magnkarl

3 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I'm not saying that. I'm saying that war is horrendous and with it come awful acts of cruel and indiscriminate barbarism, civilians targeted and so on - war is horrific, that's its nature, it's war.

Israel-Palestine isn't a war - it's a punishment.

Hamas is the government of Gaza. The Al-Aqsa brigades are their military arm. Their military arm attacked another country. It's a war. Just like Ukraine fighting Wagner is a war.

The Syrian civil war is a fight between one state actor and several smaller groups. Do you also not call that a war?

34 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think for me, that difference is in the nature of the conflicts - Russia-Ukraine is a war, an aggressor nation is attempting to take territory from another nation and the two military forces of those nations are squared off against each other - enormous damage and loss of life is an horrific by product of that.

Israel-Palestine isn't a war, it's a punishment for a shocking terrorist attack - the deaths and the horrors in both events are appalling, but the nature of the two things is different.

 

I'm sorry but this line of reasoning doesn't float for me. You don't bomb a theater full of kids because you're fighting a country's military forces, you don't abduct 80k children, you don't mass rape, do what they did in Bucha, use ballistic missiles with fragmentation and cluster warheads on a city 500miles from the front line. Those aren't military actions, even if you think they are.

The missiles Russia use to bomb Ukraine can hit a target within 100 meters. Why people keep trotting out the theory that people dying to the same missiles 50.000 meters from the front line in hospitals and schools is somehow a byproduct of military action is beyond me. It isn't, and underlines the feelings I have about standards.

Russia gets a 500 mile leeway for their bombs, while Israel is supposed to hit a needle in a haystack in the most densely populated area in the world.

For once I've got to give it to Macron. Sending troops to create safe zones in the big cities is a valid approach. That might actually force the Russians to not shoot at them due to fear of escalation. I don't see how else you're going to save civilian lives except for arming Ukraine to the teeth with every anti-air asset we have available and strangling China's supply to Russia.

For me the big difference between Russia and Israel is that Hamas started this (again), and are (were) the elected government of Gaza. In fact  they still hold a majority in support. Ukraine didn't attack Russia, it never did. Yet Russia has been doing in my opinion far worse things than Israel. Flattened cities with 100k+ inahbitants, bombed theaters with KIDS written on the roof, abducted and kidnapped 80k children, backbound, shot and dumped mayors, ex soldiers, policemen and other members they thought were 'pro Ukranian' into mass graves. Raped women by the 10s of thousands. 

One is an aggressor attacking another country completely unprovoked, while the other is a reaction to a massive terrorist attack. There's a big difference. That said I'd love to see both Benny and Vlad in the Hague, but that won't happen. I'll settle for Benny being put in prison for his corruption so there's peace to investigate, and for Vladimir to keel over once he's completely trashed everything in Russia to keep this stupid war going. Russia's just used fragmentation based cluster munitions on a boardwalk in Russia, for me he's on the same level as AH. 

Russia have used cluster warheads on Odessa. Europe 2024 folks. Several people hit, including a dog while jogging with its owner.

Time to consider sending in the troops and see if Russia dares attack NATO personnel. This can't go on.

Hidden the content in case people don't want to see it.

If we haven't already, it's time to restore the tranche 1 and 2 typhoons (if there are any left), fast track training of Ukrainian pilots and get them everything they need. Tired of the drip feed.

Translation:

Quote

Generally Prosecutor Andriy Kostin on the attack on Odesa:

Russia cynically disregards all norms of international humanitarian law. Last night, the enemy sneakily attacked Odesa. Five people died, more than 30 were injured. Among the injured are two children and a pregnant woman. Five wounded are in extremely serious condition.

The strike was carried out by an Iskander ballistic missile with a cluster warhead. It is an indiscriminate weapon, the use of which can lead to significant casualties among the civilian population. In a radius of 1.5 km from the site of the shelling, metal fragments and debris of the rocket were recovered. The investigation has reason to believe that the decision to use such a weapon was made by the officers of the russian federation deliberately in order to kill as many peaceful Ukrainians as possible.

The investigation is ongoing. We will find and punish those who issue criminal orders to shell peaceful Ukrainian cities.

Ukraine gets aid, Russia bombs joggers, pregnant women, kids and dogs with ballistic missiles with cluster warheads.

6 minutes ago, Tumblerseven said:

Oh the indiscriminate bombing another buzzword. You dont even know what indiscriminate bombing looks like. Read about Dresden jesus christ.
You understand that it makes no sense? right? you must know this.
 

Most densely populated region in the world a strip.
3 month indiscriminate bombing campaign.
30k dead?
its not indiscriminate bombing by any standard! stop using these buzzwords they dont make any sense.

If it quacks like a duck.

That said, Dresden and Hamburg would be classed as genocide today.

1 minute ago, blandy said:

Not for me. Discussing motivation (as different) while agreeing they've done genocide (like Israel has) is not a different standard. If I blow up a school because I hate all kids, or if I blow up a school because I think the people who own it have taken it from me, the motivation is different, the horror and crime is the same and utterly wrong on both examples.

