[Luis Dias]

The two state solution has been put on hold ever since the Palestinian Authority agreed they should speak to Hamas (as the elected government of the Gaza strip) regarding this issue and Netanyahu absolutely refused to take part on any of it. So for that "two state solution" to take a new hold you need to take Hamas down, either politically (let the Gaza people know and vote against them) or militarily (annihilate them).

My heart goes for the political solution that is, at this time, obsolete. It's now a race between Hamas' global political pressure against Israel's attacks and the Israel military's ability to erradicate Hamas. I don't think the Israelis will succeed, the political pressure is mounting and they will back off (always saying that it was a victory, they have achieved their objectives, etc.), and whether or not it will be a de facto victory will only be measured in the months and years to come when we are able to know if Hamas got stronger or weaker with all this. My guess? This was a tactical blunder of massive proportions and Hamas is going to get stronger, not weaker.

Using a flawed analogy, it reminds me like a very sharp chess move variation, wherein you are in trouble, but you calculate some ten or twelve moves ahead, you know you'll be sacrificing a rook or something very valuable but you are getting a ****ton of tactical goods back, and go for it. Except you haven't got the time to actually calculate everything and it becomes a race between what you think you'll get and what your opponent is able to do to defend itself from your sharp attack long enough to keep your sacrifice as an advantage.

Sometimes it works. I look at the situation and I say "I have a baad feeling about this".

[Grizzly]

(actually, it started with 3 dead Israeli teenagers, which is similar anyway),

This assumes that this action was carried out by Hamas, which is unconfirmed (and Hamas catagorically denies). Also note that it took place in the west bank, not Gaza (yes, I also regurarely mix up the two). Lastly, note operation Brother's Keeper. Some would say that it started with that (I personally think that Hamas just needs an excuse to fire missiles, but Brother's Keeper did hand them one).

[Dragon]

I think it's sufficient to say that Hamas wanted war and Israel didn't handle it well. Perhaps something could be done, but it's likely they'd have found another excuse. That's kind of irrelevant, though. In reality, it all started with the British giving Jews land in the area, so Israel is located there and not, say, in Poland or India. The region was unstable even then (in no small part thanks to the same Brits stirring Arabs up against the Ottoman Empire...), so it was either a bone-headed or downright malicious decision to settle Jews there, of all places. I know, "Holy Land" and all, but it's hardly surprising they were not very welcome there, especially after deporting a large amount of Palestinians from their land.

So for that "two state solution" to take a new hold you need to take Hamas down, either politically (let the Gaza people know and vote against them) or militarily (annihilate them).

Do not dismiss the political solution so quickly. IIRC, Hamas had denied the people of the Gaza strip even a chance to vote against them. A sound move on their part, considering how bad are they at actually running the place. Perhaps if they were placed in a situation in which they'd have to hold free elections (for instance, by the same global pressure that keeps Israel from wiping them out), they'd lose and degenerate into guerillas again. Assuming they don't bully the voters into voting for them, which such groups have been known to do.

[Sandwich]

I had a whole bunch of replies written up here to posts on page 4 and 5, but then I kept reading and saw that everything I was saying had basically already been said.

In response to the theories that if we stop giving them reason to hate us (airstrikes, blockades, etc), they'll stop hating us, I have to point out that Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, Turkey, Iran, etc (all of whom definitely hate Israel - at least, the leadership does) all have one major thing in common - (radical?) Islam. I know, I know, it's not very PC to point a finger at a religion, but there you have it. Muslims all over the Middle-East are being taught Jew-hatred from the Koran. Whether that's a perversion of what the Koran actually says or not is irrelevant to my point - it's the people's perception of their religion's teachings that is at the core of their hatred of the Jews. No amount of embargo-lifting, airstrike-halting, or land-concessioning is going to change that core religious belief.

Thankfully, the Palestinians who are getting medical treatment in Israeli hospitals - heart surgeries, etc - are witnessing firsthand that Jews do not really drink the blood of Muslims, that they don't really have Devil tails, etc. Small victories...

