differ. I still think that the core reason as to why Imperial Japan and Germany of the Third Reich were/are treated differentially by the Allied victors is primarily because of the reasons I have cited. To that I would add that after the war there needed to be a reason to justify the initial declaration of war against Germany, as the Soviet Union was just as culpable for occupying and annexing parts of Poland (the USSR’s chunk of Poland is now occupied by the Ukraine). The demonisation of Nazi Germany after the war thus became critically important for the Allies, both the Western Democracies and the Soviet Union. Curiously, the Ukraine has dropped out of the anti-Nazi narrative, and has rehabilitated their historical anti-Soviet collaborations with the Third Reich, which included Ukrainian SS units. The post WW2 Holocaust narrative was a powerful agency (weapon?) in aid of the Zionist project to create a sovereign Jewish state out of British Mandate Palestine. That project is still in progress, as the Zionist elements in the Israeli government hold that they have a right to reclaim their Biblical sovereignty over Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), and the anti-Nazi narrative is very much a part of Zionism today.
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So, I still believe that the civilian victims of Imperial Japan have little or no relevance to the victors of WW2, because they weren’t European or Jewish. In other words, there is no gain to be had in demonising Imperial Japan, particularly because Japan is now our ally against China! On the other hand, everything is to be gained by demonising the Third Reich (except in the Ukraine).
Robert McNamara worked for ‘Bombs Away’ LeMay doing operational research on the effectiveness of his fire bombing campaign against Japanese cities. McNamara wrote how he discussed with LeMay that what they were doing was a war crime and LeMay responded yes but we will be on the winning side. LeMay did put his life on the line over Europe in that at his rank flying was not a duty but LeMay did sometimes fly and did on one of the Schweinfurt raids which incurred heavy losses.
Never before has warfare been able to so easily distort the minds of impressionable young people.
Exibit A – Social Media
https://www.memri.org/tv/chinese-social-media-video-tiktok-won-big-for-palestine-jewish-elite-information-cocoons
Never before has warfare been able to so easily distort the minds of impressionable young people.
Exibit B – Artificial Intelligence
https://apnews.com/article/artificial-intelligence-hamas-israel-misinformation-ai-gaza-a1bb303b637ffbbb9cbc3aa1e000db47
From Anne Barrowclough in The Australian:
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Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir has threatened to “break apart” the government if Israel did not restart its war after the current ceasefire, which is in the fifth of six agreed days.
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“We are committed to staying in Gaza and carrying out all of our missions to bring these communities back; the mission is not complete until we finish off this problem called Hamas.”
This article appears to support the view that the Nuremberg trials after WWII had no legitimate basis in law or morality. Does it follow that the only “war crime” committed by the German military and political leadership was to lose the war?
The public execution of those who presided over the defeat of Germany is a precedent that should weigh on the minds of the Israeli government and its American backers. There are a good many commentators, such as Scott Ritter, who suggest that Zionism now faces the real possibility of a humiliating strategic defeat in its own Hundred Years War against the Palestinian people:
https://www.unz.com/article/hamas-winning-battle-for-gaza/
Prof your comments don’t really make much sense. What Hamas did on October 7th was an act of genocide aimed at nobody else but Jewish people. What Israel is doing is going after one or more terrorist groups in self defence and retaliation of the barbarous methods used in the killing of 1400 innocents. The principal group is Hamas but they are not a people.
Every time you or anybody else feel the urge to denigrate Israel just ask yourselves “who started the war and how was it executed?” I think you’ve been watching too much Al Jazeera news.
Peejay, the question of “what Hamas did on 0ctober 7th” is far more interesting and complex than you seem to realize.
To call the incursion of Hamas fighters into southern Israel “genocide” is a gross misrepresentation. Nor did it mark the moment when the war began. If one wants to understand the history of the Israel-Palestine war, one must look into the origins of the Zionist movement and its activities in Palestine during the British Mandate following WWI. Here’s the link to a multi-part podcast dealing with that history from the 1920s down to the present day: https://martyrmade.com/fear-loathing-in-the-new-jerusalem/
As for the “barbarous methods used in the killing of 1400 innocents” it might be helpful to recognize the facts of the matter. Even the IDF has reduced the “body count” on the day to 1200. Many of those killed were not “innocents” but members of the IDF or militia units. In addition, even Israeli media sources have acknowledged that a very substantial number of casualties on October 7th were people killed or injured by the Israeli military itself, acting in accordance with the so-called Hannibal Directive. The subject of what really happened on October 7th was covered at length in a podcast discussion between Max Blumenthal and Chris Hedges almost two weeks ago. You might listen to it if you want to get the facts straight: https://thegrayzone.com/2023/11/18/video-what-happened-october-7/
Grayzone is just another tiresome conspiracy theory website. Read it by all means, but it’s half an hour of your life you won’t get back.
