naraburns nihil supernum
7mo ago
(text post)
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed 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.
How are people still so naive about Islamic extremists? After ISIS, The Taliban, Al Qaeda, 9/11, all of the terrorist attacks in Europe, etc you still have people in the West who refuse to believe Islamic extremists (which includes Hamas) could commit atrocities and are bad faith actors in this conflict.
Take for example the 40 babies fiasco, where many people (especially on the Left) were talking about war propaganda and how dumb people were for believing that Hamas would do that. Islamic extremists absolutely would do that! These same people who on the same day shot up a whole music festival, murdered innocent children and took toddlers as hostages! But we are supposed to believe killing babies is too far? There is almost no amount of savagery by Islamic extremists that should shock anyone at this point, especially after ISIS, but here we are I guess.
Or take for another example this hospital explosion. It's looking like Israel didn't do it based on new intelligence, but maybe they did. At this point it still is unclear. But one thing I know for sure is that you should not take the word of Hamas seriously on who did it. This is an organization who has put weapons under hospitals and schools and is known to not give a shit if their actions led to Palestinian children's deaths. In fact, they often try to make that happen as a weapon in the information war against. So yes, they absolutely would blow up their own hospital to make Israel look bad, so you shouldn't take the word of Islamic extremists seriously on this issue. Yet you have journalists and politicians in the West taking them at their word on this atrocity. Ironically, these are often some of the same kinds of people who make fun of the Right for falling for fake news and Russian disinformation.
I'm truly at a loss for words here with this conflict. How is this possible? Is there anything that can wake people up to this issue after all these years or is this just something we have to live with?
"Would do it" doesn't equal "did do it". For example, Saddam's soldiers did all kinds of messed up stuff, but Nayrah's testimony about babies taken from incubators was still made up.
Of course. But many of these same people also instantly believed that Israel bombed the hospital and took Hamas's word for it. But what annoys me is that they act like Hamas would never do such a thing, which is of course ridiculous (at least in my opinion) based on their track record on the same day based on videos that they uploaded.
Come on, if a particular building is bombed in Gaza nowadays I wouldn't need anyone's word to think it 99% likely that Israel did it, because Israel is definitely bombing other buildings there in retalion for the Hamas attacks.
I wouldn't need anyone's word to think it 99% likely that Israel did it
Roughly one third of Palestinian casualties in any given Israel-Hamas conflict are caused by rockets fired from the Gaza strip that fail in some way such as misfiring, crashing, prematurely detonating, coming apart in midair, and so on and so forth. Might be time to update those priors.
You are correct, I was mistaken. The Iron Dome appears to only intercept rockets on terminal approach to a populated area in Israel, it does not intercept rockets over Gaza.
if a particular building is bombed in Gaza nowadays I wouldn't need anyone's word to think it 99% likely that Israel did it
Even if the Bayesian statistics bear this out (I'm not quite as confident as you, but it is probably more likely than not), the better question is whether or not it's sufficient confidence to run "Israel bombs hospital, killing 500" headlines. In this case, it seems like it probably shouldn't have been.
A particular building, yes. That particular building, no. This is a group who has put bombs under schools and hospitals in the past. Everything they say should be taken with a massive grain of salt. Israel too, but these people are already skeptical of Israel but believe something said by a literal Islamist organization that is undoubtedly a terrorist group.
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Notes -
How are people still so naive about Islamic extremists? After ISIS, The Taliban, Al Qaeda, 9/11, all of the terrorist attacks in Europe, etc you still have people in the West who refuse to believe Islamic extremists (which includes Hamas) could commit atrocities and are bad faith actors in this conflict.
Take for example the 40 babies fiasco, where many people (especially on the Left) were talking about war propaganda and how dumb people were for believing that Hamas would do that. Islamic extremists absolutely would do that! These same people who on the same day shot up a whole music festival, murdered innocent children and took toddlers as hostages! But we are supposed to believe killing babies is too far? There is almost no amount of savagery by Islamic extremists that should shock anyone at this point, especially after ISIS, but here we are I guess.
Or take for another example this hospital explosion. It's looking like Israel didn't do it based on new intelligence, but maybe they did. At this point it still is unclear. But one thing I know for sure is that you should not take the word of Hamas seriously on who did it. This is an organization who has put weapons under hospitals and schools and is known to not give a shit if their actions led to Palestinian children's deaths. In fact, they often try to make that happen as a weapon in the information war against. So yes, they absolutely would blow up their own hospital to make Israel look bad, so you shouldn't take the word of Islamic extremists seriously on this issue. Yet you have journalists and politicians in the West taking them at their word on this atrocity. Ironically, these are often some of the same kinds of people who make fun of the Right for falling for fake news and Russian disinformation.
I'm truly at a loss for words here with this conflict. How is this possible? Is there anything that can wake people up to this issue after all these years or is this just something we have to live with?
"Would do it" doesn't equal "did do it". For example, Saddam's soldiers did all kinds of messed up stuff, but Nayrah's testimony about babies taken from incubators was still made up.
Of course. But many of these same people also instantly believed that Israel bombed the hospital and took Hamas's word for it. But what annoys me is that they act like Hamas would never do such a thing, which is of course ridiculous (at least in my opinion) based on their track record on the same day based on videos that they uploaded.
"took Hamas's word for it"
Come on, if a particular building is bombed in Gaza nowadays I wouldn't need anyone's word to think it 99% likely that Israel did it, because Israel is definitely bombing other buildings there in retalion for the Hamas attacks.
Roughly one third of Palestinian casualties in any given Israel-Hamas conflict are caused by rockets fired from the Gaza strip that fail in some way such as misfiring, crashing, prematurely detonating, coming apart in midair, and so on and so forth. Might be time to update those priors.
is Iron Dome actually intercepting rockets over Gaza? Your source does not mention Iron Dome (what makes Israel even less involved)
You are correct, I was mistaken. The Iron Dome appears to only intercept rockets on terminal approach to a populated area in Israel, it does not intercept rockets over Gaza.
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And a lot of the same people saying Israel didn't do it were saying that Israel would be 100% justified in doing so the day before.
There's nothing contradictory in those two arguments. A lot of people generally think Israel is excessively soft in how it handles Hamas.
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Even if the Bayesian statistics bear this out (I'm not quite as confident as you, but it is probably more likely than not), the better question is whether or not it's sufficient confidence to run "Israel bombs hospital, killing 500" headlines. In this case, it seems like it probably shouldn't have been.
Why not?
The US was way less trigger happy then the IDF during the war on terror and we Kandahar'd the hell out of some hospitals.
It was sensational as hell though; can't argue with that.
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A particular building, yes. That particular building, no. This is a group who has put bombs under schools and hospitals in the past. Everything they say should be taken with a massive grain of salt. Israel too, but these people are already skeptical of Israel but believe something said by a literal Islamist organization that is undoubtedly a terrorist group.
Yes, because journalists and politicians did that immediately when it happened! Where do you think the casualty numbers and this news came from?
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