[Mongoose]

No other nation in the world would be expected to see rockets and weapons targeting their civilian population centers and just ignore it.  It's patently unreasonable.

Yes, they would be! If Estonia was very unstable and some part of its government decided to start launching rockets into Finland (which is where I live), with about one in thousand rockets resulting in a finnish civilian dying, then yes, absolutely we should ignore it rather than airstrike them back if doing so would be practically guaranteed to result in a much greater number of estonian civilian casualties. Dogma is irrelevant, consequences of one's actions less so.

This seems completely ridiculous.  If a foreign terrorist organization was actively killing civilians in my country, I'd expect the government to act against them immediately, if not sooner.  And if they didn't, they should be removed from power yesterday.

[SpardaSon21]

That's because you understand part of the social contract of nations is to provide communal security and support those inside it, and if an outside force is acting against those inside the nation, the nation is bound by said contract to protect those within it, even to the detriment of those outside it.  A nation that ignores part of the social contract binding it does so at its own peril.

[zookeeper]

No other nation in the world would be expected to see rockets and weapons targeting their civilian population centers and just ignore it.  It's patently unreasonable.

Yes, they would be! If Estonia was very unstable and some part of its government decided to start launching rockets into Finland (which is where I live), with about one in thousand rockets resulting in a finnish civilian dying, then yes, absolutely we should ignore it rather than airstrike them back if doing so would be practically guaranteed to result in a much greater number of estonian civilian casualties. Dogma is irrelevant, consequences of one's actions less so.

This seems completely ridiculous.  If a foreign terrorist organization was actively killing civilians in my country, I'd expect the government to act against them immediately, if not sooner.  And if they didn't, they should be removed from power yesterday.

It depends on the way in which they act against them. Obviously. That's what most of this thread is about. No one thinks that any kind of acting against terrorists killing civilians is okay.

Anyway... don't you think it would be even more ridiculous if, say, my government airstriked you because a terrorist organization in your country is killing civilians in my country? I think it would be much more ridiculous than my government choosing to not airstrike at all if they can't airstrike the terrorists without also airstriking you.

[Lorric]

No other nation in the world would be expected to see rockets and weapons targeting their civilian population centers and just ignore it.  It's patently unreasonable.

Yes, they would be! If Estonia was very unstable and some part of its government decided to start launching rockets into Finland (which is where I live), with about one in thousand rockets resulting in a finnish civilian dying, then yes, absolutely we should ignore it rather than airstrike them back if doing so would be practically guaranteed to result in a much greater number of estonian civilian casualties. Dogma is irrelevant, consequences of one's actions less so.

This seems completely ridiculous.  If a foreign terrorist organization was actively killing civilians in my country, I'd expect the government to act against them immediately, if not sooner.  And if they didn't, they should be removed from power yesterday.

I actually think it's very noble.

Some people I think don't see national boundaries and us and them, they just see dead innocents, and want the fewest number of dead innocents, regardless of where those innocents are dying. The real test of those people would be if they were in the kill zone, would they be happy to remain in the kill zone to keep the overall number of human lives lost down? And it seems he is saying yes.

If the answer is truly yes, I consider them to be morally superior to me, as I would selfishly want the risk removed from me. In the end, I would be a coward, promoting death of additional innocents elsewhere in order to keep myself safe, despite the actual odds of my death being minimal. Better 100 deaths over there than 1 death over here, right? No. Just safer for you and me. And I can't blame other people for thinking that way when I think the same. But that's what it comes down to at the end of the day, selfishness and self-preservation. But anyone who would truly rather bear the risk in order that the least human innocents die, you're better than me.

Better for us to go over to Iraq and Afghanistan and see people slaughtered well into 6 digits than to see people die in probably 3 digits over here (UK), 4 at the most, right? 5 at the very most in America. No. It's just selfish. Because we want to live, so we let them die. How many of them die in order to save one of us? Which is of greater value, one of us, or however many of them die to preserve that one of us?