Your snide comment is all-too-typical of pro-Israel propaganda these days. Ad hominem slurs (“tiresome conspiracy theory website”) do not constitute an argument, much less a refutation of Max Blumenthal’s journalism.
Even Haaretz has recognized the truth as reported by Blumenthal:
“Israeli outlet Haaretz has acknowledged a police report confirmed partygoers at a festival three miles from the Gaza border were killed by the Israeli military on October 7, just two weeks after the publication accused Grayzone editor-in-chief Max Blumenthal of spreading “conspiracy theories” for reporting on the story.
“In an article published November 19, Haaretz reporter Josh Breiner wrote that an official investigation into the deaths of Nova festival attendees “revealed that an IDF combat helicopter that arrived at the scene from the Ramat David base fired at the terrorists and apparently also hit some of the revelers who were there,” citing “a police source.”
Moreover:
“The finding should come as little surprise to the liberal Israeli publication. On November 9, Haaretz released an audio interview with Israeli reserve pilot Col. Nof Erez, who said the Netanyahu administration likely invoked the notorious Hannibal Directive, which dictates that Israelis taken captive should be killed by the military rather than left in the hands of Palestinian militants.
“Hannibal Directive was probably deployed because once you detect a hostage situation, this is Hannibal,” Erez told the outlet in a recording published November 9.
“What we saw here was a mass Hannibal,” the pilot concludes.”
https://thegrayzone.com/2023/11/21/haaretz-grayzone-conspiracy-israeli-festivalgoers/
Max Blumenthal, apart from being a defender of Putin, Maduro and, more recently, Assad, is a frequent contributor to RT and, god help us, Press TV, the Iranian government’s nauseating propaganda channel. I don’t need to condemn his “journalism” – he does a pretty good job of that himself.
I shouldn’t actually engage further on the oxymoron of Max Blumenthal’s “journalism”, or the relentlessly anti-Israel, crackpot site Grayzone, but as far as one can see what you are saying is this:
– Haaretz (Israel’s version of the Guardian), quoting a “police source”, says that civilians were hit by the military while repelling the Hamas terrorists on 7 October – tragic if true, and your point is?
– Haaretz also quotes an “Israeli reserve pilot” to the effect that “the Netanyahu administration likely invoked the notorious Hannibal Directive, which dictates that Israelis taken captive should be killed by the military rather than left in the hands of Palestinian militants”. Well, if he says so, it must be true.
None of this rises above the level of anonymous assertion and unsubstantiated opinion, but you, like Grayzone, uncritically swallow it all whole.
Nice try Sindri. Still, I imagine that it must be tiresome to see a carefully constructed but deceptive narrative so calmly called into question. And maybe stop using the ‘conspiracy theory’ bugbear to heard the sheep. It’s not really effective anymore.
Now now, Horst. “The conspiracy theory bugbear”? Coming from someone who thinks that jews control the world, that’s breathtaking.
No Sindri, that’s only what you think I think.
And you do. You’ve made that obvious from your posts.
No, you’re insistent about putting words in my mouth, perhaps because you yourself believe those words, which you choose, to be true and wish to attach a ‘Nazi’ stigma to them.
I don’t keep a catalogue of your jew-baiting rants, but your comment about the “ingenious, fractious, restless, warlike white folk” being under the thumb of the “world controllers” — a line straight out of Der Sturmer — and your recent comment that Australia is controlled by “Mr Triguboff and his ilk” are a couple of examples.
@Sindri ‘Catalogue…jew-baiting rants’
Cdi
@Sindri
‘Catalogue…jew-baiting rants’
If you had you might have noticed that there haven’t been any. Only your interpolations and subsequent reactions to them might be considered a bit ranty.
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Regarding white folks and world controllers one only need observe the demographics of Europe and the Anglosphere to realise that the European peoples are slated for oblivion. At whose behest it is difficult to say for sure. George Soros amongst others is implicated. Leftists and their ideology which the mainstream right have now largely accepted, are the clubs used to beat us.
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Mr Triguboff, a Chinese-born emigre Russian Jew is Australia’s most famous and arguably most powerful property developer, reknowned for his regular proclamations in the press on how government should act to keep his business humming, regardless of the effect on the urban environment and the people. He and his ilk, property developers, have a massive vested interest in high levels of immigration which push up demand and prices. They’re known to support both sides of the political aisle.
