Hamas launches war on Israel

[Jimbuna]

httpshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLMQ5Pvhoz0://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6NiXuX_log

[Jimbuna]

Hamas says it discussed freeing 70 hostages in return for 5-day truce with Israel after Netanyahu insisted there will be no ceasefire until ALL are returned.

[Skybird]

[Die Zeit] The US says it has evidence that the Islamist Hamas is using the Al-Shaifa hospital in the Gaza Strip for military purposes. "We have information that confirms that Hamas is using this hospital as a command and control center and probably also as a weapons cache," US national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters on board Air Force One. "This is a war crime."
The US government thus supports the account of the Israeli armed forces, which had reported, among other things, a Hamas command center under the currently embattled Shifa hospital. When asked for concrete evidence, Kirby merely said that the information was based on various intelligence sources. He did not want to go into further detail.

Kirby went on to say that the USA would not approve of air strikes on hospitals. The actions of the Hamans did not diminish Israel's responsibility to protect the civilian population. "Hospitals and patients must be protected," said the government spokesman. The US government also does not want to see firefights in clinics where innocent, helpless and sick people are simply seeking medical care.

-----------------------------

And the following is remarkable because traditionally the European leftist intellectuals are extremely anti-semitic - and Habermas is far left.

[TS] Four intellectuals around Jürgen Habermas have commented on the Middle East war in an open letter. Israel's war is justified, the accusation of genocide is absurd. - One of the most influential intellectuals of recent times has spoken out in the debate on anti-Semitism in Germany and the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip.
In a joint statement, philosopher Jürgen Habermas and his co-authors call the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip a "principally justified counterattack" to the massacre by Hamas and Islamic Jihad on October 7.

The statement was published on the website of the "Normative Order" research center at Goethe University Frankfurt am Main. In addition to the 94-year-old Habermas, the signatories also include the lawyer Klaus Günther and the political scientists Nicole Deitelhoff and Rainer Forst.
According to the authors, the Hamas massacre and Israel's reaction have led to a "cascade of moral and political statements and demonstrations". In this situation, therefore, "some principles should be adhered to".

"Principles of proportionality, avoiding civilian casualties and waging a war with the prospect of future peace" should guide the Israeli response to the massacre.
However, "despite all the concern for the fate of the Palestinian population", it is a slippage of standards "if genocidal intentions are attributed to Israel's actions".

Furthermore, Israel's actions "in no way justify anti-Semitic reactions, especially not in Germany", according to the authors. In view of the "mass crimes of the Nazi era, Jewish life and Israel's right to exist are central elements that are particularly worthy of protection" for the "self-image of the Federal Republic of Germany".

In addition, the "elementary rights to freedom", physical integrity and protection from racist defamation apply. These are "indivisible and apply equally to all".

The letter was published on the research center's website on Monday.

[mapuc]

Read somewhere, if weapons and other war material and/or troops was kept stored in protected buildings like hospitals. They are no longer under Geneva protection and are therefore legitimate targets

Now when this is said I hope Israel does not bomb this hospital.

Markus

[Skybird]

If it cannot be taken on the gorudn with calculatable risk, then give the staff enough early warning time to move out their patients, and then bomb it. Its war, damn it. Dont save the enemy below the hospital just because there are civilians around. Why do you think Hamas has moved its infrasturcture beneath hospitals, eh? They hoped to become untouchable that way. Or gain propaganda poitns if Israel strikes.

Saving the enemy is what makes you lose wars. Don't. Never.

In fact Israel has told staff at that hospital already days ago to evacuate. Staff said "No". Their deicison, they were warned. Israel also gives phone calls and knock-on dud bombs as warnign to civilians in buildings that are about to be bombed. Lets face it, no matter what Israel does or does not - the world will always be against it, since they are Jewish.

Hamas can call itself lucky that it is up against Israel and not an army like that of Syria, Saudi Arabia, or Iran. These do not know such self-restrictions as the Israeli do practice. Not to mention Russia, China.

