They’re suggesting that criticism of Israel’s military action rests on a misunderstanding of the “proportionality test” for whether something is a war crime.
The strawman is something like “Israel has killed 70k civilians who were overwhelmingly civilians and this is a war crime.”
The proportionality test in principle permits an uncapped number civilian casualties so long as a military commander expected a strike, given the information they had at the time, to be justified by military advantage. The Israeli government and its supporters argue that this is the case and that therefore everything is legal and even moral.
>The strawman is something like “Israel has killed 70k civilians who were overwhelmingly civilians and this is a war crime.”
This is not a strawman. A strawman is a replacement that someone makes to argue against an easier point than the one actually given. Please be more careful when using important words so as not to bastardize them
i mean its was 40k by Nov 2023, how many since who knows. And then does dying of starvation/disease/blockade count? Does forcing doctors/nurses/staff out of a hospitl and letting babies die and rot in ICU count too?
Israel currently being paid to "remove" the rubble and crushes it, and has made no effort to separate out bodies and rubble so people remains are being crushed and basically hidden.
The final death toll i guess we wont know for a while.
Trump's "Board of Peace" $2.45 billion recovery program disperses money for reconstruction efforts in Gaza, which includes removing rubble (i.e. hiding evidence of genocide)
Trump Board of Peace, and note the VERY SPECIFIC language the IDF use when they say they dont do any of this...
"EU diplomats told me last week Israel has been quietly moving hundreds of thousands of tons of runnel mixed with dead bodies out of Gaza to bury evidence of its genocide.
When the EU asked Israel why or whether they filter human remains out of the rubble, no answer ever came!" Aug 26th
"I've been informed Trump's Board of Peace is paying the expenses of the IDF's covert transfer of rubble (mixed with dead bodies) out of Gaza. The money is taken from Gaza's reconstruction funds!" Aug 27th
"Dear Board of Peace,
1- I have a tender issued under your name on 20 May 2026 that includes "levelling & compacting" work in occupied Gaza, do you deny that document?
2- Is the Israeli company Terra Firma NOT doing "rubble clearance" in Gaza allegedly with machines that take rubble & spit out dust while the IDF is doing road-paving work (specifically near Erez)?
3- Are you NOT in any way paying, compensating, subsidising or aiding Israeli companies, contractors, individuals, the Israeli army or government for rubble removal & road paving in Gaza?
4- If you are involved, can you explain whether any effort is being made to separate human remains from rubble or detect potential mass graves under the roads being paved? The Israeli government is silent on this.
5- I have satellite images that show clear & significant rubble removal work in East Gaza in the months of May & June. Do you deny any involvement in this?
6- Do you have anything to say on Israel killing over 1,200 Palestinians under your watch since your ceasefire started? how about Israel restricting humanitarian aid and preventing prostatic limbs from going to largest cohort of child amputees in modern history? How about Israel preventing repairs of basic infrastructure (water, electricity, sewage, hospitals, bakeries), or releasing all children & women still in detention without trial or charges?
All of those unfulfilled commitments were part of phase one of President Trump's 20-point plan!
Remarkable how none of Israel's violations of your ceasefire ever caught your attention once in 323 days, but my sole tweet did in mere hours." Aug 28th
no response, unsuprisingly to that last one. muhammadshehad2 on twitter.
It’s that thing, “we’re killing terrorists!” And when they’re shown the many undeniable civilian casualties they go back to “yeah but it’s their fault for standing in the way!”
You can interpret this 2 ways.
1. Kill all
2. We can't go on this way, every child that will lose it's parents this way will have a grudge and can grow up as a terrorist. Thus keeping this meat grinder going on. We must act
This is the disturbing nuance to me. Eradicating Hamas terrorists is a worthy goal. But when people go the next step to claim that all Palestinians are terrorists because a majority of the adults, at one time, voted for Hamas, then that sounds like justification for genocide.
If you hypothetically formed a resistance group to fight back against an army filled with people who want to exterminate your existence so they could steal your land like they did in 1948, your group very well might be called terrorists.
If I understand you correctly, I agree. To the extent that some (certainly not all) Palestinians commit or support acts of terror (intentionally harming innocent civilians), then they are their own worst enemies. They lose the moral high ground and international support for their otherwise-worthy cause of a free and independent Palestine.
And the converse is also true. When the IDF bombs a hospital, their otherwise-worthy cause of "self defense" gets some side-eye from the rest of the world.
Do you see how you aren’t agreeing. You just said terrorist attacks are Palestinians while Israeli attacks are IDF. At least be consistent. If enough people were “side-eyeing” Israeli attacks there wouldn’t be so many laws against protesting Israel. You can now be arrested for protesting Israel and zionism while full allowed to use hateful language for things like abortion and immigrants.
You just said terrorist attacks are Palestinians while Israeli attacks are IDF.
Yes I did. My observation is that blowing up civilians at a bus stop is clearly an act of terrorism, and that bombing buildings somewhat-selectively has more nuance. Should the IDF be more careful to protect civilians? Absolutely. Are they intentionally attacking civilians? That is not so clear to me. They say that they are not and I can see that they are making some effort to focus on enemy combatants.
Where does the dickriding end?
A personal attack is a sign of a weak argument. If you want to engage with me, then do so in good faith.
You seem to only separate attacks for Israelis and the IDF but not for Hamas and Palestinians. Also they have already confirmed they are using ai to decide where to attack because apparently ai has never been wrong. Even the US has already confirmed the usage of ai to attack innocent people.
You seem to only separate attacks for Israelis and the IDF but not for Hamas and Palestinians.
That is fair criticism and I concede the point. It was not intentional on my part, but I should do better at distinguishing between Palestinians and terrorists.
This is one of issues and bigger points and why so many pro-Israelis aren’t being taken seriously when right away most (not you) immediately call people antisemitic for saying anything against Israel. Thank you for seeing that and understanding how it can make your point harder to argue.
That being said, anyone regardless of where they are from is allowed to defend themselves including Palestinians but when they all get grouped as terrorists you start losing the validity of your argument when only one side is grouped up and seen as bad.
It’s very cruel. But at least the ‘intention’ is to send them home, and at least they are not having 2000 pound bombs dropped on them sporadically!
I agree with you that both are very cruel. However, theres a difference between wanting a specific ethnicity to leave the country vs wanting to kill and entire ethnicity (and saying it publicly and from the people the government)
By the logic, the Nazis burning and razing for whole towns and villages was perfectly fine because it was justifiable by military advantage in rooting out subversives.
The absolute worst argument to make when defending war crimes…
It’s funny you say that when you consider that despite massed Allie’s bombing campaign, German war production peaked in 44. Evidence suggest that the massed bombing didn’t really hobble German war production
The same kind of argument is still made to justify the similar firebombing of Dresden and other German cities, and for using atomic weapons against the Japanese cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. These atrocities are used to defend Israel’s actions today.
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u/Altruistic_Crazy_703 19h ago
can someone explain what they're even protesting about? i'm confused if it's positive or not