To be horrified re the 2000+ children killed in Gaza.

I don’t understand you. I’ve explained my view of the justification for bombing Dresden. Civilian areas were bombed by all sides in WWII.

Berlin, Hamburg, Essen, Cologne etc, were all heavily bombed. Do you think that was wrong?

What’s your point?

Not a lot of news about what's happening wrt the Gazan [non-Hamas] civilians overnight - one of the Hamas 'masterminds' behind the 7/10 attack was reported dead yesterday good news in anyones book

Small amount of mainly food aid yesterday [8 trucks] some of the hold-up seems to be due to to all the lorries being un-packed and thoroughly searched before being allowed into Gaza - hopefully that will become a more efficient process

Yesterday was the day the fuel was supposed to run out for the hospital generators and the hospitals being closed. I can barely imagine what that's like and perhaps we don't need to have it spelt out as clearly awful situation

Facebook have been closing some large pro-Palestinian sites so less citizen journalism as well as less ranting/anti-semitism, journalists and aid workers presumably also effected by shortages/bombing/can't leave so making it difficult to report do their jobs

Likely less and less news in future

How was it justified, knowing what the civilian casualty numbers would be?
(Let's face it, even with the previous typo the numbers are still horrific).
It seems that you are suggesting civilian casualties were more ok then than they are now? I find that a tad odd.

Great post

Yep

@Coughingdodger there was some press coverage of the letter, which is where I saw it, and one of the signatories was interviewed on 5 Live
But measured, calm and careful lawyers don't generally make the most exciting media, so...
It's a very human, clear headed and empathetic interview with a powerful concluding message:
"International law puts humanity as sovereign over state...
It seems to me, particularly in times of great challenge and great stress, that ubuntu - 'I am, therefore you are' - and that there is an international law and it's a humanities law - are the means to navigate this terrible time.
Less rhetoric, less partisanship, more imagination. Bloody difficult. But that's what I think is important."

Sorry @WhileMyDishwasherGentlyWeeps you're correct about the final death toll

Still a significant loss of life

Dresden’s own municipal investigation after the war put the figure for deaths at 25,000.

I can’t say I find the bombing of Dresden very upsetting. It might have been towards the end of the war but it was still perfectly justified, particularly given the knowledge, or lack of it, among the Allies about the likely course of the following months. Allies who were, after all, still engaged in a fight with Nazism.

Oops typo 90k people died not 900000 - it was bad enough at that

Yes, I only learnt just how bad it was fairly recently.

I suppose my point really is that killing innocents is nothing new, and some people find their reasons to somehow justify some deaths more than others, based on their stand point. It's all beyond horrific, yet it continues. 😪

Dresden was awful 900000 people died in one night - think the Geneva Convention came about because of this and other events where large no of civilians died

Killing innocent civilians has always been absolutely barbaric, but has also been a (strategic) part of many battles/wars - just look at some of the WW2 bombing raids, carried out by both sides, Dresden and Coventry for example. Nobody would deny that National Socialism had to be eradicated but by any means necessary?

@Cockerdileteeth
Thank you.
These views should be more highlighted in the media.

@Cockerdileteeth
brilliant post.

Thank you for posting that @Cockerdileteeth

He talks utter sense.

I'm appalled by some of what I've read here.

Feeling horror, and compassion for the dead and the grieving, both Israeli and Palestinian, really doesn't equate to being anti-semitic or an apologist for terrorism as seems to be being suggested.

Lord Neuberger and 7 other leading and highly respected Jewish lawyers said it well in their open letter last week:

"Just as international law provides the means for categorising and criminalising the barbaric acts of Hamas, so too does it provide a framework for governing how Israel must respond. Any nation, conducting any armed conflict, no matter what the provocation, is bound in law to comply with all the “laws of war”. The laws of war are not pacifist. Rather, they are the opposite — they are an admission that there are occasions when war is necessary. They are designed to ensure that when war must be conducted, there are limits on what harm can be done to other human beings.

These laws apply irrespective of the level of outrageous conduct of an enemy and no
exceptions to those rules can be derived from the level of suffering caused by Hamas’s actions.

