naraburns nihil supernum
6mo ago
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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.
More on the hospital blast. NYTimes Visual Investigations is now issuing a debunk on the supposed “lynchpin evidence” in the American and Israeli intelligence finding. A thread from NYT’s Aric Toler (previously Bellingcat) —
Israeli and U.S. intelligence officials believe that a projectile captured on videos shortly before the Ahli Arab Hospital explosion was a Palestinian rocket. nytimes Visual Investigations found that this object was launched from Israel, and likely unrelated to the deadly blast.
An IDF spokesperson went on CNN and the BBC with a printed-out screenshot from an Al Jazeera livestream showing this projectile, claiming it was the rocket that hit the hospital. We also believe that American officials are incorrectly assessing this to be a Palestinian rocket
this projectile launch from the north, south, east and west. By drawing lines of perspective, three of which can be seen here, we assessed that this project was launched from near the Israeli city of Nahal Oz.
Three days before the blast, a 155mm illumination shell, commonly used by the Israeli military and not in use by Palestinian militias, was fired into the Al-Ahli Hospital. Hospital administrators said that they had received warnings from the IDF telling them to evacuate.
Our analysis does not answer what actually did cause the blast or who was responsible, but it does undercut one of the most-publicized pieces of evidence used by both American and Israeli officials.
I hope we will eventually find out what caused the blast. This NYTimes article might wind up confirming my bias that we shouldn’t trust the immediate Israeli/American intel.* Interestingly, the NYTimes conclusion is based on a relatively obscure twitter thread by some random researcher on the 19th. So a +1 for twitter, I guess.
[edit + wording change*] small update, Le Monde agrees with the NYT assessment of the projectile.
It seems pretty clear it wasn't THAT rocket which caused the explosion at the hospital; that was a malfunctioning rocket that blew up in mid-air. I don't share the NYTs confidence that THAT rocket was Israeli; their analysis seems to have enough uncertainty to place it on either side of the border. Anyway, I'm sure if a Tamir had hit the hospital, Hamas would be parading the pieces through the streets by now.
Their "debunk" is nonsensical, however. They claim their analysis contradicts a US intelligence assessment that the video showed a Palestinian rocket undergoing catastrophic motor failure and then crashing onto hospital grounds. But if you follow the claim, not only is the US intelligence assessment just an anonymous source, but it fails to specify that it was these particular videos they analyzed.
Didn't CNN, the AP, and the WSJ, et al. all rely on this video as a "key piece of evidence" for their conclusion? And this video was cited by IDF spokesman in media interviews.
A key video in the analysis came shortly before 7 p.m. local time, when the Arabic-language news channel Al Jazeera was airing live coverage of the Gaza City skyline. As a correspondent speaks, the camera pans to zoom in on a volley of rockets being fired from the ground nearby.
Didn't CNN, the AP, and the WSJ, et al. all rely on this video as a "key piece of evidence" for their conclusion?
So one media company says one thing and others says another? So what? Some angles of the hospital explosion show two explosions; it seems likely one was this rocket and the other the hospital explosion, and they were probably unrelated (I can't rule out weird crap where a large piece of rocket and fuel managed to get as far as the hospital, but it seems unlikely). But there was a lot of ordnance in the air that night so showing me one rocket which wasn't involved doesn't move the needle much. It's like claiming a bite wasn't caused by a dog because you found one particular dog whose teeth don't match.
And this video was cited by IDF spokesman in media interviews.
As a correspondent speaks, the camera pans to zoom in on a volley of rockets being fired from the ground nearby.
This is clearly not the same launch; the rocket in the disputed video is singular, not part of a volley.
SecureSignals
Civilization is simply a geno-memetic-techno-capital machine
The_Nybbler 6mo ago·Edited 6mo ago
Is there a different video you would say provides the best evidence that the explosion was due to a rocket failure? From the beginning I found that story hard to believe, but I considered the now-debunked video the best evidence for it (like all the news orgs etc). Without that, the recording released by Israel seems to be the strongest evidence... And that's not saying much.
