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Did you ignore the part of my post where I said that I accept those facts and think the Palestinians are morally in the right to do that? It is not just to defend yourself against justified self-defense.
I'd consider the Israeli retaliation to be a campaign of murder of civilians on the other side just the same (I mean, even without getting into the weeds of how much the civilians they kill when allegedly going after Hamas seem to be treated as happy accidents by them, we have concrete cases of Israeli soldiers sniping Palestinian women and children for sport).
Yes, in my opinion. (Also the ETA and a lot of other examples like that) I think I'm generally much more sympathetic to terrorism than the socially accepted median, and find the idea that civilians inherit no culpability for the actions that a state they elected, supported, voluntarily cheered for and in turn benefitted from to be distasteful and self-servingly promulgated by people who stand to benefit a great deal from such exculpation.
I'm slightly overwhelmed with the number of responses, but I think a lot of them bring up similar points (e.g. the "Israel right to take revenge in turn for Palestinian actions?" ones). Please look at them for detail.
This is only half of the argument, my friend. The reason (A) was given a label is because it was conjoined with (B): the IRA's tactics and objectives are morally comparable to those of Hamas. That would entail that the IRA maximizes civilian casualties on their own side tactically, targets primarily civilians on the other side, and has the death of all Englishmen as a persistent and publicly stated objective. I assume you don't assert those things but I could be mistaken.
Sorry, I didn't quite grasp the structure of the argument there. I don't know enough about the IRA to answer this with confidence, but my vague understanding is that a lot of the IRA bombings certainly looked like they were maximising English civilian deaths.
This is such an extreme claim about Hamas that I would want to see evidence from it, ideally not just consisting of opinions from pro-Israel sources - unless you stretch the definition so far that it applies to any case of "use civilian infrastructure for cover so you are harder to eradicate with anything short of omnicidal measures [which you figure your enemies won't take]", in which case this seems to cover Ukraine as well (a bridge that I imagine people who are going to argue for "American foreign policy is basically good" are not willing to cross).
Absolute bullshit on IRA maximizing deaths. IRA car bombings were violent and killed but the IRA never focused on civilians the way Hamas has. 60% of PIRA kills were security targets, compared to 70% civilian Israeli casualties on Oct 7 alone not to mention the intifadas which focused on killing civilians. To equivocate the two reverses causality: seeking evidence for IRA, moral victors, being as bloodthirsty as Hamas to give Hamas cover.
As for Hamas aiming to maximise its own kills of civilians for the purpose of making Israel look bad, you have automatically excluded any piece of evidence that contradicts that statement.
But here, evidence: https://www.jurist.org/commentary/2023/10/hamas-terror-attacks-and-international-law/ https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/hamas-tells-gaza-residents-stay-home-israel-ground-offensive-looms-2023-10-13/
https://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/press-releases/unrwa-condemns-placement-rockets-second-time-one-its-schools
There is PLENTY of evidence provided by non-Israeli sources of Hamas loading up schools and civilian areas with weapons and fighting within it. It is deliberate policy by Hamas to exploit lawfare to cry foul when Israel strikes back, yet Hamas places all its military infrastructure in built environment. Furthermore the Gaza strip is not an urban metropolis there sre plenty of open spaces as csn be seen by the first search o google maps. Your refusal to consider the evidence is not because the evidence doesn't exist, its because your first order principle is Hamas has no choice and you are working backwards from there.
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This claim of fact isn't central to my point and if you don't accept it I withdraw it. The point is this:
So do you want to (validly) argue that the Palestinian response is moral? If so do you accept that you would have to agree to either (1) or (2), and if so, which do you agree to?
If you claim, for example, that (A) the IRA is generally justified in how it prosecutes its campaign and (B) the IRA's methods and objectives are morally comparable to those of Hamas, then we have something to talk about. But if there is no such claim you would make about any organization in history other than Hamas, then that would be notable.
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I read your post and you mentioned "vile and ineffectual resistance" but I don't see where you mentioned genocide as a strategic objective. That is to say Hamas and a critical mass of the Palestinian citizens want all of the Jews dead as an ultimate objective, whether they have a state or not. You assent to that as a matter of fact and think it is a morally defensible position?
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