Israel/Hamas War Superthread

[Dill]

(03-16-2024, 12:07 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Dill, please do me the courtesy of directly answering the following questions as I believe a true answer from you will be illuminating.

1.  Does the state of Israel have a right to exist in any form as it has since the end of WW2?

2.  Do you, personally, believe Hamas is a terrorist organization?

3.  Do you think the IDF commits atrocities on par with those of Hamas and at the same, or greater, frequency.

I always do you the courtesy of giving direct answers, kindly return the favor.  And with that I bid you a nice weekend.  Lookin forward to your response, it'll be interesting I'm sure.

LOL I remember when you instructed Fred to "debate like an adult" on the "LE Leaks" thread. He demonstrated the double standard immediately (#280). Adults don't resort to constant name-calling in place of rational argument and evidence.

You do me the "courtesy" of calling me a racist, antisemitic, Hamas supporter, while dodging my questions about your criteria for defining "terrorist supporters." That's not the behavior of someone looking for "an honest answer."

1. Israel has a right to exist as part of a two-state or one-state solution to the Palestinian problem. It doesn't have right to exist as an ethnic state which occupies territory gained in war with intent to cleanse and annex.

2. To repeat: I'll state "unequivocally" that Hamas meets the U.S./EU definition of a terrorist organization. But because the U.S. doesn't apply the label consistently to all who merit it, I regard its application as generally political rather than descriptive. The job of propagandists is to get people to accept and apply such labels without thinking; I won't go along. That means nothing has changed in the last four days; I still don't use the term "terrorist" as a descriptor. 

3. Not sure how you are defining "atrocities." Bad stuff Arabs do? If you mean war crimes and violations of IHL, then I'd say the record shows the IDF does so with greater frequency, with much greater destruction and loss of life. But when I've mentioned their sordid record in the past you've simply denied/ignored the facts or introduced a time limit. Do you mean just since last year or what? 

Now you can do me the courtesy of answering the following questions. 

1. Do Palestinians have the same human rights as Israelis, both as individuals and as a people? 

2. If your answer to 1 was "yes," then has the state of Israel violated those rights? This is not a poll, explain why not if you think not. 

3. And if the answer to 1 was "yes," do Palestinians have a right to self defense? Again, if not, explain why not. Flippancy ("because they don't) is a dodge.

4. I have said that Hamas needs to be destroyed if a two-state solution is going to work. Do you consider that statement "support for Hamas"?
Again, show your work. What is your standard for determining whether a statement about the Gaza war supports Hamas or not?