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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   27717 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 13, 2024

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Going just by raw numbers, in the back-and-forth of action and reaction, it really looks a lot like the Israelis are constantly escalating and the Palestinians are constantly deescalating - there is not a single instance of Palestinians killing Israelis that was not followed by Israelis killing more Palestinians, and no single instance of Israelis killing Palestinians that was not followed by Palestinians killing fewer Israelis.

This just seems like a fundamentally dishonest framing. Hamas fires dozens if not hundreds of rockets at Israel every year. These rockets are slapdash affairs with no guidance system to speak of, and the Iron Dome renders most (but not all) of them ineffective. Without the Iron Dome, it's obvious that Israel's casualties would be an order of magnitude higher at least.

Describing Hamas firing hundreds of rockets at Israel (most of which miss or are shot down before they can hurt anyone) as Palestine "de-escalating" the conflict - I mean, really? If you repeatedly shoot at someone, the fact that you're a lousy shot and/or they were wearing full body armour does nothing to exculpate you.

Yeah, as I already said in several parallel responses I'm already regretting reaching for that piece of polemic hyperbole. I don't actually believe that Hamas was de-escalating; I just think that any claim that Israel deescalated or showed restraint looks ridiculous on the face of it, in the "I only broke one arm of the angry toddler" way.

Palestinians arent angry toddlers and i bet they'd not appreciate being compared to such. you give them cover they never asked for and deny them even the limited agency they are able to exercise. that the palestinians are failing to escalate the conflict is a sore point for them, not a deliberate act of restraint. they were calling for hezbollah and jordan and syria to strike the jews at their moment of weakness on oct 7, not celebrating the completion of their objective.

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