Israel enters Gaza (warning: some graphic content)

[kimzor]

On an extreme side-note.

RANGERS ace Madjid Bougherra plans to wear a black armband at today's game in protest at the bloodshed in Gaza.
The SFA say he won't be let on the pitch wearing anything political but the devout Muslim insisted that he doesn't care if he is fined for trying to make his point make in the Rangers v Falkirk game at Ibrox.
He added that he'd refuse to play against an Israeli team in Europe.
The Algerian defender explained: "As a Muslim, I am deeply touched by the barbarity that has been suffered by our Palestinian brothers and sisters.

[MarkMono]

Good call, raising awareness isn't going to stop Israel's escalating campaign of genocide, but it should contribute to ensuring that this sort of situation is not allowed to happen again, even if its only in a small way.

[kimzor]

Good call, raising awareness isn't going to stop Israel's escalating campaign of genocide, but it should contribute to ensuring that this sort of situation is not allowed to happen again, even if its only in a small way.

Yeah. Most folk with loyalist dispositions, a love for ulster and all things orange tend to sympathize with Israel.

It'll be interesting to see the reaction he gets, if he gets his way.

[MarkMono]

People need to realise that the politics of the respective sides DO NOT CURRENTLY MATTER.

What is happening needs to stop. Maybe after that people can go back to their daft wee playground allegiances.

Reading up on DIME bombs made me feel really sick.

[endless psych]

Utterly unconscionable, indeed. For instance, Israel have targeted Palestinian police under the pretense that 'they moonlighted as terrorist rocket squads'. Which, even if it were true, would not vindicate attacking them while carrying out official police duties for a democratically elected government. They then have the gall to claim that Palestine is unstable and lawless - of course it is, THEY destroyed the legitimate police forces there!

Still, genocide is about the strongest and most horrific accusation anyone can ever make. I dont want to imply that you have an opinion one way or the other on that since your posts so far have been largely neutral wrt this part of the issue. What I'm saying is that the things the Israeli government have done and are doing are horrific and unforgivable, but they do not in and of themselves constitute genocide. UNless of course you go by Les' quoted definition which, if you ask me, waters the word down so much that it is of no use at all.

I'm torn on whether you can call it a genocide of the Palestinians but if you consider Hamas to be a "national group" then I think it could reasonably be termed a genocide.

However it is a massacre so it's perhaps splitting heirs to complain about which term to refer to unjust mass murder on the grounds one might be more hyperbolic then the other...

That is to say it doesn't really fall into the category of an exaggeration that serves the oppossing views position as their defence would have to be "Genocide, don't be ridiculous we only killed thousands of civillians!".

[MarkMono]

And given that only one side is killing thousands of civilians, genocide is a more than appropriate designation.

There is nothing wrong with enjoying debating tedious minutiae, its just misplaced to the point of extreme inappropriateness given the current situation.

It seems so disrespectful that I'm not surprised at people finding it to be synonymous with apologism.

[endless psych]

Reading up on DIME bombs made me feel really sick.

Regarding DIME bombs (ignoring the current context of maiming and murdering civillians) they are probably more humane* (if used against military targets) because they have a smaller effective range. I.E. In theory there should be less shrapnel injuries on inocent bystanders. Doesn't matter much if it appears you are using them on inoccent bystanders however...

*This is of course for a given value of humane - given somewhere around the point you get to kill lots of people you call the enemy.

[MarkMono]

Being melted and shredded doesn't seem like my idea of a party.

They are only humane in terms of blast radius, which isn't my idea of humane at all.

[endless psych]

Well obviously it's not for the target but for people who would have been killed/maimed by the detritus from less advanced weaponry it's perhaps a good thing. Of course this only holds if those doing the targetting have the intelligence and knowledge of enemy positions - which is something that just does not count in this situation.

[MarkMono]

And given that this is the first and only known use of them, you'd actually need a precedent to refer to them as humane in any way.

Potentially humane I suppose, in the same way that a gun is potentially humane if you don't aim it at anyone.

[LesMTS]

And the fact that the bystanders won't be killed outright, sure, but they'll be doused in mutagenic nano-scale materials.

The pics of a white phosphorus shell going off that the BBC are running on their headline story just now are amazing and terrifying. Fuck being there. I wonder if the wee guy right at the back made it?

[MarkMono]

If it doesn't melt you, shred you, or chop off your limbs outright, you'll get cancer from it. Very humane.

Seriously, I'd never heard of anything like this until I saw the movie Iron Man (Right down to the micro shrapnel being unremovable.) which predates any confirmed field use of the weapons.

Life imitates art in a truly sickening way.

[endless psych]

I missed the part about the mutagens that puts a very definite non-humane spin on things.

[MarkMono]

Especially the fact that it is reported to affect those 'near to' the blast radius.

This kind of stuff worries me a lot more than countries using prohibited weapons: Countries having weapons that they almost never use because they don't want other countries to know that they exist. Most of our information on DIME explosives is pieced together after the fact from victim's injuries.

[LesMTS]

I missed the part about the mutagens that puts a very definite non-humane spin on things.

It's worth pointing out, for the sake of well-targetted criticism, that they're not mutagenic by design, it's just that the materials used to achieve the intended effects are mutagenic.
(i know you weren't suggesting it was part of the design of the bomb, just think it's prudent to clear up ambiguity on our parts)