Israel announces 'total' blockade on Gaza

I’ve been tracking the comments on all of this across various websites to see what people’s thoughts are. This genuinely might be the most contentious issue of our age. There are people who are vehemently pro Palestine and can dismiss the loss of civilian lives as’ what do you expect when people are pushed like this’ . Then others are hugely pro Israel and see this as an unprovoked attack by a terrorist group and any retaliation is justified.

I think everyone’s shitty here. Hamas is a terrorist organization. They use terrorist practices and target civilians. That’s a terrorist organization. There’s no discussion on that point. Israel is a right wing authoritarian state that regularly commits war crimes. The total Palestinian body count far exceeds the death toll from this attack by orders of magnitude so we can’t pretend like Israel was minding its own business and was attacked.

I don’t think you can point to one or the other as being the true hero or the true victim. It’s the greatest grey area of all time.

I absolutely condemn the Palestinians and Hamas for this act. I absolutely condemn the Israelis for their continued mistreatment and violence towards Palestinians. One will say they only act this way because of the behavior of the other. But at this point where does the original blame for all of it start and end.

The only thing that is certain is that there will be far more blood shed and every dead Israeli will be met with 10 dead Palestinians. I suspect this will be the turning point for this ongoing conflict. And in the future there may no longer be a Palestine as we know it. With the US protecting Israel no other Arab countries will dare intervene militarily. If the Israelis occupy Gaza it’s going to quickly become a quagmire with a never ending insurgency. It will be costly and in ten years Israel will be more unsafe then they were today.

There’s no good answers or good parties here. Just disgusting human nature and the consequences of half baked racist geopolitics from the 40s.

