Israel.

[Erik The Anglophile]

I think it may be due to the documented praxis of Hamas using civilians and civilian targets as sheilds.
I know people seem to entertain the idea of them as freedom fighters, wich can to some extent be true, but lets not forget they are first and foremost a bunch fundamentalist islamist jihadist fanaticals.
And eagerly cheered on by Iran as a local proxy for whatever geo-political goal they wish to achieve for the moment.
Hamas knew exactly what they signed up for the moment they started planning the raid into Israel, and most likely could'nt care less about any civilian casualties, in fact they probably have no qualms keeping civilians there for easy PR points once they are affected by violent actions...

 

[samale]

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Looks like Putins using it too.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I have removed the part of my post that derailed the thread and have removed all discussion of it to get the thread back on topic.

 

[Clarence]

I think it may be due to the documented praxis of Hamas using civilians and civilian targets as sheilds.
I know people seem to entertain the idea of them as freedom fighters, wich can to some extent be true, but lets not forget they are first and foremost a bunch fundamentalist islamist jihadist fanaticals.
And eagerly cheered on by Iran as a local proxy for whatever geo-political goal they wish to achieve for the moment.
Hamas knew exactly what they signed up for the moment they started planning the raid into Israel, and most likely could'nt care less about any civilian casualties, in fact they probably have no qualms keeping civilians there for easy PR points once they are affected by violent actions...

You don't go far enough @Erik The Anglophile , Hamas are even more fanatical than this. If you want to get an insight into these people then listen to the podcast "Israel, invasion and the trap laid by Hamas The Rest is Politics" (you should be able to google it easily enough, but I can't get a link to work). Where Rory Stuart and Alastair Campbell talk to Yuval Noah Harari (not many of you, perhaps, know this name- no reason why you should- but those who do, I'm sure, will agree he's worth listening to). Harari reminds us that Hamas care nothing for events in this word, but is only concerned with their glory in the next, Civilian suffering, indeed their own suffering, is irrelevant! Their aim is that under no circumstances must there be any kind of peace settlement at all with Israel. End of.
So Israel is right in saying that Hamas has to be eradicated, but Harari dwells on the hopelessness of that task and doesn't shy away from the fact that Netanyahu and his nutters have done nothing to help the situation, rather they have played into Hamas' hands and continue to do so. But Hamas is not the Palestinian people. Harari makes a comparison with Isis' September 11th atrocity in the US and the subsequent revenge taken on Iraq. Not the first time and history is repeats itself. This round of Hamas atrocities also has features in common with Japanese Special Attack Unit's assault on Allied shipping in Pearl Harbour, which resulted in the punishment of the innocent folk of Hiroshima and Nagasaki the following year. It's worth remembering that while, on the one hand, Biden has shown himself so far to be nothing more than Netanyahu's puppet, on the other and when push comes to shove, all that matters is "the American way of life". It'll be interesting to see how Biden squares that with the oil producers! All the signs are that this is going to escalate out of hand, which is exactly what Hamas is aiming for and, from this point of view, Hamas is winning hands down.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Biden has shown himself so far to be nothing more than Netanyahu's puppet

Wait until you hear his speech today, he dropped the ball in a big way twice, he said he was going to tell a little story but then stopped dead and said we haven't got time for that (not his exact words but close enough) he then went on to say it was "the other team" that bombed the hospital.

 

[Erik The Anglophile]

Was it really that coherent?

 

[Druss]

It's very unlikely that old sleepy Joe will do anything other than hand out increasingly sophisticated weapons that will inevitably be used against civilians.

He's clearly nothing more than a puppet being dangled on the strings of those with an insidious agenda.

Iran are getting involved, America is getting involved, I think we can all tell where this is going to go...

 

[Erik The Anglophile]

Wage war like it's the 80's all over again...

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Well worth watching, I don't see him asking for a ceasefire any time soon.

Ball drop #1 at 5:58 (The one line story was going to take too much time)

Ball drop #2 at 6:24 (The other team not you)

 

[Clint]

The Israelis already have all the kit they want off the US.

