Hamas strike on Israel - mod warning in OP updated 19/10/23

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cyvpm1049d9o

He obviously knows the review will be a whitewash. Once again self defense does not give you carte blanche to violate international law. Hamas and the IDF regularly tell lies. I wouldn't believe either one of them . The problem is Israeli human right groups and others have documented crimes by both sides over the years. In this comflict we've seen videos of people being shot dead in cold blood while waving white flags. We've seen videos of Palestinans being used as human shields, but it's ok, it's all legitimate because it's self defense. There is no obligation to obey the rules of war and international law once you cite self defense. Supporters of this doctrine would be cribbing if another state applied this to Israel. Look we may have killed scores of Israeli civilians while targeting that military facility in Tel Aviv but hey it was premptive self defense!

"I have said this before, and I say it time again: The blood of the women, children, and elderly… I am not saying that this blood is calling for your [help]. We are the ones who need this blood, so it awakens within us the revolutionary spirit, so it awakens within us resolve, so it awakens within us the spirit of challenge, and [pushes us] to move forward." Ismail Haniyih in an address on tv in Lebanon in late October '23 and broadcast widely in the Middle East.

Hamas, in reporting the death toll in Gaza does not distinguish between their militants and their own civilian dead. No difference.They are all referred to as "martyrs". A martyr is someone who sacrifices their life for a belief or a cause. The women, children and elderly fleeing horror and taking shelter where they can are being set up again and again by members of the Hamas death cult that needs their families' and friends' and neighbours' lives to be given up in order to further its cause. Sinwar's "necessary sacrifices". And the cause is the destruction of Israel. The Hamas Charter originally referred to wiping out "the Jews" but Haniyeh watered it down a bit to "Zionist project" aimed at making it more palatable in International Law and to anyone gullible enough to think its intent was any different. And now Hamas setting up women and children and the old and infirm to die by fighting from their midst and hiding among them and speak of their blood and lives as if they were theirs to use as fuel to the cause is seen by some as fine and dandy under international law!

And bearing in mind that Hamas clearly is following orders and weaponising the very bodies of its own people and attacking from and hiding themselves and their weapons in their midst, read up on the Geneva Convention and its protection of people who are not taking part in hostilities and schools and hospitals that are not being actively used by combatants.

Ethnic cleansing isn't confined to killing the ethnic group.

Remember when the IRA put bombs into pubs that soldiers went to. Sure there were loads of civilians but according to the terrorist logic they didn't matter since they weren't the "target".

When you place a bomb in a bar with a load of civilians, you're targeting the civilians.

Same goes for when you drop a bomb on an apartment block.

People say there was a genocide during WWII …………. but even though the Nazi's had people rounded up and locked up in camps for years they didn't kill them all. When surely they could have easily killed even more of them ….… does that logic mean it wasn't a genocide? I'm confused now because we always learned in school that it was

The Israeli intention is very clear. Kill as many Palestinians as possible. Not a prisoner freed in ages either.