Feminism, rape, and Israel. Content warning.

[ArthurbellaScott]

https://unherd.com/2023/11/metoo-unless-youre-a-jew/

I skipped parts of this article, specifically the first person account.

The rest of it I think is an important read.

Murder is a premeditated and intentional act. If it is not intentional it is not murder. In a court of Law it may at most be manslaughter

Sentencing in court is discretionary according to the nature and severity of the crime. Murders or killings are not always equivalent at all. Judges retain the right to extend sentencing - sometimes to life meaning life - for certain types of act. Acts which involve intentional sadism and brutality carry far higher sentences because people instinctively recognise the difference and have a sense of moral differentiation when certain lines have bven crossed.

Hamas used " small weapons" to disembowel one woman, and to cut out a baby from another's womb - before shooting it. If you cannot recognise the nature of this then there is little point in trying to convince you otherwise.

There is no doubt that Hamas’ attack was a war crime and you are correct the key is intent. The issue, as I read it, is whether or not the means of killing civilians matters when such a war crime is being committed.

I am not invoking the Dresden Defence. To do so, I would have to be arguing that the taking of civilian lives that is “undesired, unintended, but unavoidable” is equivalent to the deliberate, coordinated and planned taking of civilian lives:

“The notion that this Nazi defendant was trying to make—that the deliberate and purposeful killing of civilians was equal to the taking of civilian lives that is undesired, unintended and unavoidable—was absolutely rejected. Those are completely two different things. And that is the essence of civilization: to distinguish between those two.” - Dresden Defense

I am saying that deliberate, coordinated and planned taking of civilian lives is equivalent no matter the means used to kill civilians. Some of the IDF attacks are alleged to have been deliberate and purposeful
e.g. the incident where it is alleged that an IDF tank shelled wounded hospital patients in their beds in Al Shifa hospital at close range killing them. Also with no warning. There are cases of alleged incidents like these being referred to the ICC for investigation.

This is true and as well as the suffering of civilian victims deliberately and purposefully killed, courts will also look at how many victims the war criminal on trial killed. As well as increasing sentences for acts of brutality, sadism, torture, rape, they also increase sentences for acts that result in the death of dozens or hundreds or thousands of civilians in one pull of a trigger. In all cases they consider the age of the civilian victims. Purposefully causing the deaths of children and babies will result in higher sentences too.

The reason I say there isn’t much difference though is because, take your example raping, disembowling a pregnant woman that is enough by itself to carry a life sentence with no possibility of parole. The same if the alleged tank incident is true, pulling that trigger and splattering bits of a dozen wounded hospital patients into chunks of flesh, some of them children, is also enough to carry a life sentence with no possibility of parole.

There is a line of a war crime that once anyone crosses it, it’s a life sentence. They are all criminals imprisoned for the maximum sentence. So there is no point arguing which criminal is nicer or more moral in my opinion. It won’t change their sentence.

The laws for war crimes and the ICC are international, so you can’t really apply concepts of English law or English courts in regards to murder/manslaughter.

'The same if the alleged tank incident ' alleged.
Again using a hospital as a shield is a war crime.
What I don't understand is why pro Palestinians didn't condemn the attack by Hamas and demand they return the hostages and give themselves up.
None of this helps the Palestinians who Hamas are willing and happy to martyr for their cause women, children the elderly and all.

Yes, it’s alleged at this point as it is referred to the ICC for investigation along with other alleged war crimes.

Israel could refer their allegation to the ICC that Hamas was using Al Shifa as a human shield and military operations command centre if they chose to join the ICC, but so far they have refused because to join the ICC means you accept their decisions as binding. They are likely to use their own nation’s Supreme Court as the justice system of choice and their anti-terror legislation to prosecute Hamas war criminals which is probably why they were debating expanding the death penalty the other day.

However, war crimes are a bit complex. Even if it is proven that Hamas used the hospital as a human shield and military operations command centre, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the tank incident, if also true, was not a war crime too. When an enemy is illegally using civilian infrastructure, there are still legal requirements such as to try and avoid civilian deaths and to only return fire proportionally, to not open fire preemptively and so on.

The ICC will have to determine all the facts once the investigations are completed.

This is tortuous. Could you clarify your base line position.

Do you accept the right of the state of Israel to exist? And do you consider Hamas a terrorist organisation?

This is tortuous. Could you clarify your base line position.

What has the labyrinthine process of how external groups decide what is or is not a war crime, got to do with someone's "base line"?

However good or bad the process it is meant to be applied equally to any group / armed force, whatever their religious or political beliefs.

Do you accept the right of the state of Israel to exist? And do you consider Hamas a terrorist organisation?

Whatever the answer to this question is by anyone of this thread, is immaterial in relation to how war crimes are prosecuted.

