Hamas don’t want peace

I see. It's a fair engagement only for those 3000+ years old. Good luck then.

Oh well. Pointless engagement then.

@Feelingathomenow Sorry, I have two few little grey cells.
I don't remember what happened 3000 years ago. Just asked my grandma, she doesn't remember either.

The little research I could do with my few cells just showed I wasn't alive then.

I tell you what, why don’t you do a little research, exercise those little grey cells and maybe you could reach a conclusion why 3000 years ago just might be relevant to this conversation and why 100,000 years ago really isn’t.

Why stop of 3000? Why not go back to 100 000 years ago?

It doesn’t really matter what you agree with. Just because one side has better equipment doesn’t make it not a war. If it makes you feel better we could call it self defence

Chomsky - the man who defended the right to holocaust denial? The anti Zionist?

Maybe first there needs to be recognition of the harm that has been visited on the Jewish people over the last 3000 years initiated by the people’s of the surrounding areas.

What Hamas did on October 7 was abhorrent and they clearly do not have the best interests of Palestinians in mind. But, if you think there was peace in Gaza prior to 7/10 you are utterly deluded.

If Israel and her supporters do not recognise the harm they have done to Palestinians over the last 100+ years it's incredibly unlikely that there will be peace.

And it certainly is a war. People die in wars. How bizarre you try and claim otherwise.
Not bizarre.
As Chomsky said, "Wanton killing of innocent civilians is terrorism, not a war against terrorism" or "Israel uses sophisticated attack jets and naval vessels to bomb densely-crowded refugee camps, schools, apartment blocks, mosques, and slums to attack a population that has no air force, no air defence, no navy, no heavy weapons, no artillery units, no mechanized armour, no command in control, no army and calls it a war".
I fully agree with him.
.

I think Hamas are in a different place to where the relevant Northern Irish parties were. I assume people have the intelligence to see the difference.

What are Hamas’s demands likely to be? What will Israel want? If Hamas get what they want this time, they will just keep going the same.

Maybe Egypt is the route through which aid can be brought into the country easily?

And @Auvergne63 it certainly is a war. People die in wars. How bizarre you try and claim otherwise.

Maybe, if the Palestinian people aren’t powerful enough to get rid of Hamas, the other Arab nations should have worked with Israel to get rid of Hamas )and Hezbollah) to keep the region stable.

The suggestions like negotiate just don’t work as Hamas refuse to negotiate and actually negotiating with Terrorists creates a bad precedent.

States have always negotiated with them, it's standard and entirely normal. It IS precedent.

We all know Hamas are shite, but Netenyahu has also refused to negotiate. Both sides have asked for things they know the other won't accede to. There was a Guardian article last week, by an Israeli insider, describing just that.

They are not dying; they are being murdered, by any means available to the IDF.
This isn't a war. A war is a state of armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country. Gaza isn't a country.
Of course, Hamas orchestrated 07/10, helped by the Israeli government who ignored the warnings and by the IDF taking 6 hours, yes 6 hours, to respond to the attack. I won't mention the Hannibal directive. How many lives could have been saved if only the warnings had been heeded and the response immediate?
Certain groups would lap up the propaganda.
The irony!
The result is a massive increase in anti semitism.
And Islamophobia.
no one here has been able to state a viable alternative response by Israel.
I, and many others, have but it is ignored.

negotiating with terrorists sets a bad precedent

Tell that to Northern Ireland @Feelingathomenow

Don't know where to begin... So, bin Laden orchestrated 9/11 to remove Saddam, right? He must have known how the US would respond. And whoever killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand is responsible for WWI and the application of chemical weapons...That's the logic you apply to 7Oct23. I disagree.

Hamas bears responsibility for their acts. Israel is a sovereign country that bears full responsibility for their actions. Please, don't infantilise Israel saying Hamas is responsible for the deaths of Palestinian civilians. Their wellbeing is actually Israel's responisibility as an occupier.

As for negotiating with terrorists, this is what brought peace to NI. If the US refused to deal with terrorists, the state of Israel would not exist either.

And there were plenty of people who were criticising Israel from the outset so don’t try and change that history.
I am not trying to change history, of course there were people criticising Israel from the outset I am talking about the international community as a whole not individuals.

The suggestions like negotiate just don’t work as Hamas refuse to negotiate and actually negotiating with Terrorists creates a bad precedent.
It was through negotiation that some of the hostages were released though. Many nations have had to negotiate with terrorists in the past, that precedent has been set time and again.

So what is your suggestion? What should Israel have done?
Stop breaking international law would be a good starting point. Allow independent journalists in, properly facilitate the distribution of humanitarian aid, facilitate proper access to medical help, stop bombing refugee camps, stop displacing over a million of people over and over. Actually try and limit civilian casualties.