But at this point where does the original blame for all of it start
The Brits
- Sykes-Picot and the Balfour Declaration basically created the political climate of the Middle East.
  Basically, the British and French decided that the Arabs were too stupid to figure out borders and squiggly lines that followed lame things like "shared cultural heritage" and "similar religious beliefs" were far too complicated.
- Which was influenced largely by the antisemitism of the West and the rise of Zionism for Jewish people which is partly radicalization as a response to thousands of years of oppression. But Brits were still in power with colonialism in full force.
- That's a foolish assumption. Plenty of countries have strong reasons to weaken Israel, and plenty of other countries have strong reasons to support them.
  Russia and China are spreading as much propaganda about this as the the US and its allies, guaranteed.
Pretty much the only unbiased take anyone can have. Both sides f*cking suck. I disagree that this is the turning point tho. We've been here before and we'll stay here until both sides come to the table and actually discuss a peaceful resolution to the conflict. It'll never happen with hamas so they have to go. It'll never happen with the current Israeli government so they need to be replaced with more diplomatic leaders. Neither is gonna happen tho, the continued conflict just puts more dependence on the bad actors that keep escalating it. Honestly I see hamas cracking before Israel softens but who knows if or when that'll happen. I wouldn't be surprised if this conflict continued far beyond my lifetime.
- I disagree that this is the turning point tho.
  Turning point, no, but I can see this being, in retrospect, an erm fulcrum point. Like what 9/11 did to the US, where the question "why do they hate us", besides further idiocy, also led to some legitimate insight into how the US' actions affect the world and provoke reactions, similarly the notion "we bred that monster" might get some more wide-spread traction in Israel.
  ...and yes this very much is a 9/11 moment for Israel, worse, actually. Caught completely on surprise, the most Jewish deaths and that in a short time-span since the Holocaust, much larger percentage of the population, it's definitely a defining moment.
This is why I mainly blame the US and Europe at this point.
Both sides in this situation are controlled by the most disgusting kind of sociopath and the only way to stop this is real (with teeth, not just bullshit talk) international pressure on both sides.
Instead there is real pressure on one side only, by declaring Hamas a terrorist organisation (which they are), whilst without pressure on the other side, the boot of Israel on Palestinian necks creates every day new people with nothing to lose, for whom joining an internationally labelled terrorist organisation is an actual step-up from their situation.
So the worst kind of Israelis have nothing to lose from joining the military or colonates and stealing from and murdering Palestinians because there are zero international sanctions on it, the Israeli authorities fully support it and they have overwhelming force, whilst the worst kind of Palestinians have nothing to lose from joining Hamas and murdering Israelis because they have nothing to lose since the actions of the above mentioned Israelis have made their baseline situation be "a life of misery treated as less than human" and even made any organisation that resists Israel (even one as bad as Hamas) be relativelly prestigious and an actual step-up for many in that environment.
Unless the "solution" envisioned by US and European leaders is genocide of the Palestinians, then both sides have to be put in a situation were they do have something to lose by doing what they've been doing and that means keeping on the pressure on Hamas and extending the sanctions to the Israeli government.
- Why are you blaming just US and Europe? Why do Russia and China get a free pass? Russia gives support to Iran and Iran directly supports Hamas. China deliberately plays both sides while doing nothing to fix the situation. Nobody is actually trying to fix the whole situation but somehow only US and Europe are to blame. I'm not against being critical of the EU and US (there are things to be critical about), but let's not act like they're supposed to be the world police. We have other countries who could also work towards a solution, ideally in cooperation with US and EU, but they seem to be more interested in blaming "The west" than actually solving the issue.
I suspect this will be the turning point for this ongoing conflict.
Agreed.
And in the future there may no longer be a Palestine as we know it.
Yea, I don't think the two-state compromise is even possible even more. Israel won't tolerate even letting Hamas stick around, so Gaza will be leveled. As for what will happen to the civilians; I've not a clue.
It goes back even further than that when you look into why Zionists wanted a Jewish state in the first place. I did a deep dive today trying to figure out the origin of the conflict and the original victims and aggressors, and I ended up in Revolutionary Russia before calling a quits for the day.
I don't know what an ideal solution is at this point, nor what an actually viable solution would be. I wonder if it would even be better for the issue to not end instead of continuing on the path it's on. The way things are going, the only place we'll end up is with one of the sides completely wiped out. :/
- I suspect this will be the turning point of tbe conflict. I don’t know that we are going to walk Israel back from the full on attack.
  The reality is as long as there are Palestinians alive there will be a terrorist network operating in their ranks. Israel could offer an olive branch and stop their oppression of the people but that hatred runs deep and it won’t be long before there’s another attack and we are back to where we started.
  There’s no good solution at all. There’s only the question of when does a military action in response to a terrorist act swap from righteous retribution to a genocide. Because short of genocide the Israelis can do nothing but occupy the territory and deal with an insurgency which will only breed more terrorists as all the fatherless sons grow up hating Israel and want to enact their revenge.
Yep, ESH
Which is why the Palestinians need to recognise the writing on the wall decades ago and pushed to settle somewhere else where it isn't a lost cause. They can't just keep turning their people into combatants and not expect to be suppressed for it.
Israel isn't going anywhere, it will take more than the Middle East to force them and even then, they already have nukes.
- You realize most of them aren’t even legally allowed to leave, right?
- Where exactly are the Palestinians supposed to settle? The Israelis took their land, homes, and businesses, so a great many Palestinians are impoverished. Many can't afford to move. It's not like the Palestinian government can just purchase land and build new cities elsewhere as it's poor too. If the Palestinians were to all move to any other country, they'd largely be refugees, reliant on their host country for food and shelter, which is a huge financial drain. Who is going to take and care for all of them?
  And if they were to move, Israel would take over the evacuated area. It'll be enough for awhile, but the population is ever growing. Who will Israel invade next?
- Do you think a Palestinian passport makes countries welcome you with open arms?
  Israel isn't going anywhere
  Great, they should help out their Palestinian citizens who are obviously suffering.
- Ahh, the good old "Ukraine should make territorial concessions for peace" style of "argument"...
  Because history has shown that conceding territory to Israel or Russia is such a great way to stop them from coming again later, killing more people and "be willing to stop" for more territory.
- Exaxtly, Ukraine should just compromise and give up land to Russia.
  They just need to read the writing on the wall.

I don't know how this will do anything but result in another attack. Making people that desperate is not a solution that will work well. Plus, my fellow Jews should know better than intentionally starving desperate people.

