To understand the escalation in Lebanon, we must confront what Israelis are thinking

[Gunnersforthecup]

Rather good and well-informed article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/sep/28/escalation-lebanon-israelis-benjamin-netanyahu-hamas-hezbollah

"It is almost certainly true that the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has political reasons for prolonging the conflict. But while a majority of Israelis would probably like a different prime minister, many don’t want to stop the war until they think that both Hamas and more particularly Hezbollah – which has tied its actions directly to Gaza – have been neutralised as serious threats.

And that is because behind both groups they see an Iran that is dedicated to their destruction...

This isn’t simply about the US and its western allies. This time the Gulf states – and most of all Saudi Arabia – are going to be key actors. The prize of normalisation with Israel has not disappeared. But the price has gone up. It will certainly include the effective containment of Iran and its allies – and an answer to real, not simply declarative, Palestinian statehood. And this time we need to make it stick. Otherwise the pain we are seeing now will not simply not go away. It will get a lot worse."

Sadly, there are some terrorist supporters on here. Awful.

Yes it is pointless discussing this with you. I agree we should stop. It's depressing to hear justifications for the slaughter of civilians after all we've seen in the last year and I'd rather not.

I don't think every man in Gaza is a terrorist, no. That's IDF propaganda.

Exactly. Because they only have the lens of European colonialism to view this (israel is a setter colony bullshit). Or try to use the black/brown vs white lens even though it doesn't apply at all in this situation. Yeah, there's racism in this conflict but it's not based on skin colour
Just lazy and ignorant really

The ip address will be traceable.

Clearly out and out support for terrorism. Illegal in lots of countries.

PP wasn‘t wrong though? If an area is targeted because of the terrorists there and civilians get caught up in it, it’s awful, but you can’t say that it was the civilians who were the target.

Saying most adults in Gaza are terrorists or helping terrorists is hate speech.

You can when you target civilians. Refugee camps, schools, homes. They're not getting caught up in it. They're getting bombed in their beds deliberately.

@Lalaloveya ,

‘You can when you target civilians. Refugee camps, schools, homes. They're not getting caught up in it. They're getting bombed in their beds deliberately.’

You have to ask why Nasrallah and his cronies were having a meeting in Beirut in a densely populated civilian area, under a building occupied by civilians, rather than deep in one of their tunnels under the desert.

IDF isn't saying anything of the sort 🤦🏻‍♀️ Neither is anyone on here. This is getting pathetic now. I feel like you're trying to pretend someone upthread has said so in the knowledge that other people reading this will gladly accept what you're implying without double-checking.

Just accept you've been using incorrect terminology to support your incredibly biased narrative and move on. It's ok to admit you're wrong. No one will think worse of you.

Something else people in general and @Lalaloveya specifically are in denial about is the fact that there isn't a clear distinction between "terrorists" and "civilians". There are not big camps where the terrorists are living, doing terrorist things, leaving everywhere else populated exclusively with innocent pregnant women and pregnant children. The terrorists don't just "live among" the population of Gaza, they are a huge part of the population of Gaza. They live with wives, children, elderly parents, carrying out their occupations in their own homes. If your husband is dealing drugs in your house, where your kids live, that is a drug dealer's house, where drug dealing happens. It's not a totally innocent location because people who don't deal drugs also live there, and you can't be surprised when the police come knocking.

Well, they "might" not be aiming to kill innocent civilians (although some of the rhetoric from members of the Israeli government appears to contradict your statement), they are.
Statistics from the conflicts both in Gaza, the west Bank and Lebanon. They are dated August 2024. Obviously, the numbers would have grown.
With Gaza's death toll over 40,000, here's the conflict by numbers | AP News

Their counts earlier in the conflict included every man. I haven't looked at them lately so maybe they've revised that strategy. They also round up hundreds of civilian men and torture, rape and murder some of them. That suggests they view all the men as terrorists. Same as when they shot the escaped Israeli hostages on sight. It sort of suggests that any man is a target.