Does it really matter what anyone thinks Israel should have done? Are you suddenly going to go shit yeah you're right declaring that you are going to eliminate everything and create Nakba 2023 is wrong, they should deffo have done it your way! If you don't think that their plan to elimate everything was wrong then you are on a whole different plane to those who think there is never an excuse to eliminate everything when you are talking about people and their lives. It's different value systems that are never going to see eye to eye.

The suggestions like negotiate just don’t work as Hamas refuse to negotiate and actually negotiating with Terrorists creates a bad precedent. Anyone familiar with the repeated attacks, genocide and exile of Jews over millennia will be able to understand why they reacted so decisively. Maybe if Hamas didn’t hide behind civilians it might have been better.

And there were plenty of people who were criticising Israel from the outset so don’t try and change that history.

So what is your suggestion? What should Israel have done?

I don't think initially many objected to Israel responding and looking to secure the safe release of hostages but it is the how and the disproportionality of that response that people have an issue with. The limiting of humanitarian aid, the indiscriminate bombings, the no independent overserves or journalists, the huge civilian death toll, the over 16,000 kids killed. The complete destruction of Gaza, the displacement of 90% of the population, the targeting and killing of humanitarian aid workers and journalists and so on. The concern that genocide is happening. The genocidal and dehumanising statements being a feature of the current government in Israel. That is where people have an issue

None of that is a spun narrative on social media.

no one here has been able to state a viable alternative response by Israel.
That is simply not true there has been many alternatives suggested. I honestly think anyone who thinks Israel had no other option are deep in Israeli propaganda tbh

No one is saying people aren’t dying in Gaza. So no pulling the wool over anyone’s eyes over that. It is about whether the war is justified and whether Hamas orchestrated the attacks of Oct 7 knowing Israel would respond and that they could use that response by coupling it with the narrative spun on social media, knowing that certain groups would lap up the propaganda. The result is a massive increase in anti semitism- that was the aim of the Oct 7 attacks and subsequent social media flooding.
no one here has been able to state a viable alternative response by Israel.

They have undoubtedly used and continue to use social media and the mainstream media - both are full of useful idiots who will buy a narrative and repeat mantras unquestioningly.
They rely on people to follow narratives which people do time and time again. They are recruiting unwitting terrorist supporters in their propaganda wars. People so desperate to fit in they don’t even question the narrative they are supporting. you can’t really blame them social media has been cultivating a culture of unthinking compliance for years. It’s not surprising when that culture is used by terrorists.

So it is all down to Hamas propaganda and social media and mainstream media following their narrative oh and useful idiots believing it because they want to fit in? whatever that means.
Amazing the power they wield over the world view. They have sucked us all in, the EU, individual Nation States, the UN, the ICJ, the ICC, they even have medical professionals coming out of Gaza making stuff up? Are you also suggesting Israel's side is the one to be believed? Pull the other one it has bells on

Why do you think Hamas perpetrated 07/10? What do you think they hoped to accomplish?

It's my opinion that, after 15 years of living under siege, with daily raids by the Israelis, that they expected a brutal and extremely disproportionate response, which is exactly what they got. I am of the opinion that they wanted the world to realise just how brutal the Israelis actually are.

This is not about the people who live in Gaza their dreadful situation is at Hamas’s hands.

And, let's not forget, in the hands of the Israelis. They could, if they chose, at least try to abide by the international norms and laws of war, instead of deliberately targetting civilians. The majority of the dead have been women and children.

If Russia bombed a vaccination centre and killed loads of mothers and children, you wouldn't be blaming Zelensky.

The people living in Gaza were in a dire situation long before Hamas ( boosted by Netanyahu) existed . The people in the West Bank where there is no Hamas are being killed by the IDF. Hamas were allowed to fill a vacuum that was created by the west in allowing the mistreatment of the Palestinians by the Israelis . Hamas don’t exist when nearly a million Palestinians were thrown out of their homes , and tens of thousands slaughtered. In the West Bank last year before October 7th 35 children were killed by the IDF the youngest of whom was two which Israel called a mistake. It’s not Hamas that allow the settlers to throw Palestinians out of there homes and act with impunity . Stop pretending it’s about Hamas ! You know just as well as I do it’s not but it’s the line that you’ll continually use to justify genocide to yourself !

They have undoubtedly used and continue to use social media and the mainstream media - both are full of useful idiots who will buy a narrative and repeat mantras unquestioningly.

If only there was a simple answer to this. Like maybe Israel could let in International media and independent observers like everybody has been asking them to do for the past year plus. If the whole world could see what Israel are doing in Gaza and see for themselves that the 'narrative' is completely different to the one they have been seeing on social media then surely the Palestinian people would lose the support of the 'useful idiots' as you put it.

Instead Israel have banned foreign journalists, blow up Palestinian journalists, is banning International NGOs, have killed more aid workers than in any other crisis and are trying to shut down the largest aid agency that operates there.