There are some aspects of Israel’s response that already cause significant concern. International law forbids sieges of civilian populations. Gaza is home to some 2mn fellow human beings (almost half of whom are children) and it would be a grave violation of international law to hold them under siege and while doing so deprive them of basic necessiƟes such as food and water. To be clear, collective punishment is prohibited by the laws of war. Equally, international law requires combatants to ensure minimum destruction to civilian life and infrastructure. An intent to cause indiscriminate damage, rather than behaving in a precise manner to minimise damage would, if established, constitute a grave violation of international law. In the conduct of any military campaign, politicians and commanders alike must be careful to ensure that their words do not imply to their troops that the laws of war can be disregarded, nor employ language whose effect is to dehumanise a civilian population.

In these early days when emotions are so understandably raw, many might be reluctant to remind Israel of its international law obligations, considering to do so insensitive or inappropriate. However, we disagree. In these times of pain and terror the notion that there are laws that we must all live by is challenging but essential. Jewish history teaches us that we cannot give up on them."

Not a psychotherapist but here's some ideas which might help

Total break from all SM and news in any form

Limit time thinking about it all to a specific half hour/day - not at bed-time

Choose a thought eg Enough to quickly insert into your thinking to bat away distressing thoughts/images

Do nice things to distract yourself eg walk on a stormy beach/woodland/bath

Keep busy

Give to aid peace/charity if you can afford it

Pray

It's all awful beyond words

Someone will probably have better advice

It is possible. I have IG but unrelated topics. No TV news reports. No Twitter

Of course it’s possible to read just words or hear radio analysis if being up to date is wanted.

Or avoid those if not. If you’ve just had a baby take care of your mh

How are people coping with seeing images of dead children and babies and sat lonely on a hospital bed. I have had to delete my Instagram. I am haunted by what I'm seeing so much so that I've become really gloomy. I'm trying to pull myself out of it but ultimately I think the human brain isn't built to witness such atrocities and then revert back to normal and go about their day. At least, I am feeling quite down (could be linked to my PNA and only recently having a baby)

if anyone has any good psychotherapy hacks on how to deal with what's going on, I would be very grateful for it.

20 years after it happened the final no of deaths in Rwandan genocide isn't known
500000-800000 is such a huge range - it's not an exact science. And that was over 100 days not 20

Some further facts attested by others incl Hamas

Gaza ran out of body bags in the first week
Cemeteries in Gaza were full by the end of the week
Mass graves of un-identified people

The difference between 4000 [Oxtam] and 6000 [Hamas] is in line with the range above

In 6 months time quibbling about whose right will look very different tho' doubtless for some will be still a source of dispute

When the war first started all the retrieved bodies were taken to the hospital morgue where they were counted by the Hamas Public Health official before the relatives took them away for burial, Fairly quickly this system became overwhelmed because relatives weren't collecting the bodies because they were either injured or dead themselves and more and more bodies were arriving. At one point babies and small children's bodies were being kept in ice-cream vans because there wasn't room in the morgue - don't know how this working out now with the lack of diesel. The morgues are full several bodies deep to over-flowing outside and 1 in 5 hospitals are no longer functioning

There are an unknown number of bodies still in the ruins - Hamas have been saying 1000 for sometime And the smell is understandably appalling throughout Gaza

So yeah not a well functioning set-up to record fatalities accurately and if you think Hamas is cynically inflating the figures for sympathy well who knows

You could do your own calculations.
No clean water - 2/3 days life left
Drinking dirty water - couple of weeks left? Not sure how long it takes to die from cholera
No medical supplies - variable, depending on injury
Bombs - well, instantaneous death, or possibly 2 weeks
No food - death within 4 weeks ish
No electricity - instant death for babies in incubators and those on life support

By my calculations the entire population will be dead in the next 3-4 weeks if something doesn't change. I probably missed some factors, but I'm sure you can reach a rough estimate of how many are dead/will die yourself.

You’re writing your own posts here.

I said what I meant. Your words are your own.

I do not doubt the October 7th atrocities.

Are you really telling me there is no footage of atrocities about what is happening in Palestine ? You must be ignoring it as Twitter and ig is full of it

I don’t doubt the atrocities on October 7th as there is footage to show it

People suffered those barbaric acts