Some people can willingly, knowingly choose to go to their own death in order to save lives, strangers' lives, over escaping and letting those people die. I couldn't do it, and I consider myself inferior to someone who could.

[Aardwolf]

Hypothetical scenario with two fictitious factions, "you" and "somebody else"

The civilian death tolls start at: 1-you, 0-somebody else

You have two possible options.
A: the civilian death tolls increase to: 2-you, 0-somebody else
or
B: the civilian death tolls increase to: 1-you, 200-somebody else

Which option do you choose?



"But Aardwolf, that's a huge oversimplification!"
Somewhat.

[Scotty]

If you want to send the clear message to your people that you value them less than some other random asshole's people, you pick A.

If you recognize how the social contract works, you pick B.

[Aardwolf]

Utilitarianism with all people valued equally > your narrow interpretation of "the social contract"

[Lorric]

Hypothetical scenario with two fictitious factions, "you" and "somebody else"

The civilian death tolls start at: 1-you, 0-somebody else

You have two possible options.
A: the civilian death tolls increase to: 2-you, 0-somebody else
or
B: the civilian death tolls increase to: 1-you, 200-somebody else

Which option do you choose?

How about if you is literally you. Your own death vs. the lives of X number of strangers.

Would you let 10 people die to stay alive? 100? 1,000? 10,000?

If you want to send the clear message to your people that you value them less than some other random asshole's people, you pick A.

If you recognize how the social contract works, you pick B.

Value them equally to the other person's people is what it would mean, not less.

[Aardwolf]

Holy crap Lorric actually said something more eloquently than I was going to.

[Mongoose]

Anyway... don't you think it would be even more ridiculous if, say, my government airstriked you because a terrorist organization in your country is killing civilians in my country? I think it would be much more ridiculous than my government choosing to not airstrike at all if they can't airstrike the terrorists without also airstriking you.

If my country was doing nothing at all to inhibit the actions of said terrorists--or to be more accurate in the analogy, if my government was committing the acts of terrorism in the first place--then I would find it completely reasonable that another government would attack them.  More to the point, if my own government was setting up military installations in civilian buildings with the express purpose of guaranteeing civilian casualties when said installations were attacked, I would choose to actively fight against them.

This isn't a goddamn numbers game here; it's not some account ledger that needs to come out balanced.  It's about the responsibilities of governments towards their own citizens, and about the actions of one government that are intentionally endangering its own citizens.  At some point, someone in Gaza has to stand up to Hamas and say, "Enough is enough, **** you people."

[Polpolion]

"But Aardwolf, that's a huge oversimplification!"
Somewhat.

You acknowledge that your glib interpretation of the ethics of geopolitics is unrepresentative of the way the real-world works, but you continue to insist that a nation shouldn't respond to direct agression?

[InsaneBaron]

Israel is the only place in the entire goddamn world where this sort of thing results in people blaming Israel.

(yes I know it was a quote within a quote, but you reiterated it emphatically)


This assertion amounts to "you are only blaming Israel because they're Israel", aka "because you don't like them". I have told you why I am criticizing Israel, and the reasons I gave were clearly not that. Yet you continue to repeat this claim ascribing some motivation for my "blaming" Israel other than the one which I explicitly stated.

I will now explicitly state that "because they're Israel" or "because I don't like them" is not my motivation for criticizing Israel. If you repeat this claim again, you are calling me a liar, and I will not stand for that.



Note: "I" = succinct version of "myself and others in this thread who have expressed similar criticisms of Israel's recent behavior"; the same goes for other first person pronouns, verb conjugations, etc..

I wasn't referring to you at all, I was talking about the international community. I could be wrong, but I think Scotty's motivations were the same as mine. I'm sorry if that wasn't clear.

[Aardwolf]

Le sigh.



Lets say in the scenario I presented earlier, instead of countries or factions, the people involved are you, your friends, your family, and your loved ones, split into two groups based on who gets heads or tails on a coin toss.

