War in the Middle East, again

[Torco]

I'm sorry for bringing the guy to mind lmao

I get my news from French media, so it's... not so surprising. Criticizing Israel's actions is unremarkable here; always has been, as far as I remember.

ah, i see. my experience of the ubiquity of condemning hamas as a talking point is mostly english and spanish sources. well done france.

You might be reading a bit more into my words than are actually there. I feel there's a big difference between Israelis (if you prefer) and their government(s) (which happen to have been horrible for more than 20 years.) Just like there's a huge difference between Hamas and the Gazans.

there is, but i think it's still the case that this curious assymetry is present: people easily condemn hamas as such, and rightly so, but only some of the actions of the israeli government... which is even more jarring considering the differences in the magnitude of the human rights violations commited by each actor.

[Travis B.]

Why can't one condemn both the Israeli gov't and Hamas?

[Travis B.]

(This I see as the real issue -- as you put it, it seems to you that one can only condemn one or the other, not both.)

[Torco]

sure one can, but even that is sort of... jugar al empate, we say here. what's that desmond tutu quote of an elephant stepping on a mouse if declare neutrality you're collaborating with the elephant? something like that. that's why i drew the example of two guys trying to kill each other and how the appropriate response is stopping the guy who's winning first, not the guy who's losing first cause if you stop him first that's the same as entering the fight on the side of the first guy.

[Travis B.]

sure one can, but even that is sort of... jugar al empate, we say here. what's that desmond tutu quote of an elephant stepping on a mouse if declare neutrality you're collaborating with the elephant? something like that. that's why i drew the example of two guys trying to kill each other and how the appropriate response is stopping the guy who's winning first, not the guy who's losing first cause if you stop him first that's the same as entering the fight on the side of the first guy.

Just because one guy is a priority to be stopped first in that the magnitude of what they are doing is worse does not mean that the other guy isn't also morally bad and should not also be condemned.

In this case it is not as if Hamas is just killing Israeli soldiers as they attack Gaza -- if that were they case then what they would be doing would be legitimate acts of war. Rather, they killed ~1200 innocent Israeli civilians and took ~200 of them hostage starting this latest cycle of violence; just because Israel has since killed far more Palestinians than that in this war does not make what Hamas did any more moral.

[Torco]

yeah, no, for sure. and don't get me wrong, it is in general moral to present armed resistance to armies and regimes such as israel, and of course just armed resistance forces are going to be called terrorists by their enemies. I'd be all for 'em if that was all. but even though some civilian casualties are to be expected of guerrilla activity, just like with the maquisards or the MIR, the IRA or the vietcong or whatever else, everyone can think of one armed resistance movement they like... but hamas went waaay beyond that into psycho "kill em all" territory. music festivals etcetera are not valid war targets, and if you're gonna kidnap someone kidnap officials of the enemy regime, not randos.

no wonder israel funds them, they make the perfect enemy PR wise *and* are, from a military perspective, dumb.