Who wants to place a bet if Israel is going to give a shit?
My vote is on “keep going and keep denying”.
I know Biden gets a lot of shit for it, but I suspect this is also one of the reasons why the Biden administration has delayed criticising Netenyahu and been very cautious in doing so.
They know Netenyahu would ignore them anyway, that it would damage their alliance with Israel, and have probably come to the conclusion that being too strong wouldn’t help remove him from power.
Articles like this seem to back up my theory:
After cautious criticism by Biden, Netanyahu rallies Israel’s right wing
Not that I agree with the logic, but that might partly explain it.
Then Biden is ignoring that this might cost him the reelection that’s coming up. Left-leaning people even in the US aren’t that keen on genocide, and a lot of them might just elect to stay at home rather than voting for an enabler.
The saddest thing is that you don’t have much choice do you. It is either Biden or Trump and then you need to decide what’s the lesser evil, isn’t it?
Tell me again how a dual-political system is again considered a democracy?
The worst thing about it is that both parties are neoliberal. On the economics side, it’s just an illusion of choice. They only differ on social issues.
The vast majority of American voters support Israel in this war and do not consider what Israel is doing a genocide (55ff.):
https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/HHP_Jan24_KeyResults.pdf
I think you fell into the common trap of believing that your particular filter bubble is representative of the general consensus.
Over 1/3 of voters say it’s genocide. Which party do you think they will skew towards? Given that the last election was pretty close it doesn’t look great.
Go back a few pages and see that only 2% of voters consider Israel the most important issue. Next to nobody is going to base their voting decision on Biden’s Israel policy.
It’s not a problem that we’re trying to get him to fail then. Surely only 2% of people won’t make any difference so why are you trying to stop us?
Because you can never be too careful. Yes, it’s almost certainly not a problem, but don’t tempt fate. Biden is the best choice by a country mile, for everyone involved. This doesn’t mean he’s perfect, he most certainly isn’t, but neither is any other politician in all of human history. Vote for the least flawed of the leading two candidates in your system. Doing anything else - third party, abstaining - only benefits fascists.
I bet there are enough of us that’s are against genocide that we can make him fail the reelection
And then you get Trump. Ever looked up his Israel policy? Got any other brilliant ideas?
Maybe just do the right thing. Clinton lost because of 80,000 votes from 3 states. You don’t think that can happen again because of a genocide ?
Like I said to the other user, only 2% of voters consider Israel the most important issue. It’s not gonna swing 80k people against a candidate as controversial as Trump.
I am also really not buying that genocide accusation (and shouting the word doesn’t help your case). It doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.
So far, percentage-wise Israel has killed fewer Palestinians in Gaza than Hamas did in the communities they invaded. This doesn’t bring any life back and every innocent person killed remains a tragedy, but it is important to see the whole picture.
Hamas terrorists killed ten percent of the population of these small kibbutzes within a day, whereas Israel killed 1.2% of the people in Gaza over the course of more than three months (this 1.2% number includes Hamas fighters - it’s not just civilians). Keep in mind that Hamas only had access to small arms and drones for the massacres they committed, yet they caused significantly more deaths percentage-wise. To me at least, this signifies a massive difference in both intent and conduct. Israel, with its powerful weaponry, could have killed far more Palestinians if they actually wanted to, if this was their actual intent. They are, in terms of military capabilities, entirely capable of killing every last man, woman and child in Gaza within a few weeks at most (or a few seconds, if they don’t mind breathing in some fallout). Yet they clearly didn’t.
If genocide really was their intent, then why are they still issuing at the very least some warnings to civilians? Why did they protect an evacuation corridor with their lives, against Hamas attacks on both IDF soldiers and the civilians trying to flee? This doesn’t make any sense.
The long-term genocide accusation makes even less sense. Since 1960, the Palestinian population as increased almost five times - compared to four times the Israeli population. Before this war, Palestinians had a life expectancy that was three years above the average for Arab nations. Neither high birth rates nor high life expectancy are typical of any actual genocide in history.
The very worst one can accuse Israel as a country of is that some politicians in the government coalition are running their mouths wild with revenge fantasies against the entire Palestinian people for the October 7 attack. They should be punished for it, at the very least lose their jobs and ideally their freedom, but the conduct of the IDF as a whole does thankfully not reflect the rhetoric of these politicians. That’s not to say that the IDF is perfect, far from it. It is almost a certainty that individual units have committed atrocities. This is an unfortunate reality of war, similar to how e.g. ISAF soldiers have committed atrocities in Afghanistan, even though their mission as a whole was most certainly not. I do believe that the IDF is no different in this regard, that atrocities are the exception, not the rule. The IDF’s mission in Gaza is to free hostages and destroy Hamas capability of both ruling the strip and attacking Israel. It is perfectly fine to discuss how this army goes about achieving this goal and how it should best proceed, but it is not fine to throw, despite a complete absence of evidence, the accusation at it that their actual mission is to eradicate all Palestinians.
Tell me something, how many genocides did that stupid motherfucker support?
My guy, did you forget how COVID killed over a million Americans while Trump did nothing?
No one is forcing Biden to export weapons to Israel, knowing full well they are being used to commit war crimes.
