Why couldn’t the Israeli military go after Hamas fighters without dropping bombs that kill civilians?

How does the bomb know if the person is a civilian or Hamas?

Good question. I’ve wondered that too. The Israelis used to be known for their intelligence.

The kindest explanation is that going door to door is risky for them, and palaestinian lives are worth less than their own.

^^If true, why worth less than their own in your opinion?

Because they are the enemy. They are the other.
They are collectively guilty of everything Hamas does.

I don’t think it would have made any difference. There was a point when they were talking about just flooding the tunnels completely with sea water. Those that support Hamas tried making that out to be some environmental issue. It doesn’t matter what Israel does or doesn’t do, there are going to be people that just hate Jews and will call foul. These same people ignore that they are supporting terrorists.

@seawulf575 That’s some remarkable sway that self-identified Hamas supporters have. Why don’t these Hamas supporters just ask for anything else they want?

They could, but fighting people by sending in troops to gunfight inside buildings, is much much more deadly for your own troops, compared to blowing up those buildings first with bombs and artillery.

^^I thought so. Same thing I think what the US military did in flattening Manila first to weaken the Japanese forces before sending in troops.

@mazingerz88 Yes. It was US military doctrine pretty much throughout World War Two: bomb and shell the enemy positions as much as possible, then assault with troops. It tends to be quite effective, and greatly reduces your own casualties, especially if you have the advantage in terms of air power, artillery, ammunition, etc.

One main thing about World War Two, however, was that usually urban populations were able to evacuate areas before the front lines reached them. In Gaza, the population is mostly confined inside walls and not allowed to evacuate.

But it really would be a much much deadlier fight for the IDF, if they had to go looking for Hamas on foot, in un-bombed buildings. Potential snipers and ambushes, having to enter buildings not knowing what armed and unarmed people (or just booby traps) might be inside, not being able to take a lot of advantage of superior numbers and weapons, etc.

^^Appreciate the answer. Not sure though about Gazans not allowed to evacuate.

Gazans are allowed to move around inside Gaza, but that’s 2 million people in 139 square miles of land, there’s a huge wall around all of it, only a few checkpoints, and for a complex combinations of reasons, most of the population doesn’t have the ability to leave.

And, the Hamas people the IDF wants to kill, tend to stay amongst the rest of the population to avoid detection and/or use the rest of the population as human shields or at least make the IDF likely kill nearby civilians if they attack Hamas.

Because Netanyahu doesn’t give a shit about Palestinian civilians.

They are on the ground there to some extent. From what I understand not initially, but have been for a while.

The IDF, under Netanyahu, has been targeting Gaza, not just Hammas.
Early on, it was realistic, to expect some civilian casualties.
Then, details emerged that Israel was using unguided bombs.
We saw a very high casualty count on journalists, and medical workers.
Seeing IDF soldiers gunning down their own hostages approaching them with white flags, and committing war crimes, it became crystal clear that Netanyahu is “culling the heard.” Or. Killing as many Gazans (future terrorists, in his eyes) as possible.

@seawulf575 “There was a point when they were talking about just flooding the tunnels completely with sea water. Those that support Hamas tried making that out to be some environmental issue.”

Yep. They could have flooded it with fresh water and I would have supported it. As much money and lives lost with the wholesale destruction of Gaza, it would have been cheaper and saved many innocent lives. Desalination or simply taking a fleet of tanker to the Great Lakes and filling them up would be well within the realm of possibility.

But that’s not the point. The massacre of civilians and annihilation of their civil infrastructure and cultural ties to the land, their graveyards even, is a feature, not a bug. They’re “Amalek” as Netanyahu has called them.

The civilian death toll is really quite astonishing. Palestinian civilians have been dying at a rate of around 160 each day since 7 October. Of the 33,000 deaths to date around 80% are estimated to be civilians and most of them are women and children. The civilian death toll already exceeds that of two years of fighting in Ukraine and is beginning to approach Russia’s military deaths.

Israel constantly claims the high civilian casualties are due to Hamas using the population as “human shields” but the term lost its meaning when Israel began bombing hospitals. The priority is to get Hamas regardless of civilian casualties and that is why the IDF has used 2,000 bombs (supplied by the US) in urban areas.

One of the bombs that dropped on a hospital was a Hamas bomb.

My biggest problem is that there hasn’t been another at least short cease fire to get food and supplies into Gaza in bigger quantities and safer conditions.

Actually, I have a problem with not moving Gazans out of Gaza, but most people just say Israel should stop not that other countries should take Gazans in temporarily. They think if Gazans leave they will never be able to come back. They are being killed. I find it interesting that all other wars we are grateful for a safe haven. Syrians taken into Germany and some other countries. Jews during the Holocaust into the US (sometimes they were refused) and some other countries in Europe and The Americas. Why not the Gazans? Ukranians into Poland.

Because they’re trying to kill civilians. :) “But!- No!- That’s not-!” Yes, they are. Seeing is believing, and it’s happening before our eyes.

Have a good day!

The massacre of civilians and annihilation of their civil infrastructure and cultural ties to the land, their graveyards even, is a feature, not a bug.

Facts.

@JLeslie “One of the bombs that dropped on a hospital was a Hamas bomb.”

That’s very much in doubt.

