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.
Will Al-Shifa be the turning point, one way or another? Or will nothing change? If the IDF takes the hospital, and there are tunnels there, will anyone change their tune, or will it be "Well, the IDF was telling the truth this one time, but they still shouldn't have killed babies"? If there are no tunnels, will Israel back off and end their campaign in shame (their own and the US intelligence community's), or will they try to brazen it out and assume no real net change in total hatred for them? If Hamas blows the tunnels and collapses the area to avoid giving Israel evidence, will anyone accept that it wasn't an Israeli bomb?
Or am I overestimating the importance of this one battle and the massive accompanying news coverage?
If Hamas blows the tunnels and collapses the area to avoid giving Israel evidence, will anyone accept that it wasn't an Israeli bomb?
Yeah tons of people will. Polls show a large majority of Americans support Israel both in this conflict and in general. The Hamas supporters are louder but that's because they're mostly young, very online people who may one day be in charge but not for another 20 years or so. If Israel can't wrap this up by the 2040s then they might run into a PR problem. I wouldn't expect any particular incident to sway people much in either direction.
Al-Shifa being a military installation has been "priced in" for some time. Very little will change if Israeli claims turn out to be correct.
Frankly, finding tunnels isn't enough. If the IDF doesn't have dozens of geolocated photos showing Hamas munitions stockpiles trending on Twitter by 7:30AM EST, Israel is toast. The dying Palestinian babies are trending right now.
The tunnels have been known about for decades. It’s not news. So whether or not there’s something significant under that particular spot, nobody who’s following this region doesn’t know about the tunnels. So those who see this as self defense will continue to do so, and those who see it as provocation will continue.
Whether they find a torture chamber/military base combo pack, or they turn the stone over and all it says is "Peace on Earth;" I predict that IDF will claim the former while Hamas will claim the latter, no one supporting either side will care regardless.
Israel has already been caught faking evidence on official channels, repeatedly and blatantly. No one who supported Israel beforehand cared, nor should they. IDF forces will claim there were military installations under the hospital, they will fake it as aggressively as they need to. The people who want to believe the IDF will believe the IDF; and if they are presented with clear and convincing evidence that the IDF is lying they will say it doesn't matter.
Hamas' track record of honesty is...are we even going to try to address that point? No one who feels that the deaths of [x] number of innocent civilians isn't worth it is going to change their mind, regardless of what they find under there. Nothing they find under there will justify the murder of babies to get it, so therefore they probably won't find it anyway. It's a kind of ethos argumentation: any group bloodthirsty enough to kill children to achieve their military objective is untrustworthy enough to lie about why they killed the children.
It's the law of merited impossibility all the way around. One side says: it's worth killing those kids to get at that military installation, so there must be a military installation there. The other says, it's not worth killing those kids to get at any military installation, so there can't be a military installation there.
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Notes -
Will Al-Shifa be the turning point, one way or another? Or will nothing change? If the IDF takes the hospital, and there are tunnels there, will anyone change their tune, or will it be "Well, the IDF was telling the truth this one time, but they still shouldn't have killed babies"? If there are no tunnels, will Israel back off and end their campaign in shame (their own and the US intelligence community's), or will they try to brazen it out and assume no real net change in total hatred for them? If Hamas blows the tunnels and collapses the area to avoid giving Israel evidence, will anyone accept that it wasn't an Israeli bomb?
Or am I overestimating the importance of this one battle and the massive accompanying news coverage?
Yeah tons of people will. Polls show a large majority of Americans support Israel both in this conflict and in general. The Hamas supporters are louder but that's because they're mostly young, very online people who may one day be in charge but not for another 20 years or so. If Israel can't wrap this up by the 2040s then they might run into a PR problem. I wouldn't expect any particular incident to sway people much in either direction.
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Al-Shifa being a military installation has been "priced in" for some time. Very little will change if Israeli claims turn out to be correct.
Frankly, finding tunnels isn't enough. If the IDF doesn't have dozens of geolocated photos showing Hamas munitions stockpiles trending on Twitter by 7:30AM EST, Israel is toast. The dying Palestinian babies are trending right now.
More options
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The tunnels have been known about for decades. It’s not news. So whether or not there’s something significant under that particular spot, nobody who’s following this region doesn’t know about the tunnels. So those who see this as self defense will continue to do so, and those who see it as provocation will continue.
More options
Context Copy link
Whether they find a torture chamber/military base combo pack, or they turn the stone over and all it says is "Peace on Earth;" I predict that IDF will claim the former while Hamas will claim the latter, no one supporting either side will care regardless.
Israel has already been caught faking evidence on official channels, repeatedly and blatantly. No one who supported Israel beforehand cared, nor should they. IDF forces will claim there were military installations under the hospital, they will fake it as aggressively as they need to. The people who want to believe the IDF will believe the IDF; and if they are presented with clear and convincing evidence that the IDF is lying they will say it doesn't matter.
Hamas' track record of honesty is...are we even going to try to address that point? No one who feels that the deaths of [x] number of innocent civilians isn't worth it is going to change their mind, regardless of what they find under there. Nothing they find under there will justify the murder of babies to get it, so therefore they probably won't find it anyway. It's a kind of ethos argumentation: any group bloodthirsty enough to kill children to achieve their military objective is untrustworthy enough to lie about why they killed the children.
It's the law of merited impossibility all the way around. One side says: it's worth killing those kids to get at that military installation, so there must be a military installation there. The other says, it's not worth killing those kids to get at any military installation, so there can't be a military installation there.
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That is evidence in itself.
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