Your point is a way to justify the deaths of civilians. They weren't targeted, we just knowingly killed tens of thousands of them. Oopsy. So there's no blame and no accountability.

Children are being intentionally shot dead. That's one example of targeting civilians.

Literally the only thing I've been trying to do during this unnecessarily long discussion has been to encourage you to use more accurate and less divisive terminology. Your words of choice are designed to stir up further hatred which, again, is completely unnecessary in a conflict and debate already so incredibly full of hatred.

At NO point have I justified any killing of anyone as that is not what was being discussed. You're once again seemingly trying to twist my words. Why? What are you getting out of it?

It is. I was listening to Radio 4 program "any answers" where listeners expressed their views on what is happening in Gaza and Lebanon. It was comforting to hear that 95% of callers were appalled by the actions of the Israeli government. The testimony of a lady whose father served during the British mandate was very moving.

Callers will be screened. If there is a particular viewpoint radio 4 would like aired it is entirely within their control

Please could you clarify what was disturbing about my rhetoric? I assume you're not just blindly agreeing with the poster, so please let me know what I said that's so disturbing.

I'm not stirring up hate by pointing out that bombing civilians is targeting civilians. Maybe you don't realise that what you're saying is extremely offensive to some people. 15000 children are dead but no one is to blame for it because you're splitting hairs over language. They were not targeted, despite the army knowing that they were there and killing them anyway. And in many cases there were no terrorists there. Or the children who were shot. Were they not targeted either? What was that? Bad aim? Unfortunate? Sad? What rubbish.

My comment about justification, which I've already explained, is that when you say civilians aren't being targeted the inference is they're just an unfortunate byproduct of the conflict and no one is to blame. I don't accept that.

Edited for clarity.

Tbh I’d take the BBC position on events against their editorial stake

As I would The Guardian, DM or any press

Always filter through a what is their position lens

@Lalaloveya

You are stirring up hatred with your word choice. Civilians aren't targeted, they're killed because it's a war being faught against terrorists hiding among civilians.

People are being killed because of terrorists living among them. I'm not sure why you feel like you need to blame Israel 100% for absolutely everything that happens. I assume you also somehow blame them for Islam Hijazi's brutal murder?

If you had said in this thread that far too many innocent people are suffering, dying etc I would have agreed with you. If you had said that Israel have been too heavy-handed, I would have agreed with you. If you had said this war needs to end, that Netanyahu needs to step down and be held accountable, that Ben Gvir etc are racist, that violent illegal settlers are terrorists I would have agreed with you. But you didn't. You decided to continue to claim that civilians are targeted. I'm obviously not going to just accept your choice of words because they're inaccurate, hateful and dangerous.

I honestly feel like I live in an alternative universe to a lot of posters on here, posters who seem to think that the solution is to just keep letting terrorists terrorise everything and everyone around them, including Palestinians.

Care to elaborate what you mean by " particular viewpoint"?
Sympathies for the Israelis Palestinian conflict (yougov.co.uk)

There you go that YouGov chart does not tally with 95% of callers does it?

It would have been 1/3 of the callers

@Auvergne63

Your posts are always informed, humane and rational. And they deal with the reality which is brutal and has no easy answers.

We'll have to agree to disagree then won't we. Tea and sympathy is super and there's a lot of it when it comes to discourse about this conflict but I think a supposed democratic and civilised state needs to be held accountable when it commits war crimes. And deliberately bombing places where displaced people are living is part of that. I won't say "target" as it seems to trigger you.

I assume you also somehow blame them for Islam Hijazi's brutal murder?
More bizarre assumptions from you. Please stop.

I honestly feel like I live in an alternative universe to a lot of posters on here
Same.

What I find disturbing is that this level of " collateral" damage is fine in your eyes. Neither Hamas or the Israeli government care about the innocents. Both have shown this by their actions; both illustrate this quote by O R Melling:
"Where there is no respect for life, there you will find evil."