The crime isn't the same. Genocide is different to war crimes. I get the sentiment, and that is why I think so many people are arguing genocide.

If you think kidnapping 70k kids and wanting to wipe out a whole nationality and culture in Ukraine doesn't constitute genocide, then killing 35k people in Gaza isn't genocide either. Differing standards.

7 minutes ago, blandy said:

That isn't what you say -  the first line directly says @OutByEaster? agrees Russia is committing genocide. He's right too, about Russia seeing Ukrainians as Russian (like them) whereas Israel doesn't see Palestinians as Israeli (like them).

Claiming that Russia doesn't want to eliminate Ukrainians when they've bombed more schools and hospitals in a week almost every week than Israel has for 6 months and saying that they don't have the intent, while calling what Israel does is a clear cut case of differing standards. Which is exactly what I was pointing at. Read some posts further down and you'll see a follow up as to why said poster only thinks Russia is committing war crimes.

Ergo Israel is held to a different standard. 

10 minutes ago, Tumblerseven said:

you said this too first random page.

I dont understand are we like pretending that people in here dont demonize israel? :DDD  Or your argument i said a few nice things so that means im fair? you cant be serious.

IDF and Israel's right wing leadership deserves demonisation. They've prosecuted war with Hamas and Hezbollah before without the massive civilian loss of life before, they could do it again.

That said I understand that it needed a bigger reaction this time after what happened Oct 7th. I just don't think they chose the right action. They could've played this the proper way - go to the UN, present their proof, get backing from the majority to go into Gaza with UN soldiers, apprehend the people in charge, blow up tunnels, bunkers, clean the area of weapons and put a spotlight on Hamas backers. That way they'd get a much bigger 'ok' to actually go hard against Hamas wherever Hamas was hiding. The indiscriminate bombing is just a bit too 1945 or Russia for most people's liking.

I just find the whole trampy non-critical support for either side asinine. Both sides here have 70 years of furthering these issues, and whenever there was a deal or agreement presented the extremists from both sides shut it down to make money and further the conflict.

53 minutes ago, blandy said:

I can't find such posts. Maybe my search term wasn't the right one.

18 minutes ago, blandy said:

I'm not sure that's really true. Without looking back, I guess there might be a tiny number of posts doing that, but generally no. I feel that people hold Israel to exactly the same standards as any other nation, particularly those nations with armed forces of a reasonable size/capability.  One of the many issues is that both at an executive level and at an operational level the IDF and the government of Israel has massively breached, ignored, disregarded, those standards and that's so blindingly obvious and the cause of a fair amount of the loss of sympathy with Israel after the Oct 7 attacks. I genuinely don't think anyone on here would be any less critical of the countries you mention if they'd done something similar to what Israel has done in razing Gaza to the ground.

A few weeks ago this exact thing was done when Russia flattening Mariupol was mentioned, in this thread. The argument that was used was that Russia was attacking soldiers and weren't committing genocide.

11 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Perhaps there should be some neutral or multi party version of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre set up to relentlessly hunt down the butchers and their masters.

Anybody killing hostages, targeting civilians, ordering the closure of food supply lines, using an injured child as sniper bait, stealing land, or bombing refugee tents should be hunted down.

A good idea. In my humble opinion you'd need to also go after the people who are stealing the aid that is meant for the Palestinian people. The heads of the PA\Fatah\PLO\Hamas are dripping rich and have absolutely no incentive to have Palestine be a proper state, it'd remove their cash cow. We also need to seriously look at how the UN is prolonging this rather than actually helping the people who are suffering by using militants and corrupt officials to hand out aid. It hasn't worked.

In example, how is Yassir Arafat's widow so rich?

How did Suha Arafat amass all these millions?

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“You know and I know that this is the Palestinian people’s money. These millions didn’t belong to Yasser Arafat, they belong to the Palestinian people. Besides, the fact that these millions were embezzled or arrogated four or five years ago doesn’t mean that it is hopeless or too late to set the record straight."

10 hours ago, Panto_Villan said:

I agree that the Palestinians should be held to account for their behaviour too, and I've criticised their organisations many times in this thread.

It's perfectly reasonable for you to point those things out, but you might be better off doing it directly rather than bringing it up in response to criticisms of Israel - it sometimes comes across as deflection, rather than adding context (although I know that's not your intention).

I despise Israel as much as anyone else for what they're doing, I'm just a bit fed up of the one sided gang-hysteria coming with the Pro-Palestinian stance at the moment, it's been 7 months of harassment, racism, bad arguments, going around calling for wiping out the only Jewish state in the world and a complete lack of awareness of other things. The oxygen that other issues need is essentially outplayed by a war which Palestinians started themselves, over and over and over. No one talks about how they've got a history as checkered as anyone, they're all talking about Israel. People (like you've seen in this thread) hold Israel to a much higher standard to other warring nations, be that the US, NATO, Russia or whatever. When someone then brashly comes in and lays all the blame on the country that has been invaded by their neighbours umpteen times, terrorised and had the (for some) unreasonable reaction to invasion and terror of striking back, in mostly defensive wars, I'll react. 