I have a feeling that was the plan all along
Intentionally antagonize the Palestinians that's already been antagonized for decades .... push them over the edge to make them make the first move.
Then once the first move is made .... move in and completely annihilate them under the guise of justified retaliation.
When it comes to one of the most well organized, well trained, well funded militaries and intelligence organizations in the world .... I don't think anyone can surprise them with a major attack.
The Israelis knew this would happen .... because they know how they will respond.
- Thousands injured, almost a thousand murdered and hundreds kidnapped including women and children sounds like "the plan" to you? I'm not saying they're saints but how can you say a country would go to war as a PR move just to see their already antagonized enemies suffer? This attack was planned for about a year with the help of Iran on a shabbat, alongside a rocket barrage to keep soldiers from mobilizing and joining in to help, but you honestly believe Israel were the ones who planned this.
starving Palestinians out like this, will force them into the desperate move attacking Israel. Israel can therefore declare them as terrorists and shoot them indiscriminately. I hope that I’m wrong and this isn’t a tactical decision
- The Egyptian border is still open. Food can still get in.
Exactly, what did they think they'll achieve but even more resentment and hate?
- I honestly don't know, but Neteyahu is one of the most evil people in the 21st century, so I have very little hope for the innocent Palestinians caught in the middle of this.
  Some people are bandying about some statistic out there of a majority of Palestinians approving of Hamas. First of all, that was before this happened, and secondly, approval is not the same as aid. The vast majority of them had nothing to do with this and are caught in the middle. Now at least 500 are dead in this current conflict.
- They expect to get the hostages back.
The intent is to make it impossible for there to be another attack.
- Yep

So they will kill all people in Gaza?

I always thought that is what Israel wanted anyway.
- Hamas sets up military operations in a civilian building by force - the civilians have no say in this and get killed if they protest Hamas then uses that building to launch rockets, store ammunition, communication stations How the fuck should Israel proceed to neutralize those sites? Because what they do is:
  “Roof knocking”: Hitting the building’s roof with a small explosive to announce that it will fall in 15 minutes (see video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teevWpXlRZY example from yesterday) Automatic SMS and phone calls impacted areas warning and urging to evacuate Precision strikes that make the building fall vertically with minimal damage to the areas As a result, civilians (and potentially military personnel) are given a chance to evacuate while ammunition stashes, rocket launching stations etc stay in the building and are destroyed.
  To be honest, I’m shocked those protocols are still used after Hamas’s attack. I would absolutely not be surprised of these measures stopped.
  The anti-Israel don’t care that Israel is bending over backwards to minimize human suffering while fighting a decades long war against people who are deliberately trying to kill their children.
  Remember how upset they are when Israel does something 100 percent defensive, like build a security fence to keep out an endless stream of suicide bombers?
  This isn’t good-faith criticism.
  These people hate Israel for this that they works be applauding other countries for. And we all know why
So, it's an unattended concentration camp, and they hope everyone dies there.
- Has been for decades...
  It's over 2 million in like 140 sq miles...
  They don't have their own police, don't get to vote (Israel won't let them have an election), aren't in control of their own utilities, don't have freedom of movement, and get treated as subhuman.
  And Israel wants everyone to believe there's no reason for Palestinians to hate Israel's government.
  Put people in those conditions and refuse to treat them as humans, and some of them are going to stop acting like humans. It's basically sociology and would happen to any population in those conditions
If history's taught us anything, it's that the good guys always indiscriminately target civilians!
Well, killing some and hope the rest will try to flee to Egypt at which point Gaza is free for the taking.
Or well, maybe, they hope that in desperation people will try to rush the blockade, at which point they just kill them. Hamas awful actions have given Israel plenty of ammunition to keep everyone else on the world stage away for a while, no matter what they do now.
- Hamas awful actions
  Didn't happen in a vacuum...
  There's reasons people are willing to die in a war they have no chance of winning.
  It's stand up for your people or watch them essentially be tortured slowly to death.
No, and that was never the plan. Had it been Israel has far more efficient ways of doing it. The goal is to put the pressure on Hamas, two million people worth of pressure. You can claim you are fighting for freedom until stomachs start grumbling. Then Israel hopes Palestinians will turn on Hamas and the whole thing will be over or at least at a different stage where something can be done without wiping the whole place.
- naive

So if it's a total blockade now, what was it before? (hint: it was also a blockade then, has been since 2007)

It's saddening to see Israel's military (which is not Israel) attack civilians and civilian infrastructure in retaliation for Hamas (which is not Palestine) having attacked civilians and civilian infrastructure- this is all a shit-show of punishing the innocent to get the other side to back down and it will never end.