Yes, but the US iced out Pakistan and leaned into Jordan after Bin Laden was discovered in Abottabad and AQA millitants routinely received refuge in Pakistan. Alliances need to serve both sides and Netanyahu’s refusal to deescalate or take the off-ramp and let Israel move on from his policy failures, has put Biden and the US atop a geopolitical powder keg.
Great name.
Plus the literal interpretation of some Saudi royal family member owning a milk empire is very funny to me
ICJ orders Israel to take measures to prevent and punish direct incitement of genocide
ICJ ruling does not explicitly order a ceasefire
Israel’s security minister responds to ICJ ruling by tweeting ‘Hague Shmague’
Israel will continue to defend itself while adhering to international law, says Netanyahu
Gentlemen don’t bet on a sure thing.
Most countries don’t take advice from people that hate them and want to see them destroyed.
But of course you’ll probably continue to think that if you scream even louder about how much you hate Israel maybe Israel will listen to you.
Meanwhile in the real world, Israel is not committing genocide. People wouldn’t be calling for a ceasefire if there was actual genocide going on because a ceasefire would mean Hamas would no longer be able to protect Palestinian civilians from a genocidal army. Calls for a ceasefire is an admission that a) Hamas is not protecting the civilian population and b) civilian casualties are only occurring because of conflict between Israel an Hamas. Civilian casualties that occur because of a conflict is a part of a war. Genocide is when civilians are directly targeted, which can happen while in a state of ceasefire, which is what happened on October 7.
Nobody calls for the perpetrators of the genocide that occurred on October 7 to surrender and face justice, because we all know it’s pointless. Actual perpetrators of genocide do not respect the law. When people call on Israel for ceasefire, call on Israel to make more effort to reduce civilian casualties it is an admission that Israel does respect the law.
The accusations of genocide is simply an attempt to motivate people into attacking Jews in Israel… and sometimes even Jews elsewhere in the world. It’s all about increasing hostilities and wanting more people to die out of anger over the people currently dying in a conflict which was started by Hamas.
The calls for ceasefire is all about people wanting Yahya Sinwar to survive so he can fight another day and continue this conflict long term. Ideally Sinwar should face justice for the genocide he ordered. But it’s doubtful that he will surrender himself, so the most likely scenario is that he will be killed, either directly by an IDF soldier or buried alive in an underground bunker constructed to keep him safe while leaving the Palestinian people at the mercy of an army that Hamas claims to be committing genocide. The myth of the fascist strongman leader in all of it’s glory.
Now people will scream emotion at me thinking their emotion will somehow change the rules of logic. You may even report my post and have a moderator remove it because this “Israel is committing genocide” hateful meme can’t survive the light of truth and basic logic. It only can survive in a place where hated dominates discussion.
Full text of the order. Juicy bits start at paragraph 75, page 24 thereabouts (goddammit pdf page numbering).
In particular, this:
The Court further considers that Israel must take immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance to address the adverse conditions of life faced by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
“Immediate and effective” is very clear language, and can be easily assessed. If Israel doesn’t do that it opens the doors wide open to actually be found guilty of genocide, no wiggling “but we didn’t mean to”, no nothing. A legal tripwire if I’ve ever seen one.
Also make note of the one judge who voted against everything, including ordering that humanitarian aid be provided. No, it’s not the Israeli one.
I also noticed that judge Sebutinde voted against everything. I wonder why? Why would anyone vote against an order to provide humanitarian aid?
Edit: removed a word
She voted against a resolution wherein even the Israeli judge voted yes.
In other words, continue military complain, just give some food.
Well they also say that Israel should make sure that the IDF, or subsets thereof, aren’t committing genocide.
Ordering to stop a military campaign as such is out of the jurisdiction of the ICJ AFAIU: Israel does have the right to defend itself against Hamas under international law, arguably has the duty to do so, it’s the above and beyond that’s the issue, what the ICJ can actually rule on.
Stopping the IDF would be a thing for the security council, “ok you’re making a mess of things, we’ll take over, guaranteeing your security from Hamas while not committing genocide”, but given the identity of some veto powers on the UNSC that’s hypothetical at best.
Notably, they did NOT call whatever Israel has done as genocide.
Not what they ruled on so of course they didn’t. They also didn’t call it not a genocide.
What they ruled is that South Africa’s case has enough merit to warrant a preliminary order, meaning that it is possibly, but not necessarily, a genocide, “It is not obvious that there’s no genocide going on”. The actual verdict will take years to reach as it requires establishing intent and everything, not just “civilians are dying and Israel could and should do more to prevent that”.
Well, they had much more information than an average internet user has and that’s quite different conclusion from what majority users on this board would immediately jump without any doubt that Israel is committing genocide.
More over, it did not say that “Israel could”, i.e. it did not say that it did anything incorrectly. only that “it should take all measures within its power”.
“Please be nicer. Thanks.”
That’ll show 'em.
ICJ is completely useless
Such provisional measures issued by the world court are legally binding,
That’s impossible. Israel is a country, there’s no legal authority above that. That’s what “sovereign” means when we refer to a country as one.
It’s entirely possible Israel has signed treaties whereby it agrees to follow World Court orders, but if it violated said treaties, that wouldn’t be illegal (since Israel would give itself permission to do so, making it legal under Israeli law). Legality isn’t really defined when countries interact with each other.
This is semantics. International law is a concept. You can say that disobeying the treaties you mentioned is illegal.
