SD on 10/10/2024 at 15:11
Hamas routinely uses ambulances for transport, just as it routinely sites command centres and rocket batteries in schools, hospitals and residential buildings. Until I know precisely which ambulance(s) are being referred to here, I can't really add much more.
I would suggest that going door-to-door, dragging individuals from their homes, raping them and executing them in the street is orders of magnitude more evil than collateral damage in ordinary legal warfare. The latter is understandable and almost certainly inevitable, since it's happened in every war in modern history. The former is a choice made by monsters.
PigLick on 10/10/2024 at 16:01
You could also argue that dragging people from homes, raping and killing in the streets has also happened in every modern war. Still evil though.
Starker on 10/10/2024 at 17:12
Killing large numbers of civilians is a war crime any way you try to put it, whether it's to done kill a Hamas member or not. There is such a thing as proportionality in war. Which Israel is clearly not following, if there are tens of thousands of women and children killed directly and many more indirectly.
RippedPhreak on 10/10/2024 at 17:37
The GC and laws of war have essentially become outdated by now. They were meant to guide behavior during a conflict between two European powers, but now we're dealing with utterly inhuman savages who will butcher a bunch of women and children, then run off laughing and hide in a hospital. "Haha you can't catch me, I'm in a protected building, neener neener neener!"
Under those circumstances there simply are no "rules" that are going to matter.
Starker on 10/10/2024 at 18:07
As the incidents laid out in the report demonstrate, it's not just a matter of Hamas tactics or fighting an irregular force in urban environment. It's blatant disregard for human life by Israeli forces. Denying people medicine, food, and hygiene products is not a matter of fighting inhuman monsters, it's a matter of being inhuman monsters.
RippedPhreak on 10/10/2024 at 18:34
Hey if Hamas wants to line up in an open field and fight in uniforms, they are free to do so. If they would prefer to hide in the urban environment...oh well.
Starker on 10/10/2024 at 18:44
This is why there can be no military solution to this conflict (or a terrorist one, for that matter). No such force is going to just conveniently line up to be killed. Not Viet Cong in Vietnam, not the mujahideen in Afghanistan, no insurgency works like that. And what is also constant in history is that killing civilians never works in favour of the large force dealing with the insurgency.
Subjective Effect on 11/10/2024 at 15:11
Interested to know what you think the combatant to civilian death ratio is in this conflict, and how it compares to others.
Starker on 11/10/2024 at 21:13
According to the best dataset available, the typical civilian to combatant ratio is anywhere from around 42-63% in modern conflicts: (
https://aoav.org.uk/2024/netanyahu-got-it-wrong-before-the-us-congress-idfs-clean-performance-in-gaza-is-a-lie/)
In Gaza, we just don't know, but according to the identified dead from direct bombings and combat, around 41% have been males aged 15-69. Obviously not every male in this range is a combatant, but the figure is at the very least 59% at the low end where every male in that age range is an enemy combatant. But even if as many has half the males killed were combatants, the figure would still be at least around 80%.
Though that still doesn't account for the people who are killed through indirect means such as malnutrition or disease.