In any case, certain people here have absolutely jumped the gun by accusing the press of being "stenographers for terrorism." The situation is murkier than that, and if anything the Press has helped Israel's narrative by appealing to a now-debunked piece of evidence to all draw "high-confidence" conclusions...
The press (including the most 'reputable' outlets like the BBC) spent the first day after the hospital explosion credulously repeating "Israeli strike on hospital kills 550" (or even 800 in some cases).
It is now clear that even if Israel caused the explosion, which seems very much a debatable matter still, it didn't kill anywhere near the 500-800 people that Hamas' health ministry claimed.
There is no way this event would have been front page news, knowing what we know now. "Parking Lot bombed, 30 killed" doesn't have the same ring as "Hospital bombed, 500 killed".
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Notes -
More on the hospital blast. NYTimes Visual Investigations is now issuing a debunk on the supposed “lynchpin evidence” in the American and Israeli intelligence finding. A thread from NYT’s Aric Toler (previously Bellingcat) —
The NYTimes article is archived here: https://archive.ph/ngGpq
I hope we will eventually find out what caused the blast. This NYTimes article might wind up confirming my bias that we shouldn’t trust the immediate Israeli/American intel.* Interestingly, the NYTimes conclusion is based on a relatively obscure twitter thread by some random researcher on the 19th. So a +1 for twitter, I guess.
[edit + wording change*] small update, Le Monde agrees with the NYT assessment of the projectile.
It seems pretty clear it wasn't THAT rocket which caused the explosion at the hospital; that was a malfunctioning rocket that blew up in mid-air. I don't share the NYTs confidence that THAT rocket was Israeli; their analysis seems to have enough uncertainty to place it on either side of the border. Anyway, I'm sure if a Tamir had hit the hospital, Hamas would be parading the pieces through the streets by now.
Their "debunk" is nonsensical, however. They claim their analysis contradicts a US intelligence assessment that the video showed a Palestinian rocket undergoing catastrophic motor failure and then crashing onto hospital grounds. But if you follow the claim, not only is the US intelligence assessment just an anonymous source, but it fails to specify that it was these particular videos they analyzed.
Didn't CNN, the AP, and the WSJ, et al. all rely on this video as a "key piece of evidence" for their conclusion? And this video was cited by IDF spokesman in media interviews.
So one media company says one thing and others says another? So what? Some angles of the hospital explosion show two explosions; it seems likely one was this rocket and the other the hospital explosion, and they were probably unrelated (I can't rule out weird crap where a large piece of rocket and fuel managed to get as far as the hospital, but it seems unlikely). But there was a lot of ordnance in the air that night so showing me one rocket which wasn't involved doesn't move the needle much. It's like claiming a bite wasn't caused by a dog because you found one particular dog whose teeth don't match.
This is clearly not the same launch; the rocket in the disputed video is singular, not part of a volley.
Is there a different video you would say provides the best evidence that the explosion was due to a rocket failure? From the beginning I found that story hard to believe, but I considered the now-debunked video the best evidence for it (like all the news orgs etc). Without that, the recording released by Israel seems to be the strongest evidence... And that's not saying much.
In any case, certain people here have absolutely jumped the gun by accusing the press of being "stenographers for terrorism." The situation is murkier than that, and if anything the Press has helped Israel's narrative by appealing to a now-debunked piece of evidence to all draw "high-confidence" conclusions...
The press (including the most 'reputable' outlets like the BBC) spent the first day after the hospital explosion credulously repeating "Israeli strike on hospital kills 550" (or even 800 in some cases).
It is now clear that even if Israel caused the explosion, which seems very much a debatable matter still, it didn't kill anywhere near the 500-800 people that Hamas' health ministry claimed.
There is no way this event would have been front page news, knowing what we know now. "Parking Lot bombed, 30 killed" doesn't have the same ring as "Hospital bombed, 500 killed".
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