Is What's Happening in Gaza a Genocide? Experts Weigh In

[David__77]

More than 11,000 people have been killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, after a deadly Hamas attack prompted Israel to declare war and begin a military offensive along the densely-populated strip of land more than 2 million people call home.

…

Raz Segal, the program director of genocide studies at Stockton University, concretely says it is a “textbook case of genocide.” Segal believes that Israeli forces are completing three genocidal acts, including, “killing, causing serious bodily harm, and measures calculated to bring about the destruction of the group.” He points to the mass levels of destruction and total siege of basic necessities—like water, food, fuel, and medical supplies—as evidence.
He says Israeli leaders expressed “explicit, clear, and direct statements of intent,” pointing to Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s statement during an Oct. 13 press conference. In his statement, Herzog said, “It’s an entire nation that is out there that’s responsible. It’s not true, this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true,” Herzog said. “They could have risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d'etat.” (Herzog later said that he is not holding the civilians of Gaza responsible for keeping Hamas in political power, when asked to clarify by a journalist at the same press conference.) Segal says that this language conflates all Palestinians as “an enemy population,” which could help prove intent.

…

David Simon, director of the genocide studies program at Yale University, says that Israel has only explicitly said they want to exterminate Hamas, and has not directly stated intent to “destroy a religious, ethnic or racial group.” Simon says it's possible a court could conclude that either Hamas or some elements of the Israel Defense Force (IDF) could be found guilty of committing an act of genocide, but “it's certainly not textbook in that connecting the intent to destroy ethnic group as such is difficult.”

https://time.com/6334409/is-whats-happening-gaza-genocide-experts/

[Chainfire]

1. When the experts are arguing the "fine points" of wheter an action is genocide, it may be time to

demand an end to the killing.

[leftstreet]

6. +1

[Mosby]

2. Sounds bad.

Nt

[RainWalker]

3. Agreed

[redqueen]

4. K&R

[electric_blue68]

5. Still not sure, but I do think Netanyahu has allowed too much indiscrimenent killing, and bombing...

However this Herzog official does sound genocidal! Horrific.

That being said Hamas, and Hezbollah need to be destroyed as long as they're calling for the elimination of Israel.

I will.look at the progressional graphic on Genocide posted.

"the river to the sea" aspirational to living together in harmony?
Yeah, Riiiiiight.
^
just in case


Oh, and how is a generally unarmed Gazan population supposed to put down a well armed Hamas.

[BlueTsunami2018]

7. It's not a genocide.

For fuck’s sake, people who want to kill everyone don’t give warnings, make precision attacks or escort you to safety. They just kill you.

Israel could very well carpet bomb the entire place and turn it into the proverbial parking lot if they were looking to kill everyone there.

It’s ridiculous hyperbole to call this a genocide.

The people who want genocide are Hamas and their radical Islamic ilk.

If Hamas would release the hostages and stop their endless rocket attacks, this could end. I wonder why the people suffering the most from this aren’t revolting against them and calling for these very things. I wonder why we never hear these calls from the protesters.

All this is happening because of Hamas, you’d think the people they’re using would turn against them.

[Chainfire]

8. As noted above, there are people who study and teach genocide that disagree with you.

I don't think that it is either ridiculous or hyperbole. I will let the experts decide the definition. If what is happening in Gaza is not genocide, it is genocide's next door neighbor. I think that part of the problem with some people is that they believe that genocide against the Palestinians is justified.

The war needs to stop.

[yagotme]

10. I think you are righter (more correct) than you realize.

If what is happening in Gaza is not genocide, it is genocide's next door neighbor.

Hamas's goal is to destroy all of Israel. Hamas is Israel's next door neighbor...

[Chainfire]

11. cute...

[yagotme]

12. You're welcome.

[BlueTsunami2018]

14. Whether it stops or not is entirely up to Hamas.

But they’re a gutless, cowardly group of scumbags who actively want their “own” people killed to try to save their craven asses.

They can release the hostages and stop their attacks to get a ceasefire. But they really don’t want a ceasefire and even if there was one, they wouldn’t learn their lesson or change their ways. There’s no negotiating with people like that. They’re religiously insane fanatics bent on wiping out the country of Israel and all of the people.

They need to be eliminated by any means necessary.

[malaise]

9. Duh!

Nothing justifies this response.

[EX500rider]

13. Opinion: I'm an expert in urban warfare. Israel is upholding the laws of war

John Spencer is chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute (MWI) at West Point, codirector of MWI’s Urban Warfare Project and host of the “Urban Warfare Project Podcast.” He served for 25 years as an infantry soldier, which included two combat tours in Iraq. He is the author of the book “Connected Soldiers: Life, Leadership, and Social Connection in Modern War” and co-author of “Understanding Urban Warfare.”

Opinion: I’m an expert in urban warfare. Israel is upholding the laws of war

https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/07/opinions/israel-hamas-gaza-not-war-crimes-spencer/index.html

All war is hell. All war is killing and destruction, and historically civilians are inordinately the innocent victims of wars. Urban warfare is a unique type of hell not just for soldiers, who face assaults from a million windows or deep tunnels below them, but especially for civilians. Noncombatants have accounted for 90% of casualties per international humanitarian experts in the modern wars that have occurred in populated urban areas such as Iraq’s Mosul and Syria’s Raqqa, even when a Western power like the United States is leading or supporting the campaign.

The destruction and suffering, as awful as they are, don’t automatically constitute war crimes – otherwise, nearly any military action in a populated area would violate the laws of armed conflict, rules distilled from a complicated patchwork of international treaties, court rulings and historic conventions. Scenes of devastation, like Israel’s strikes on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza earlier this week, quickly spark accusations that Israel is engaging in war crimes, such as indiscriminately killing civilians and engaging in revenge attacks. But war crimes must be assessed on evidence and the standards of armed conflict, not a quick glimpse at the harrowing aftermath of an attack.

Hamas forces indisputably violated multiple laws of war on October 7 in taking Israelis hostage and raping, torturing and directly targeting civilians, as well continuing to attack Israeli population centers with rockets. Years of intelligence assessments and media reports have shown that Hamas also commits war crimes by using human shields for its weapons and command centers and by purposely putting military capabilities in protected sites like hospitals, mosques and schools.

On the other hand, nothing I have seen shows that the Israel Defense Forces are not following the laws of wars in Gaza, particularly when the charges that the IDF is committing war crimes so often come too quickly for there to have been an examination of the factors that determine whether an attack, and the resulting civilian casualties, are lawful. The factors that need to be assessed are the major dimensions of the most commonly agreed to international humanitarian law principles: military necessity, proportionality, distinction, humanity and honor.