However, if you feel this question is the filter as to how anyone can contribute to this thread, that you should say so.

I'm posting this article even though it is extremely upsetting and distressing to read, but it indicates that even when you might think something is an open and shut case, the legal procedure is anything but straight forward.

Strongly suggest not reading it, unless you are interested in the process of gathering of evidence and what is or is not accepted by a court.

Sexual Violence Evidence Against Hamas Is Mounting, but the Road to Court Is Still Long
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-22/ty-article-magazine/.premium/sexual-assault-evidence-against-hamas-is-mounting-but-the-road-to-court-is-still-long/0000018b-f6bb-dafe-a18f-f7fb0a570000

Article behind a paywall but can be read here https://archive.ph/iYirr

The Palestinian hate on here is as appalling as anti semitism or accusations of minimising Jewish victims.

Palestinian women - oppressed, without rights, confined to home
Palestinians - voted in Hamas (another debate) - thus asked for it
All Pro Palestinian marches - by default pro Hamas and anti Israel

Israel is talking about releasing 150 Palestinian women and children - is noone asking why they were held hostage, pre Oct 7th, in the first place? Or that doesn't matter, cos they are Palestinian and must be to blame?

Is this hate not simply two sides of the same coin?

Also, the large women's rights organisations, children's orgs, human rights lawyers and activists etc, have been largely silent about the massacre of thousands of Palestinian women and children, c sections without anesthesia, babies dying in incubators due to no electricity. Condemnation has been few and far between and late, and especially missing on "international children's day". I think when it comes to this complex socio political conflict, there seems to be a silence for fear of backlash, losing jobs, roles etc, and the loudest voices have been of people, not organisations. All those voices shouting solidarity with women being forced to wear hijab for eg are silent about Palestinian women.

Both Jewish and Palestinian women have been let down.

'Israel is talking about releasing 150 Palestinian women and children - is noone asking why they were held hostage, pre Oct 7th, in the first place? Or that doesn't matter, cos they are Palestinian and must be to blame?'

Israel is releasing prisoners not hostages. They have been convicted of crimes. There's no hate of Palestinians just opposition to terrorists like Hamas. Hamas are responsible for their strategy and actions. They have exposed Palestinian women to this hell. It was not necessary.

They have been convicted of crimes.

This isn't true. Many are held by Israel under what is termed "administrative detention" - a practice that allows Israel to jail Palestinians indefinitely without charge or trial.

They have exposed Palestinian women to this hell. It was not necessary.

If you mean the Israeli bombardment of Gaza, many people, including hostage families, think this was not necessary. Not only not necessary but will have long term negative consequences for Israel and therefore Israelis.

The full list of prisoners I've seen include a wide range of crimes, including arson, carrying and using weapons, throwing bombs as well as stones and more minor things. Of course I don't know which precise prisoners will be released and I haven't gone through the whole list.

It's interesting that when they exchanged about 1000+ prisoners for the soldier Gilad Shalit they released the evil piece of work Yahya Sinwar in 2011. He went on to become Hamas leader responsible for planning the Oct attack.

This is not true - Israel is allowed to detain Palestinians for any reason, in an apartheid legal system different from Jewish citizens.

And yes - Palestinian hate is rife on mumsnet (again - Palestinian women are absent on streets, have no rights, etc) . I'm not going to sit here and take away from someone's experience of anti semitism on MN/the world, so don't minimise when someone is telling you there is Palestinian hate. It works both ways.

From B'Tselem

Administrative detention is incarceration without trial or charge, alleging that a person plans to commit a future offense. It has no time limit, and the evidence on which it is based is not disclosed. Israel employs this measure extensively and routinely, and has used it to hold thousands of Palestinians for lengthy periods of time. While detention orders are formally reviewed, this is merely a semblance of judicial oversight, as detainees cannot reasonably mount a defense against undisclosed allegations. Nevertheless, courts uphold the vast majority of orders.

Report on administrative detentions and use of violence and torture

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/11/israel-opt-horrifying-cases-of-torture-and-degrading-treatment-of-palestinian-detainees-amid-spike-in-arbitrary-arrests/

A huge number of these are children - note

That’s a tricky one, Chaitales. The comment about women on the streets was actually made in defence of the Palestinian population currently suffering.
I was disgusted at the acclaim and celebration when tortured women’s bodies were paraded in the streets by Hamas, and referred to that as evidence that Hamas aren’t a tiny terrorist minority unsupported by the population, but are the accepted representatives of the population. In my view it legitimises Israel’s response- they are at war with that population, not just the terrorist leaders, and in war civilians suffer too.

A PP pointed out that women probably weren’t part of that crowd, and that on this thread we are lamenting the suffering of women.