They were allowing them access to electricity and food supplies before
- Other nation on land you claim
  box them in, stop food shipments
  Wait, that kinda reminds me of something recent...
It was a blockade looking for components that could be used to make rockets. Goods could (and did) come through after inspection.
Well it's one thing to blockade a region during a war/conflict (which even has a border with Egypt) and killing and raping hundreds of festival attendees...
- Yep, very bad moves by Hamas troops to do that. Doesn't take away from Israel's war crimes and genocide.
- Eventually you have to stop letting your enemy make the rules, and defend yourself.
  Well, it looks to me like both sides are convinced that unless they punish the other side, the other side will keep on doing what they've been doing. Acting on that belief only provides evidence for the other side for the case that the other will stop at nothing but the other's extinction, that the only rational course of action is yet more offensive action until the other side finally capitulates- ...which seems unlikely to ever happen so long as Palestine remains the accepted battlefield for the proxy war that this conflict is.
  Yes, Hamas commits war crimes by using civilian infra Yes, Israel commits war crimes by bombing it The context of this exchange of atrocities is... the occupation of Gaza, which meets too many of the measures of a genocide. At this point, neither Israel nor Hamas are defending themselves, they're cooperating in the genocide of Palestinians The broader context of that is that Israel:Palestine is a proxy conflict between their respective allies, who are just fine watching Palestine burn

- And the answer is all of them because they either don't care or are allied with/support one side or the other.
Fortunately the war criminals are now being blockaded and bombed to shit and are about to be invaded
- ~~Fortunately~~ the largest prison in the world is now being blockaded and bombed to shit and is about to be invaded.
- Yeah, by the war criminals on the other side.
  Also, if you think people murdering each other is "fortunate" you're some low level scum in my eyes.
- 2.9k comments in 3 months.
  and I thought I used this too much. Go touch some grass.

Making one giant concentration camp.

Huh.

To be fair, it already was a giant concentration camp. That's the reason they got uppity in the first place.

So, a minister of a Jewish state compares another nation to animals and decides that genocide is the proper solution Ironic.gif

The Israeli government has been waiting for an excuse to do this for years. Finally, they'll get the land and homes of all the people who were there before them and the Western world will largely support them. It's disgusting.
- Everytime there is a war with Israel this is said. But yet it never happens.. Israel control the area for a short time and gives it back when things calm down
It sounds bad, but it makes sense when you look at things through a historical context.
Well. . . it sounds bad because it is bad.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_punishment

Are you suggesting that Israel should be bound by international law to not impose collective punishment, while the state of Palestine is killing and kidnapping civilians and clearly not hindered by it? Palestine is a hostile nation that just launched a bloody attack on civilians. Aren't the effects of a war typically felt by all members of a state participating in it?
- Yes of course.
  If a nation states justification for violating such laws is that a terrorist organization is doing too, then they fucked up completely.
- No.I do believe Israel should respect international law. This doesn't mean I approve of what Hamas did.
- Israel as the occupying power had already been breaking international law so a bit more won’t make much difference.

I am not sure they understand what total means. Hamas didn't get those rockets from Israel - hense there must be an unmonitored way in from Egypt that Hamas controls.

If there is, all food comes now from Hamas = Palestinians support Hamas more. If that gets cut, videos of mass starvation will eventually pull other Muslim countries into the conflict.

That’s what Israel wants. They want Iran to get pulled in and then further justify asking the West for more military aid and “support” to launch another “war” in it’s “defense”. Fucking terrorist regime in power unfortunately for Palestinians and Israelis.
- Iran literally funds terrorists and advocates for the destruction of Israel
  Israel could invade and conquer Iran tomorrow and they have not.
  Iran's military is as much a bungling shit-show as Iraq, Russia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. There is no universe in which Israel needs US help to shatter Iran.
  Last time Iran even got close to enriching weapons-grade uranium, Israel launched airstrikes and flattened the plant, completely uncontested and without any reprisal from Iran, who knows they can't win.
Likely Israel is planning to gain control of the border with Egypt to cut off anything coming in that way, and either annexing that border strip outright or maintaining control of the border will be part of the peace terms.
Irrespective of stopping the movement of new arms and missiles into Gaza, more hawkish israelis would probably salivate over being able to shut down all trade into Gaza every time they shoot off missiles, especially since every time they do it weakens confidence in being able to trade into Gaza, raising the costs for anyone trying to import anything into Gaza, and lowering the sell value of any goods made in Gaza.

