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Israel-Gaza Megathread #1

This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.

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The pro Palestine argument is that Israel is colonial power and that Palestine deserves freedom. The chant is “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

In the minds of most of these people, it is Israel that is keeping the Palestinians down. Yet Hamas, the regime in charge of Gaza, hasn’t held an election since 2006. They are an autocratic dictatorship. Why is the focus solely on Israel as “oppressors” and not the shitty, despotic regime in charge of Gaza?

I have no sympathy for the terrorists, but are you sure Israel would have let them become richer? Sometimes they are targeting civilian infrastructures like power plants, it does not help when you try to build a richer country. A rich enemy is more dangerous, it's a risk Israel is perhaps not ready to take.

Does Israel have the same level of attacks on the West Bank?

I don't know, but the West bank is not controlled by Hamas so you can't put it on them. Moreover, from Wikipedia:

According to a 2013 World Bank report, Israeli restrictions hinder Palestinian economic development in Area C of the West Bank. A 2013 World Bank report calculates that, if the Interim Agreement was respected and restrictions lifted, a few key industries alone would produce US$2.2 billion per annum more (or 23% of 2011 Palestinian GDP) and reduce by some US$800 million (50%) the Palestinian Authority's deficit; the employment would increase by 35%.

I don't know if this report is biased.

Yep, Hamas could have chosen to tread the path that Singapore took, instead they preferred to lob rockets into Israel rather than improve the living standards of their own citizens, or even allow a different group who would have focused on that to take power. At this point I absolutely support Total Hamas Death, not just for what they have done to the Israelis, but also what they have done to their own citizens: Kill Hamas, Behead Hamas, Roundhouse kick Hamas...

Hamas could have chosen to tread the path that Singapore took,

No they couldn't.

Where's the talented and capable han chinese minority that were an essential part of Singapore's success? Where's the massive advantage of being an incredibly important maritime trading post for centuries? Furthermore, Singapore didn't need a strategy to deal with an equivalent to Israel, a well supplied and technologically advanced occupation force that actively works to sabotage their economy and control trade. Criticising Palestine for not pursuing a strategy that required substantially more genetic capital than they had on hand is farcical reasoning - one may as well criticise a poor person for not investing several million dollars in stocks and living off the dividends.

And while I'm not exactly on Hamas' side, from their perspective they are doing everything they can to improve the living standards of their people. They view the current situation as an Israeli strategy of wiping them out gradually overtime - there's a need for violent resistance or their people just stop existing.