Where do you stand, @Chaitales? Are the women complicit in the atrocity Hamas plotted and therefore share in their fate and consequences, or are they marginalised and deserving protection from the repercussions on their militant, barbaric menfolk?

It’s a bit Schroedinger’s cat.

I realise that’s a massive oversimplification, but for ease of expression- Israel suffered a barbaric crime.

Now everyone is suffering.

Cross post- I’ll read your article now @Chaitales

It's a tricky one and there is no easy answer. Don't want to derail this thread which is about women but to answer your q-

Where do you stand, @Chaitales? Are the women complicit in the atrocity Hamas plotted and therefore share in their fate and consequences, or are they marginalised and deserving protection from the repercussions on their militant, barbaric menfolk?

The starting point for this context for me would be the militant, barbaric Israeili government and military tactics that not just forced millions from their homes and made them refugees in their own countries, but continued an apartheid system of oppression, continuous land grab and indiscriminate murder (did anyone protest the murder of Shireen Abu Akleh in cold blood while she was wearing a press vest?) for the last 75 years, and led to creation and upholding of another militant barbaric organisation. Netanyahu has himself on many occasions talked about Upholding Hamas - https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-10-20/ty-article-opinion/.premium/a-brief-history-of-the-netanyahu-hamas-alliance/0000018b-47d9-d242-abef-57ff1be90000. Netanyahu and Hamas are both the same with different faces. Palestine suffered and has been suffering a barbaric crime, except its largely ignored by the world's media, and women are suffering.

So my point would be that women face injustice and abuse from all sides, and in this particular conflict, both Israeili and Palestinian women have been paying the price and largely ignored.

I think the baseline is to divert attention away from the intended focus of the thread of the sexual abuse of Israeli women by Hamas terrorists.

I felt the discussions were in line with the thread but derailed by the media opening line tactic of "do you condemn Hamas" in order to divert from a nuanced discussion of geopolitics in the region.

The starting point for this context for me would be the militant, barbaric Israeili government and military

See I think that’s where the difference lies in positions.

The starting point for me is Hamas’s attack on Oct 7th. Never before have I come across an atrocity where people were so focused on the ‘context’ and understanding’ for the perpetrators. All barbarity, all of the world’s worst atrocities have ‘context’. Those discussions can normally take place without using them as a mitigating factor for the horror that was committed. But for Oct 7th this has not happened. There was not even time to breathe or pause after the attacks, to absorb their horror. The first responses I heard in RL and online were ‘context’ and ‘understanding’ for the terrorists, if they were not actively rejoicing.

So here, uniquely, the focus was on understanding the perpetuators, not standing with the victims and their families.

And the ‘understanding’ and ‘context’ only goes one way. Those talking of understanding and context for hamas’s barbarity, never seem to apply that to Israel. Israel is not seen through the context of the history of the Jewish people. The current actions of Israel are not seen through the context of October 7th but through the ‘context’ of past Israeli government actions. This is an extraordinary act of giving Hamas a free pass, and an extraordinary act of never allowing Israel ‘context’.

I blame Hamas entirely for the Oct 7th attacks, nothing, nothing justifies or mitigates those and I hold firm to that, and primarily for the response they evoked. I look on astonished as Hamas, who deliberately committed acts of the worst type of utter depravity and cruelty to provoke an violent response from Israel, and yet seem held unaccountable by so many for the terrible ensuing suffering of both Israeli and Palestinian people. Even when, during the bombardment, they rejoice in the death and suffering of their own civilians l, as ‘martyrs’ even those those civilians never consented to be martyred. Still Israel is blamed and not Hamas. Hamas brought this on their people and they did it knowingly and are still applauding their suffering as ‘martyrs.

No if you go back to the start of the thread you will see @BabaBarrio starting the derail by denying there has been silence / muted responses, calling the article the thread is based on ‘rubbish’ and from there moving the thread to their own agenda.

There are many, many threads in line with @BabaBarrio ’s thinking. She could have posted there. But this one thread focusing Israeli women and their suffering was not allowed to stand without divergence. Just like the Oct 7 th horror was not allowed to stand without diverting people’s attention away from it.

I can’t envisage any context that ‘explains’ the October atrocity.

I remember the IRA having successful fundraising drives in the states. My US boyfriend was bemused by all the precautions we lived with in the UK. The removal of litter bins, and so on. He’d had no idea there were live, ongoing attacks on civilians.

9/11 was brutal, but didn’t require the hands on brutality of this October atrocity. This group of men willingly brutalised civilians, women and small children. Willingly, hands on. Far beyond the treatment of those detained by Israel- though that should also be handled differently.

One day soon, this will be weighed and measured. I wonder how it will fall.