“David Isaac”, I am replying to your last post here because there’s no reply button on your post below. Let me get this straight. The “white folk” (whom you describe as “the ingenious, fractious, restless, warlike white folk”) are “slated for oblivion”, by reason of declining demographics. That may or may not be the case; let us accept for present purposes that it is. What you assert, however, that this is not merely the consequence of chaotic or uncontrolled immigration brought on by ignorant or blind politicians and bad policy, or a complete lack of policy. You assert that a group of people – who control the world – are deliberately engineering this result.
You say that you don’t know exactly who this group of people who control the world are. I don’t believe you. Your Nazi sympathies, together with your tendency to bring the jews into everything, demonstrate very clearly that you think it’s a jewish conspiracy.
I’m more than ever convinced, by the way, that you must be one of those people who used to hang around the so-called “Adelaide Institute” website. Your style is so similar to that mischievous old toad Dr Töben, it’s uncanny.
@Sindri
You wrote: ‘You say that you don’t know exactly who this group of people who control the world are. I don’t believe you.’
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Well that’s very generous of you but you may have misread my power level.
Then you wrote: ‘Nazi sympathies..tendency to bring the jews into everything… You think it’s a jewish conspiracy.’ So you’re saying that I, a jew-obsessed Nazi, do know exactly who the people who control the world are and I think it’s a jewish conspiracy. Hmmm, it sure seems as though you think (know?) that’s what’s happening but don’t want others to think similarly. As for me, I really don’t know, I just want my country back.
I’ll try to make this my last contribution to this particular exchange as it’s a bit pointless to continue it (I imagine you agree). But really – have I misread your post, or do you seriously think that I believe, or even know (!) that there is a Jewish conspiracy to control the world, but I’m trying to persuade people here that there isn’t? That I am, in other words, an active agent of the conspiracy? That’s called paranoia, mate.
This quote from Nicholas Monsarrat’s novel The Cruel Sea on the absurdity of upper limits in war and a rebuttal to those ignorant demonstrators shouting ‘from the rivers to the sea’ for the Palestinian cause but Israel’s demise:
“You took my ship by surprise, Captain,” he [Von Hellmuth, the Nazi captain] said slowly. “Otherwise …”
“His tone hinted at treachery, unfair tactics, a course of conduct outrageous to German honor: suitable only for Englishmen, Poles, Negroes. “And what the Hell have you been doing all these months,” Ericson thought, “except taking people by surprise, stalking them, giving them no chance.” But that idea would not have registered. Instead he smiled ironically and said:
“It is war. I am sorry if it is too hard for you.”
Good piece Peter and I agree.
Israel of course is the only free and fair country in the whole area and the Hamas terrorist organisation is an enemy that has to be destroyed for there ever to be peace, and unfortunately the only way is by having tha Army go in… and do it. All your points are good.
If Hamas really were really interested in the lives of their huge numbers of children ( in very poor families in the main I read….for some strange reason ) they could always lay down their arms and surrender.
It would be a perfectly honourable thing to do under the circumstances I think.
The IDF’s monumental efforts to take out the murderous Hamas savages who slaughtered innocent babies, children, women and men in Israel in the most heinous way on October 7th 2023 must be understood. The very best coverage of what is really happening is on the Raptor News. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-mahgiNm6g
We must not forget that Israel is a small landmass compared to the whole of the mostly Islamic Middle East. Israel is only about 8,400 square miles, the Middle East is about 5,000,000 square miles. Also, the Islamic population is about 315,000,000 compared to the Israeli population which is only about 7,100,000.
There must be no more ceasefires to appease the pro-Islamic propagandists whose mantra is, “Death to Israel; Death to America; Kill the kaffirs/ infidels/ unbelievers/ Christians; From the river to the sea; Gas the Jews; Annihilate the State of Israel; Genocide against the Jewish people etc” The IDF must finish their mammoth task of taking out Hamas.
And the rest of the world must understand that “While the Israelis were urging the residents of northern Gaza to move south to avoid being caught in the cross-fire, Hamas leaders were ordering Gazans not to move to safety, and shooting at them as they tried to flee — presumably so that Hamas could have more dead bodies to show the television crews how evil the Israelis supposedly are.”
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20141/israel-iran-biden
All the innocent Israeli hostages and those from other countries must be released BEFORE there is a ceasefire. NO Islamic convicted prisoners must be exchanged for innocent Israeli, American and other hostages. There will ONLY be peace through strength.