 

[Clarence]

I don't think it's going well for Biden. Serves him right for meddling. According to the Guardian, it no longer matters who blew up the hospital as the Arab states have largely made up their minds it was Israel wot dunnit! And now the US has unilaterally vetoed a UN draft resolution for humanitarian pauses in hostilities. That's going to look good, but I don't think he cares. Would have been better off just biden his time, in my opinion.

Right, the sun's over the yard arm so time for a lager and lime or two, methinks.

Calls for a day of rage are interesting. I gather this means rather more than stamping ones feet and pouting churlishly throughout the hours of daylight, but I can't get to the bottom of what exacty it does imply.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...rom-regional-allies-over-gaza-hospital-deaths

 

[Chippy_Tea]

BBC News Summary​

1. Israel's military has vowed to intensify air strikes on Gaza and has warned Palestinians still in the north of the territory to flee south
2. A military spokesman said this would allow Israel to "minimise the risks to our forces in the next stages of the war"
3. Meanwhile, Hamas says 55 people were killed in air raids on Gaza overnight
4. Separately, the Israeli military says it struck a Hamas cell sheltering in a mosque in the occupied West Bank
5. Israel has amassed tanks and troops on the boundary with Gaza ahead of an expected ground invasion, though the potential timing of this remains unclear
6. The UN hopes it can get more aid into Gaza today - after vital supplies yesterday reached people for the first time since fighting erupted
7. It's two weeks since Hamas launched its assault on Israel, killing more than 1,400 people. Palestinian officials say more than 4,300 have been killed in Gaza since then

 

[stripeyjoe]

It's an absolute **** show, over 6000 dead civilians, the majority Palestinian, and a third of Gaza's infrastructure flattened. Isreal need to stop the bombing, Hamas need to return the hostages and stop firing rockets. Then there needs to be an ICC investigation into the war crimes committed by both sides and Isreal must be forced into complying with the numerous UN resolutions and withdraw all the settlements from the occupied territories. Hamas should then disarm and allow the Palestinian Authority to hold elections. And the West needs to stop interfering in the middle east, we f**ked the place up in back in the early 1900's with our stupid notional borders and made it worse in 1948, that's before we get to the whole cluster**k after 9/11.

 

[samale]

It's an absolute **** show, over 6000 dead civilians, the majority Palestinian, and a third of Gaza's infrastructure flattened. Isreal need to stop the bombing, Hamas need to return the hostages and stop firing rockets. Then there needs to be an ICC investigation into the war crimes committed by both sides and Isreal must be forced into complying with the numerous UN resolutions and withdraw all the settlements from the occupied territories. Hamas should then disarm and allow the Palestinian Authority to hold elections. And the West needs to stop interfering in the middle east, we f**ked the place up in back in the early 1900's with our stupid notional borders and made it worse in 1948, that's before we get to the whole cluster**k after 9/11.

Shocking the amount of children they have murdered. I had to stop looking at twitter it's horrific.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

How are they going to get Hamas to disarm they dont play by any rules.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

If you dont want to watch it all watch from here -

As he says at some point Israel will either leave or govern/occupy so they will be back to square one -

 

[Clarence]

How are they going to get Hamas to disarm they dont play by any rules.

Hamas won't disarm. They're a suicide cult. That's no excuse for Israel's behaviour, though.
How they're to be irradiacated is beyond me, frankly, but it's still no excuse for killing civilians.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Hamas won't disarm. They're a suicide cult. That's no excuse for Israel's behaviour, though.
How they're to be irradiacated is beyond me, frankly, but it's still no excuse for killing civilians.

I agree Hamas will never disarm how are they to be forced to do so.

Saying they want to erase Hamas and telling citizens to move south gives them the excuse to kill whoever gets in the way, how is blowing up buildings and killing innocent people defending themselves?

What Hamas did was awful and the world rightly condemned it how can the same people condone what is happening now.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

We see people on TV and radio calling for a ceasefire what chance is there of a ceasefire when you see what Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi said to his troupes on Saturday -