Israel has announced a “total” blockade of the already besieged Gaza Strip, including a ban on food and water, after Hamas carried out the biggest attack on the country in decades.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday authorities would cut electricity and block the entry of food and fuel as part of “a complete siege” on Hamas-run Gaza, where about 2.3 million people live in one of the most densely populated areas in the world.

der crossing points; the third is controlled by Egypt.

“We are putting a complete siege on Gaza … No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed,” Gallant said in a video statement.

Israel’s chief military spokesperson, Daniel Hagari, told reporters on Monday that Israel has “control” of its communities following Saturday’s mass incursion of Hamas fighters into its territory.

Hagari said there had been some isolated incidents on Monday morning, but that “at this stage, there is no fighting in the communities”.

He added that “there might still be terrorists in the region”.

Israeli tanks and drones were guarding openings in the fence to prevent more infiltrations, Hagari said, adding that 15 of 24 border communities had been evacuated, with the rest expected to be evacuated over the next 24 hours.

Earlier, Hamas spokesperson Abdel-Latif al-Qanoua told The Associated Press news agency that the group’s fighters continued to battle outside Gaza and had captured more Israelis as recently as Monday morning.

He said the group aims to free all Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, which in the past has agreed to lopsided exchange deals in which it released large numbers of prisoners for individual captives or even the remains of soldiers.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

People want revolutionaries under constant oppression and inequality to fight a "fair, modern war" against one of the most well-funded militaries in the region.

Are people stupid? Palestine, unlike Ukraine, doesn't have the privilege of fighting an equal war.

One could say just fight against those doing the oppression then. Its not just cowardly to hunt and kill innocent civilians, it's inhumane. The same point goes to both sides. Israelis killing hamas terrorists is a-OK from me. Collateral damage not so. Hamas terrorists killing innocent civilians is just as bad. This isn't even collateral damage, they intentionally sought them out to send a message.
- Hamas will use Palestinian corpses to bury Israel, and Bibi is undoubtedly salivating at the chance to wipe the Palestinians out because he's, ironically, seemingly after a Jewish ethnostate.
  Israel conveniently has a forever enemy in Hamas, who give no shits about Palestine. It's all a big game and everyone loses.
Ukraine absolutely fought the Russian advance to a standstill in an "equal war." They are currently retaking ground in an "equal war."
- Nobody said "white privilege", you conservative snowflake. The simple fact is that revolutions are messy, even completely justified ones.

I'm sure this will in no way backfire.

It'll escalate the conflict...
Which is what Israels government wants...
So yeah, it's not going to backfire, it's going to do exactly what they want.
Same way using the IDF to make sure Palestinians couldn't fight back against "settlers" just escalated the conflict. If Israel wanted peace, that backfired. But they don't want peace. They want a war so they can use it as an excuse to expand their borders again.
- I want to disagree so badly...but I can't.

All those who condemned Hamas for attacking civilians, I wonder if they will have the same energy when Israel starves civilians?

Yes. I condemn both. And I don't play the "which is worse" game. They are both unacceptable evils. Israel needs to stop this immediately and, at the very least, negotiate a peace if not some sort of solution to the whole issue (hopefully including at least some right of return) and Hamas needs to return the hostages.
You don't need to pick a side when both sides are committing atrocities.
- One of these “sides” could unilaterally peacefully end the conflict. For the other side choosing “peace” just means submitting to living under an occupying force as eternal second class citizens. insert mlk quote here.
- The hostages are probably one of the things keeping some areas in Gaza secure. Was a effective move to gather as many as you can, not only as bargaining chips but strategically.
  Hamaz will use them as human shields in important positions, Isreal gives little fucks about dead Palestinians, thing changes when it's your own civilians you bomb.
  They should not give them back if they want to be able to operate a little further and prepare for a possible ground assault by Israel.
  That's what their soldiers are more effective in, no sense in getting bombed without aa.
FAFO. I'm not sure what else was going to happen.
- Israel has been fucking around for decades. Yet i bet you dont use that cop out for the attack on the weekend.