The groups split up and each group independently attends a course on ethics; "heads" decides it is their responsibility to protect the lives of the members of "heads", while "tails" decides it is their responsibility to protect the lives of the members of "tails".

Now "heads" has to choose between letting 1 randomly selected member of "heads" die, or letting 200 randomly selected members of "tails" die. Ok, you probably don't have 200 friends, family, and loved ones. Lets say only 10.

Which choice do you hope team "heads" goes with?



Why is your answer different when I use the terms "your friends, family, and loved ones", "teams determined by a coin toss", and "for no good reason", versus when I use the terms "civilians", "countries", and "in self-defense"?

[Spoon]

Random suggestion: Ignore Aardwolf's attempt of kidnapping the topic and continue meaningful discussion without him.

[MP-Ryan]

OK, what the hell, I apparently lost a post.  I had responded to Luis and Joshua at the top of the page this afternoon, but it seems the damn forum ate my post. Arrrrrgh.  It was both brilliant and eloquent too, damnit.  Let's try this again.  I'll see if I can recapture at least some of it.

Israel and the PA could come to a two-state solution.  It would take time, but it can happen.  Israel, the PA, and Hamas can't.  This is fundamentally because Hamas ceases to exist if the two-state solution becomes a reality.  The entire reason for Hamas' existence is to destroy the state of Israel - period.

Herein lies the quandry:  if Israel does not respond to Hamas' attacks, there are two immediate consequences - (1) Hamas gains/maintains the limited support it has, and (2) Israel's population, being constantly under siege without a government that protects its civilians from rocket fire and Hamas' attacks, hardens against concessions as part of the two-state solution.  So... not only does allowing Hamas to fire on Israel with impunity benefit Hamas, it simultaneously harms the best shot at peace in and around Israel in the long term.  That's two significant long-term consequences which are more important than the short-term death toll in either direction.

Hamas runs Gaza through force of arms.  Emboldening Hamas - by unilateral cessation of fire - gives them the propaganda victory of continuing to rain fire on Israel (which is popular among Hamas supporters and maintains or increases their support level), and further demoralizes the majority of Gazans who would love nothing better than to get rid of Hamas and invite the PA back in, but can't... because they're governed at gunpoint.  Ceasing attacks against Hamas while they continue to attack Israel also allows them breathing room to perfect their techniques without worrying about a missile strike taking out their launchers and the people running them.  That makes it very likely the civilian body count and destruction on the Israeli side will also increase which.... you guessed it, further benefits Hamas.

Hamas has a very clever tactic.  They park their weapons and key personnel in places they surround with civilians, they fire at Israel, not caring about retaliation, and then they wait for the international community to condemn Israel while they gleefully continue the rocket attacks until the point at which they either run low on weapons or take enough hurt that continuing is no longer an option, but by then all the ignorant do-gooders in the West have done their job for them - they've ignored the fact that Hamas is a group of terrorists targeting civilians, and condemn the nation state defending its civilian population that happens to kill ordinary Gazans because Hamas intentionally puts them in harm's way.

The only end game here is the complete elimination of Hamas' power, and so long as they are firing at Israel, force is unfortunately the only way to work toward that.  Only then will a true peace process be possible, and Hamas knows it, which is why they do their best to derail the process as frequently as possible.  It's also self-preservation - if the two-state solution becomes a reality, Hamas loses its only reason to exist.

Once Hamas starts firing on Israel, Israel has no choice but to shoot back until Hamas can be forced into a cease fire.  Doing anything else - at least until the intercept program is perfected to the point where Hamas can't hit Israel with any airborn weapons, period - harms the peace process in the long run.  Even now, at the height of the pictures of dead children, Hamas does not have majority support in Gaza.

[InsaneBaron]

Random suggestion: Ignore Aardwolf's attempt of kidnapping the topic and continue meaningful discussion without him.

So I'm not the only one who thought that that came out of nowhere? That's a relief.

On a meaningful note, it seems to me the best way to minimize losses on both sides is to end it fast. That means quick action, no diplomatic timewasting.