Israel And The Palestinians (now with added Iran/Lebanon)

[Shadow Play]

1 hour ago, jagfox said:

 

The Financial Times today are quoting  the war against Hamas will last for over a year.  They also quoting that the most intensive ground assault to date  will commence soon and last into 2014.

[jagfox]

4 minutes ago, Shadow Play said:

The Financial Times today are quoting  the war against Hamas will last for over a year.  They also quoting that the most intensive ground assault to date  will commence soon and last into 2014.

The war machine keeps on turning,  i guess? Just seems the IDF aren't doing a very good job apart from aerial bombing. If they aren't reigned in by their allies (well, the US), their SMO could indeed drag on with no discernable goals achieved, short of killing more and more civilians.

Maybe that's the plan?

[Jacksgranda]

14 hours ago, Freedom Farter said:

Israel's latest innovation in genocide technology that they're busy hard-testing on Gazan children. 

Israel exports this dystopian shit it creates:

(https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/features/2023/11/17/israels-weapons-industry-is-the-gaza-war-its-latest-test-lab)

 

Which generates them a lot of revenue and keeps most nations friendly with them:

(https://archive.ph/1zIad)

145 different countries. That must be most of them.

[sophia]

18 minutes ago, Shadow Play said:

The Financial Times today are quoting  the war against Hamas will last for over a year.  They also quoting that the most intensive ground assault to date  will commence soon and last into 2014.

Well if that's the case it seems that proportionality has won. There was a time when bombing back to the stone age was advocated but if it's only 2014 on this occasion, maybe that's ok.

[beefybake]

1 hour ago, orfc said:

The BBC had it's pants biblically pulled down when they reported without verification Hamas's lies about the Israeli airstrike on a hospital that killed hundreds that turned out to be a Hamas missile misfire. I suspect they're now just double checking the Hamas Pallywood nonsense and finding it wanting.

Don't think so.

As described many times elsewhere..., in previous conflicts casualty figures coming out of Gaza  have proven to be reasonably accurate.

 

Secondly, as posted, with links, on this thread already..., What eventually transpired was that the hospital had reported hundreds of casualties.

This went to Al Jazeera, who due to, as I recall, an error in dialect/translation, mistranslated 'casualties' as 'deaths'.  This then got picked up

by other mainstream media, and broadcast as such.

 

The missile strike. I never followed this through to the end. However, it looked to me that the 'reports' blaming a Hamas/Islamic Jihad missile fault seemed to be emanating from Israel or US sources, who would say that anyway.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 2, 2023 by beefybake

[BFTD]

37 minutes ago, Shadow Play said:

The Financial Times today are quoting  the war against Hamas will last for over a year.  They also quoting that the most intensive ground assault to date  will commence soon and last into 2014.

Never mind 2014, they're going to send Gaza back to the Stone Age.

[jagfox]

 

[coprolite]

1 hour ago, orfc said:

The BBC had it's pants biblically pulled down when they reported without verification Hamas's lies about the Israeli airstrike on a hospital that killed hundreds that turned out to be a Hamas missile misfire. I suspect they're now just double checking the Hamas Pallywood nonsense and finding it wanting.

That nevet happened, and i have no idea what Pallywood means. Other than that, great post. 

[Shadow Play]

Watched a bit of Question Time to try and broaden my (lack of) knowledge of this subject.  Andrew Neil stating he sees no hope whatsoever for any resolution.  In fact he reckons Hamas will be elected in the West Bank come the next elections.

[Freedom Farter]

4 hours ago, Shadow Play said:

Watched a bit of Question Time to try and broaden my (lack of) knowledge of this subject.  Andrew Neil stating he sees no hope whatsoever for any resolution.  In fact he reckons Hamas will be elected in the West Bank come the next elections.

Gaza is almost entirely a refugee population. When you look on a map you see there's randomly 2 million Palestinians in this little strip of land wedged between the sea and the Egyptian border. That wasn't a naturally occurring arrangement. Those people were herded into that area having been displaced from elsewhere in what is now Israeli territory. There has been no chance to build anything generation upon generation because of the constant upheaval. In recent times, Israel has visited what it calls its "mowing the lawn" policy on Gaza. That means they bomb it flat every decade or so to reset any progress. The Gazan population is kept in a constant state of shell shock. They're also blockaded - trapped in and not allowed to import the materials they need to create any sort of economic prosperity. 