IDF claimed beheaded babies and babies being cut from the womb of mothers. that was false. They claimed mass rapes, and that was false, they claimed that Al Shifa was above the “beating heart” of Hamas, complete with 3d bunker rendering, but all of that was false. They pointed to calendars as evidence of hostages being held in Al Shifa, but then it was pointing out that in all likelihood, “Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday” probably aren’t the names of Hamas terrorists. They point to images of tunnels near hospitals as evidence of terrorists and then it gets debunked. Israel has killed over 100 journalists. They’ve bombed people on the safe routes they’ve instructed people to go down, they’ve executed unarmed people with white flags, they’ve massacred aid workers, rescue workers, healthcare workers, they’ve apparently executed people with their hands bound behind their backs, catheters in their arms, and wearing hospital scrubs in mass graves. They routinely amputate detainees after the restraints are left on for way too long. They allow Israeli protestors to block humanitarian aide. They have used AI to justify the killing of thousands allowing up to 20 innocents for each low-level Hamas fighter, intentionally waiting for him to return home so his family could be annihilated as well and over 100 innocents for a high-value target as revealed from interviews with Israeli insiders. And there are plenty of others.

At this point, I assume anything the IDF says is a lie unless proven true by an independent 3rd party. Their objective is to make Gaza uninhabitable for the Palestinians and to force them into the Sinai (or other countries) so Israeli settlers can move in. They have to do it in such a way that Zionists abroad can still believe Israel is a just and moral country. If a Palestinian kid is killed in a gas chamber, then that’s unspeakably evil, but if that same kid starves to death, or is buried in rubble as tens of thousands of nameless innocents have, then Zionists get to tell themselves that it was sad, but it was a necessary evil to fight terror.

@JLeslie “They think if Gazans leave they will never be able to come back.”

Of course one way to guarantee they would be allowed back would be to move them into Israel. But that would NEVER happen.

Because Hamas intentionally embedded themselves, their resources, and infrastructure within Palestinian civilian life. It is almost impossible to distinguish a civilian from a Hamas fighter or a private residence from a weapons cache. If they go door to door, Hamas will just move their stuff around through their system of tunnels and sympathizers. IMO, The biggest enemy of Palestine is not Israel, it’s Hamas because of these tactics. Hamas is banking on Israel to cause a lot of collateral damage. I don’t agree with how Israel is handling this though, they took the bait and should have stood down from the very beginning. Aside from the civilian casualties the whole region is more destabilized.

@Blackwater_Park “Because Hamas intentionally embedded themselves, their resources, and infrastructure within Palestinian civilian life.”

Just curious, but where do you expect Hamas to go? Should they build a military base and all congregate there? We’re talking about an open-air prison in one of the most densely populated areas on the planet, especially when considering the volumetric area of the population (i.e. short building but high population). They’re not allowed to have a military.

@gorillapaws I’m not even going to pretend that you don’t believe that they’re intentionally hiding behind and embedding themselves with civilians. The more civilians get killed, the more the world will see them in a positive light. Make no mistake, they are monsters.

@Blackwater_Park Without a doubt, Hamas are monsters. Full Stop. They killed innocents on 10/7. They kidnapped innocents on 10/7. Some innocents have been raped.

I would argue that the language you’re using though is being used to justify the massacre of civilians. It’s what any resistance group would do in the same situation. If the US were occupied by the British with overwhelming military superiority, the “US Resistance” wouldn’t group up in one easy-to kill formation, they would disperse (and that’s exactly what many did in 1776).

@gorillapaws Of course, I don’t agree. I have already said both now and when this whole thing began that Israel should stand down. It’s a hostage situation with both the Palestinian civilians and the Israelis who were kidnapped being held. You don’t shoot the hostages.

No doubt we need more third parties, more outside reporting from Gaza, although the risk to their lives is incredible if and when they are allowed in. Even if we have reporting there will be biased reporting, this is what we live with now. The journalists look for the story they want to tell, but it is still better than nothing. There is some video available of Gazans recording their situation.

“The journalists look for the story they want to tell, but it is still better than nothing.” I don’t necessarily agree, I think in some respects, it’s worse than nothing.

@JLeslie – Israel has been repeatedly condemned for targeting journalists. More than 100 journalists have been killed by Israel.

@hat I’ve heard statistics of journalists being killed in Gaza, and my statement was that we need more third party journalists in Gaza, so I am not sure if you are arguing with me or what exactly. Israel has been preventing journalists from going in from what I understand. I have yet to see a roster of the names of the journalists killed so far and who they reported for previous to the war. I am not questioning that some have been killed, I question the number cited. To get a count they must be able to account for each journalist I would think? How else do they get the count?

Here is a list of the journalists so far.

Interesting thread. If Hamas want a cease fire, all they need to do is give up the hostages. Hamas has always been the stumbling block for any resolution in Palestine. Like or hate whoever you want but Hamas has to come to the table for any negotiations to be started.

I agree @Jaxk but that is still notan excuse for the I D F shooting hostages that were released.

I’m pretty sure that early on Hamas agreed to return the hostages in exchange for the “hostages” being held by Israel and a permanent ceasefire.

Israel keeps thousands of “hostages” in detention, many without charge or access to a lawyer. some are minors. There are widespread accusations of mistreatment in detention as well for years if not decades.