My rule for such a scenario: give early warning to civilians, and then target and bomb the hell out of any enemies around.

Note that they say Hamas has abused many such civilian places like hospitals and schools. Israel should not do them the favour to carelessly massacre civlians when bombign these, but allow civilians - sufficient but short - time to escape. But for everything that counts in war, it should not restrain from attacking these military targets. You dont win wars by saving the enemy.

BTW, I personally would also strike at "religous" places if these get used for military purposes of any kind. In Irag for exmaple, they often stored weapons in mosques and had snipers and obeservations posts in minarettes. Sorry dudes, that makes you all valid targets, holy ground or not.

If rules apply even in war as some say, then I insist at least on these rules being followed by the other as well - Reciprocity. So far the Hague Landwarfare convention has not been signed by Hamas, Taliban, or IS.


Ironically, the Hague Convention was initiated by the Russian Tsar. Now look what Russia does these days.

[mapuc]

OK then I have remembered wrong I thought

Geneva conventions covered civilians in wartime
and
Hague Conventions covered soldiers in wartime

I agree with you on the fact that Israel should give a warning and then some hours or minutes later bomb the place.

Markus

[Skybird]

Establishing military posts of any kind inside hospitals, like Hamas does with severla hopsitals ion Gaza, is a war crime, that is for certain.



And Israel seesm to think it can solve the problem without flattening the whole building, and sent trained forces into the hospital that have been deliberately trained to act inside that environemnt (language skills were especially required). If they can acchieve the task this way, I am all for it.

[Jimbuna]

Israeli forces have entered Gaza's largest hospital in what the military says is a "targeted" operation.

A journalist inside the hospital tells the BBC that soldiers are going room to room and questioning people but there is currently no shooting taking place.

The same witness said commando soldiers had entered the main emergency department, with tanks also in the hospital area.

Israel accuses Hamas of running a command centre in tunnels under the hospital and the US says it has intelligence that supports this.

Hamas denies this and says the raid on the hospital is a war crime - hundreds of civilians have been sheltering there, alongside patients.

The White House says civilians and patients must be protected, adding: "We don't want to see a firefight in a hospital"

[Skybird]

NZZ, SZ and Tagespiegel all report that weapons were found in Shifa hospital.

[Jimbuna]

All Hamas need do is allow the Red Cross unrestricted access to the hospital but that is obviously asking too much for some people.

[Jimbuna]

[Skybird]

https://www.nzz.ch/feuilleton/hamas-..._x_tr_pto=wapp

A skewed concept of justice is now in vogue in the West. In the Western canon, this refers to the individual, and everyone is equal before the law, whether rich or poor, brown or white. In the left-wing narrative, however, the collective prevails, defined by pigmentation, origin, identity and, above all, victim status. Morality is selective. Some groups are more “equal”: blacks, Muslims, LGBTQ+. . ., but not the victims of yesterday such as Jews or, in America, the descendants of the Chinese who were kept like slaves during the construction of the railway. Justice is assigned, not weighed; It's not about good or bad behavior, but about favored minorities.

[Jimbuna]

[Jimbuna]

Israel says its jets attacked the Gaza house of Ismail Haniyeh, widely considered as the overall Hamas leader.

Haniyeh lives in Qatar - Israel says the house was being used as a Hamas meeting place.

Elsewhere, Palestinian media say around 50 people were killed by an air strike in the central Gaza Strip.

Israel hasn't commented on the strike, but says it targets Hamas infrastructure and minimises civilian deaths.

On Wednesday night, Israel continued its operation at the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, which it says was being used as Hamas base.

US President Joe Biden says he is "mildly hopeful" about freeing more than 200 people being held hostage in Gaza.

[Skybird]

After Munich 1972, the Israeli send assassination commandos worldwide to find and execute the leaders behind that terror plot.



Just a thought.