West Bank, like Gaza, has refugee settlements inhabited by Palestinians who were forced out of what is now Israeli territory. Where West Bank differs from Gaza, though,, is that West Bank has indigenous settlements still existing complete with their original populations. Particularly the cities Hebron and Nablus. The population of those cities has been added to in recent times by internally displaced West Bankers. Israel colonises land in West Bank, it doesn't want the people. So its taking all the land around these cities but not the cities themselves. That sees West Bankers in rural towns and villages constantly being displaced (I mean literally kicked out their homes, plus all the communal facilities like schools in these Palestinian villages get bulldozed). These folk have to then relocate to the cities like Nablus and Hebron. 

So West Bank at least still has an intact society, albeit one under enormous strain. Ways of living are passed down the generations and West Bankers still have that. They have some stability which Gazans do not. That makes it less likely we'll see the same sort of militancy developing in West Bank as we've seen in Gaza. Folk still have something to lose in West Bank, they're able to live heavily repressed yet still productive lives. In Gaza, things have always been more desperate and the people more traumatised.

West Bank militancy already exists although its mostly confined to the Jenin refugee camp. As West Bank Palestinians are put under increasing pressure, the militancy will probably spread. However, we definitely won't see any paramilitary forming in West Bank capable of doing what the Gazan militants did in October. There's the reasons I gave above and also that West Bank, unlike Gaza, is under full military occupation. There's no possibility for West Bankers to organise themselves how the Gazans were able to as the Israeli boot is so firmly on their necks. Gazans were blockaded but left to freely associate within their herding pen. In West bank, there's military check points everywhere.

Edited December 2, 2023 by Freedom Farter

[Shadow Play]

1 hour ago, Freedom Farter said:

Gaza is almost entirely a refugee population. When you look on a map you see there's randomly 2 million Palestinians in this little strip of land wedged between the sea and the Egyptian border. That's wasn't a naturally occurring arrangement. Those people were herded into that area having been displaced from elsewhere in what is now Israeli territory. There has been no chance to build anything generation upon generation because of the constant upheaval. In recent times, Israel has visited what it calls its "mowing the lawn" policy on Gaza. That means they bomb it flat every decade or so to reset any progress. The Gazan population is kept in a constant state of shell shock. They're also blockaded - trapped in and not allowed to import the materials they need to create any sort of economic prosperity. 

West Bank, like Gaza, has refugee settlements inhabited by Palestinians who were forced out of what is now Israeli territory. Where West Bank differs from Gaza, though,, is that West Bank has indigenous settlements still existing complete with their original populations. Particularly the cities Hebron and Nablus. The population of those cities has been added to in recent times by internally displaced West Bankers. Israel colonises land in West Bank, it doesn't want the people. So its taking all the land around these cities but not the cities themselves. That sees West Bankers in rural towns and villages constantly being displaced (I mean literally kicked out their homes, plus all the communal facilities like schools in these Palestinian villages get bulldozed). These folk have to then relocate to the cities like Nablus and Hebron. 

So West Bank at least still has an intact society, albeit one under enormous strain. Ways of living are passed downs the generations and West Bankers still have that. They have some stability which Gazans do not. That makes it less likely we'll see the same sort of militancy developing in West Bank as we've seen in Gaza. Folk still have something to lose in West Bank, they're able to live heavily repressed yet still worthwhile lives. In Gaza, things have always been more desperate and the people more traumatised.

West Bank militancy already exists and as the Palestinians there are put under increasing strain, that militancy will only increase. However, we definitely won't see any paramilitary forming in West Bank capable of doing what the Gazan militants did in October. There's the reasons I gave above and also that West Bank, unlike Gaza, is under full military occupation. There's no possibility for West Bankers to organise themselves how the Gazans were able to as the Israeli boot is so firmly on their necks. Gazans were blockaded but left to freely associate within their herding pen. In West bank, there's military check points everywhere.