But, if all the Palestinian civilians headed south, would they then be safe? Would the militants just stay in the north to be annihilated? Of course not, as guerrillas, they would retreat with the civilian population. If Hamas is eliminated, who will take their place? We’ve seen the disastrous effects of “regime change” in Syria and Iraq. Isn’t it likely that the “Islamic State” will replace Hamas?, or that the conflict will spread internationally, with suicide bombings, etc?
cbattle1 – If all the Palestinian civilians headed south (and the Hamas savages didn’t shoot them as they left), and then the IDF went into Palestine and neutralised all the Islamic Hamas Jihadis, then Gaza and The West Bank could be controlled by the very capable IDF and be turned into an International Nature Reserve. This would include the Official National Animal of Israel which is the endangered Israeli gazelle. This could be a new holiday mecca for the world to enjoy!
MargieCJ: I’m all for nature reserves, but what about the Palestinian population of Gaza and the West Bank? You haven’t said.
cbattle1 – As around 90% of the population of Gaza and The West Bank is Muslim, they can well be accommodated by their Islamic brothers and sisters all around them in the Middle East which occupies a land area of around 5,000,000 square miles. Israel which is only about 8,400 square miles, can then peacefully be occupied by all the other cultures and creeds which do not threaten each other with death if they don’t belong. Yes, then Gaza and The West Bank could be controlled by the very capable IDF and be turned into an International Nature Reserve for the tourists of the world to visit. There will ONLY be peace through strength.
You write “Israel must be proportionate and thus minimise civilian casualties in Gaza.”
What constitutes ‘proportionateness’. What constitutues ‘minimum civilian casualties’ ? I think there are no absolutes as ‘rules of war’. Evidently Hamas thinks so too: they use civilians as human shields. Why would Israel abide by some code when Hamas doesn’t?
Searcher, Proportionate in this context means harming no more civiltans than is necessary to achieve a military target; which, in turn, must be significant enough to justify putting civilians in harms way. It’s a civilised rule of war which Israel upholds. Hamas isn’t civilised, so it doesn’t. As to your question. I suppose trying to act as decently as possible even in wartime separates us from the barbarians. I mean who would ever support deliberately killing mothers and their babies and children, or not support taking prudent measures to avoid, so far as is feasible, catching them in crossfire?
“Proportionate in this context means harming no more civiltans than is necessary to achieve a military target”
I wonder what proportionate means for Hamas. How many Israeli and Palestinians civilian deaths, wounding and permanent maiming are necessary to accomplish Hamas’ military and political targets? Why is that not asked? How many Palestinian children need to die before Hamas declares, “We accomplished it, we ruined Israel’s reputation, so we’ll stop now.”
Peter Smith, thank you for your reply “Proportionate means …” I still think such questions can have only partial or subjective answers. I guess it’s generally a matter of imponderable degree. I am glad to read your comment “It’s a civilised rule of war which Israel upholds. Hamas isn’t civilised, so it doesn’t.”
Hamas is actually a political party that forms the government in Gaza; are they all terrorists that need to be exterminated? I have recently heard that there were actually three groups that participated in the Oct 7 raid; one was the Hamas militants, another was the “Islamic Jihad” or something like that, and the other was constituted from “gangs”. It would be relevant if those individuals who actually committed the crimes were brought to justice.
Was the atomic bombing of Japan a genocide?
Peejay, another podcast on the 1948-1982 period that is worth listening to can be found at; https://martyrmade.substack.com/p/war-all-the-time-israel-vs-palestine
@Sindri
‘An active agent of the conspiracy….’
It’s a possibility, consistent with your attributing, admittedly most likely inadvertently, knowledge of the existence of a world-controlling Jewish conspiracy to me, knowledge which I have not claimed mind you. Of course there are lots of other more likely possibilities why you might have assigned yourself to police, misrepresent and at times ridicule my comments, Sindri the dwarf, forger of Thor’s hammer Mjolnir and of Odin’s ring. You just got a bit tied up by your own words as you called me a liar.
Still trying to work out what that’s all about. But my reason for the use of the screen name Sindri is much more humdrum.
I am in fact your worst nightmare. A total race-traitor.
@Sindri “race traitor”
Re-read it and you’ll find it’s not so complicated. Well, whether you’re dwarf, jew, englishman, norseman or chinaman I should hope you love your folk and are unafraid to seek the truth. Merry Christmas or perhaps Good Yule.