Welp, whatever goodwill and sympathy I had for Israel just went poof. Less than 24 hours too, gotta be a record for them.

Funny, I feel the same way about Palestine. Their army of terrorists was raping young women next to their dead civilian friends at a concert promoting peace and love, while slaughtering unarmed edm kids trying to escape in the hundreds:
Others were captured and bound and kidnapped. “I saw videos with a male getting held by a group of Arab kids. Like, they’re like 16, 17,” one survivor recalled. “They’re kids, but they’re young men already, and they’re holding this guy, and he looks as his girlfriend is being mounted on a bike and driven away from him. God knows what she’s going to experience … Women have been raped at the area of the rave next to their friends bodies, dead bodies.”
Several of these rape victims appear to have been later executed. Others were taken to Gaza. In photographs released online, you can see several paraded through the city’s streets, blood gushing from between their legs.
One survivor who’d returned to the scene later in the day to look for his friends spoke, in a breaking voice, of what he’d seen. Of the bodies, mainly of young women, lying cold and mutilated. Of scantily clad corpses, many of whom appeared to have been shot at point-blank. Of cars, perforated by bullets or blown up by grenades.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/israel-music-festival-massacre-eyewitness-account
Closing the borders and shutting off supplies provided by the nation they attacked is enough to make you lose sympathy for victims of such acts? Your sense of moral equivalence seems broken.
- Maybe don't have your "festival for peace and love" in an apartheid state about 5km from one of the most contested borders in the world? Not saying what Hamas did was right but goddamn was that some ignorant yuppie shit to have a music festival right there

So, normal occupation stuff then? They have very little drinking water already.

Having access to a few litres for drinking, cooking and minimal hygiene is still a far stretch away from having no access to clean water.
Typical water use in developed countries ranges between 100 litres and 400 litres a day per person, but you can get by temporarily with as little as 15 litres per person and day. https://www.who.int/teams/environment-climate-change-and-health/water-sanitation-and-health/environmental-health-in-emergencies/humanitarian-emergencies
Fully cutting the water supply like announced is a severe escalation of the humanitarian situation and beyond the "normal occupation stuff."
- Waaaaay beyond normal. 100% agree with you on that. This is a cruel punishment and target the whole people because their goal is to kill everyone of them and take the rest of the land, probably move into Lebanon after that. Sad fuxking sad.

This conflict has been bringing out the absolute worst in people. Lemmy is acting more civil than reddit, but fuck.. it's not great. I see why this subject is avoided.

I think it's important to keep in mind that Hamas is completely capable - at any moment - of surrendering, releasing all hostages, de-militarizing, and vowing to never again attempt to kill civilians. The water and electricity would come right back on.

Doing so would save the lives of countless Palestinian civilians, and if they had any care for their lives at all, they would do this immediately.