Thanks for taking the time to post your very detailed assessment of the current situation.    

[Freedom Farter]

6 minutes ago, Shadow Play said:

Thanks for taking the time to post your very detailed assessment of the current situation.    

Ha! No problem. I'm definitely someone who likes the sight of his own typing. I'm actually the same myself in that my primary aim is to understand what's going on and I'm constantly learning new information that changes my perspective on events. 

[Freedom Farter]

5 hours ago, Jacksgranda said:

145 different countries. That must be most of them.

Sure, I googled that now and apparently the number of countries is somewhere in the 190s (the exact number depends on which are recognised by the nation state you're in). On that Israel stat, actual drone exports were only made to 56 of those 145 countries they were marketed to.

[TxRover]

1 hour ago, Freedom Farter said:

Sure, I googled that now and apparently the number of countries is somewhere in the 190s (the exact number depends on which are recognised by the nation state you're in). On that Israel stat, actual drone exports were only made to 56 of those 145 countries they were marketed to.

Easiest is 193 (in the UN). Then we have 2 with UN observers (Vatican City and Palestine), 1 without UN observer (Taiwan), plus 2 dependencies of New Zealand (Cook Islands and Niue) who have some UN representation, and then a further 17 that the UN recognizes as not self governing (https://www.un.org/dppa/decolonization/en/nsgt). So you can argue for as many as 215.

[coprolite]

49 minutes ago, orfc said:

Yes it did

And it's also the case that anyone who says the BBC is biased gives away more about their own position than the BBC's (which is neutral if that helps)

The BBC reported that a missile had hit the hospital and reported that there were reports that it was an Israeli missile. They attributed the report to an NGO inside Gaza, which had actually put that in the public domain. 

Anyone who says the British state broadcaster is neutral gives away their own position. 

Do you want to buy a bridge? 

[coprolite]

6 minutes ago, TxRover said:

Easiest is 193 (in the UN). Then we have 2 with UN observers (Vatican City and Palestine), 1 without UN observer (Taiwan), plus 2 dependencies of New Zealand (Cook Islands and Niue) who have some UN representation, and then a further 17 that the UN recognizes as not self governing (https://www.un.org/dppa/decolonization/en/nsgt). So you can argue for as many as 215.

Plus Sealand. 

[Freedom Farter]

Israel's aim with their current military offensive is to cripple Gazan society by destroying its infrastructure. I don't mean this is merely the outcome of Israel's actions, I mean its the express intention, its the literal military doctrine that Israel go by (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dahiya_doctrine).

That's why they bomb healthcare facilities and why a disproportionate volume of Gazan doctors are being murdered, because those doctors are working in the hospitals which get bombed.

Its not just doctors being disproportionately killed, its various types of civic leader because they staff the infrastructure that gets bombed. 

If a society is gutted of its best and brightest, that stymies knowledge transfer within that society. Something particularly important to Gaza as nearly half the population are children.

The above Twitter account is a Bosniak and she mentions in her follow up tweet how this "eliticide" was done to her ethnicity in 1990s Bosnia.

[Freedom Farter]

On 02/12/2023 at 11:45, coprolite said:

That nevet happened, and i have no idea what Pallywood means. Other than that, great post. 

It's a conspiracy theory perpetuated by US supporters of the Israeli occupation. They allege that all the crimes Israel commits against Palestinians in the occupied territories are staged. They talk about crisis actors and the like.

Here's an example of a current Pallywood conspiracy theory, claiming that dead Gazan babies are actually Chinese dolls:

I suppose the term Pallywood being picked up and used by idiots here (well, at least by one idiot) shows again how easily US nonsense transfers to UK.

Edited December 4, 2023 by Freedom Farter

[jagfox]

 

 

[welshbairn]

The old story about Iraqi soldiers throwing babies out of incubators and shipping the equipment back to Baghdad, provided by the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador as was later revealed, seems to have finally become partially true, but by Israelis. They probably didn't nick the incubators.

A Gaza hospital evacuated, four fragile lives and a grim discovery