People here don't seem to understand this. All they think is "Israel bad". Also, instead of cheering for Hamas when they drag dead civilians through town, they could, you know, not do that.
- Starving innocents is bad, yes. Abuse breeds abuse, it’s no wonder the Palestinian reaction considering everything the Israeli government has done to them.
  Not to mention the Israeli military is the reason Hamas is where it is, funding it in the 80s and 90s because they’re easier to hate than the moderate coalition.
- Also, instead of cheering for Hamas when they drag dead civilians through town, they could, you know, not do that.
  Who is doing that?
Submitting to an oppressive government is not peace.
- By definition peace is when war and violence stop, the kinds of governments involved are irrelevant.
You can male the same argument the other way around. Why don't we stick to what's already international war, and that attacking civilians is forbidden? This seems a form of collective punishment as well.
surrendering, releasing all hostages, de-militarizing,
And allow the genocide of Palestine to continue without opposition? Why should they simply lay down and die? Because fighting back is distasteful?
- I must have missed the lesson in school about how the way to resist oppression is to rape and murder hundreds of innocent civilians at a festival.
  It's not as if there were a lack of military targets around. If Hamas had strictly focused on attacking military bases and infrastructure, I might be able to be sympathetic. At the least, that would fall under the umbrella of meaningful resistance. Instead, their sole aim was to murder as many Jews as possible. Kidnapping civilians and threatening to murder them on a livestream is absolutely indefensible.
- Then so be it and fight without complaint.
I think it's important to keep in mind that Israel is completely capable - at any moment - of surrendering, giving right of return, de-militarizing, opening all borders, creating a single government that fairly represents all in the area, giving reparations, and vowing to never again attempt to kill civilians. The water and electricity would come right back on.
Doing so would save the lives of countless Palestinian civilians, and if they had any care for their lives at all, they would do this immediately.
I think it's important to keep in mind that the Zionist entity is completely capable - at any moment - of surrendering, releasing all hostages, de-militarizing, and vowing to never again attempt to kill civilians.
- You know as well as I do that a de-militarized Israel would very rapidly no longer exist.
  If you recall, Gaza was occupied until 2005, when the IDF withdrew as a sign of goodwill towards peace. Gazans then elected Hamas and started shooting rockets at Israeli cities.
  If you're supporting a side that's threatening to livestream the murder of hostages, you need to take a very long look in the mirror.
"Look what you're making us do."
- Ah, I forgot, Hamas simply had to rape a bunch of women and butcher 200 people at a festival. That's just what righteous resistance looks like.
  Or perhaps childish quips aren't actually useful in a productive conversation, who knows

I'm not sure if this is better or worse than what I was expecting,

I was worried about the Israelis just storming right back in there and going full Srebenica over this.

Hopefully the blockade can be lifted soon. Since it appears Israel is at war against the government of Gaza (Hamas), there's a difficult line to walk where a complete and lasting victory is achieved while avoiding humanitarian disaster. A quick victory will hopefully avoid the most extremes of humanitarian disaster. In the long term I hope nearby Arab states help provide a peaceful solution to the problem.

While i undestand the strategic motivation and can see why fuels and electricity are considered necessary to weaken the military capeabilities of Hamas cutting the supply of drinking water and food is not excuseable.
Especially without access to water it only takes a few days until people are dying from dehydration and it is impossible to treat wounded. Also the substitution of clean drinking water with water from tainted sources can quickly lead to an epidemic of cholera and other deadly diseases that would be devastating and impossible to contain given the current situation.
- Is there a reasonably safe way to provide water during the type of military operation that's coming? Pipes have historically been used to smuggle weapons into Gaza, even the water pipes, so Israel is likely trying to contain that source of weapons during the upcoming operation.

There's been a lot of heated commentary on this subject, and some genuinely good analysis https://digressionsimpressions.substack.com/p/israels-strategic-cul-de-sac

I thought this was helpful and insightful, so sharing it here

This is barbaric, and no one with any sense of morality should be supporting the zionists any more.

In very related news the United States Government still suporting Isn'treal

Scum Israelis

Hopefully they fully level it completely. Gaza shouldn't be allowed to exist anymore.

I honestly think the two state compromise is no longer possible (something I strongly supported); we can all thank Hamas for that; they never wanted it either. They wanted Israel completely gone, and now instead it will be Gaza that gets wiped off the map.

I've no idea what will become of the civilians, but it likely won't be good.

Edit: For those down voting me, why? Do you honestly see a better path out of this mess that doesn't involve Hamas being utterly destroyed? Plus, none of the surrounding countries want Palestinian refugees because that means taking in Hamas sympathizers (did ya'll forget what happened in Jordan as well?!). Wherever they go, they bring chaos.

You are wondering about downvotes? You are calling for the total destruction of Gaza which inadvertly murders or displaces over 2 million people.
Also putting the sole blame for the impossibility of a two state solution on Hamas ignores how Israel built more and more illegal settlemants on occupied territory to deny territory to a two state solution. Also the recent ramp up in IDF backed settler violence, the storming of the Al-Aqsua Mosque by Jewish fundamentalists and the genocidal rhetoric of Netanyahus coalition partners makes it evident that Israel didn't want a two state solution long before the Hamas attack.
- No. If you don't like it, block me.
🖕

Well, FAFO

It's now the FO stage

War is basically just a literal dick measuring contest between two sides overcompensating.