I'm tired of the childish pro-Palestinian stance with no context, no other thought than screaming about intifada and justice for a population which have been massive troublemakers not just to Israel but to everyone else around them, where no one holds anyone on 'their side' to account, while at the same time expecting Israel to behave better than any other warring state in the world. It's beyond me. Go back in this thread to the days after Israel started responding, by the look of some of the posters we were already then at 100.000 civilians killed, hospitals bombed (which turned out to be Hamas) and - when after 8 months, we're still not at 35.000 - including Hamas fighters, they're still banging the same drum. At the same time, a reported triple of that figure has died in Sudan, I don't see anyone at all protesting for helping the Sudanese military stop RSF who are actually committing genocide on the behedst and with the support of Russia\South Africa. The Palestinian cause is popular, popular to the point of people cheering for a people who are doing absolutely nothing in the way of moving forward or stopping the spiral even with billions and billions of aid every year. If you count the issues Egypt had with Gaza, this is the sixth war Gaza's population have brought to other people. Maybe it's time to start asking why, and trying to figure out what it is about Palestinians\Gaza which makes the population so prone to acting like this, even if it is Egypt, Hamas, Israel or whoever who is trying to control it. it's not all Israel's fault, and Palestinians aren't children.

41 minutes ago, Panto_Villan said:

 

I don't agree with this logic; it's perfectly possible to point to specific instances of war crimes by Israel and assign the blame specifically to Israel. Like the recent killing of the aid workers in Gaza. It was Israelis "accidentally" not following their own rules of engagement (which are already skirting the legal definition of "proportionate"), and I'm sure has happened many more times to people who aren't foreign aid workers. That's not the fault of Hamas, even if both parties are responsible for the wider conflict.

Clearly there's a lot of people who believe flattening any hospital is automatically a war crime if Israel does it. But you also can't argue that all Israeli actions become necessary and proportionate because they are linked to previous events - that's equally bad for the opposite reason.

All perfectly fine. By that account it is also perfectly reasonable to point at the things Palestinian organisations are doing. People aren’t. They’re whitewashing everything Palestine and furthering the conflict by not holding the Palestinians accountable for anything. It is not like Israel is the only country who have had its share of issues from the group of people millions are protesting for every weekend.

If you can plan and enact the largest terrorist act since 9/11 you can also be held responsible for the appalling state of your government, corruption, stealing of aid and terrible treatment of anyone not male and Muslim. Terrorism has consequences, and Israel is by far not the only country who has gone totally overboard dealing with it.

There are obvious things that the Pro-Palestinian organisations don’t want to talk about. Hostages, terror, fundamentalism, killing of opposition, gay people, minorities, stealing aid and water pipes to make rockets. +++. It can’t all be Israel’s fault, it’s been happening since 1948, aimed at not just Israel, but Germany, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Christians, Kurds, Turkmen +++.

1 hour ago, Jareth said:

I think it depends on how wide you go. Israel flattened a hospital, a war crime, and as a consequence a child dies as they had no access to healthcare (or even food and water) - I'm blaming Israel for that war crime and the subsequent death. I would blame Hamas for Oct 7th, another war crime. Is there blame to be shared in either instance? If there is then that's not easy to say. On the overall conflict,  there is blame on many sides. 

The same child lives in a state where the government is withholding and hoarding aid to use as their own combat rations. The blame is still on both Hamas and Israel. Pro-Palestinian people need to put at least a tiny bit of responsibility where it’s due, which is both sides. Feverishly protesting for Palestine with absolutely no idea about how to better people’s lives outside of removing the Jewish state from the Jordan to the Med is as mindless as it gets.

9 minutes ago, Jareth said:

I do hear this often, those people getting written off one way or another - I'm fairly sure they shouldn't be written off, same as nobody has written off the victims of Oct 7th. It's a tragedy for Israel, most neutrals watching the reaction to Oct 7th see an over-reaction, a murdering spree multiple times larger than Oct 7th - and I can't speak for the Irish gov, but the overiding message is for the killing to stop, first and foremost. Israel have done untold damage to themselves and when folks are suggesting they stop, it's honestly because they think it's in their best interests, I certainly think that.

No one is advocating for Israel to kill civilians. No one is writing off the murdered on both sides. Some people are naivly thinking that two sides who have been at it for 70 years are going to not kill each other. At the same time as was replied to your earlier in this thread, Hamas is hiding in refugee camps, shooting rockets from civilian areas, using the population as living shields and taking food from the population that is starving. In a recent poll the same population is still supporting Hamas. Israel could go block by block to clear it of Hamas but that would likely mean that Hamas got it exactly the way they wanted. Find me an instance of a country's government attacking another country, killing 1000 people and the other country just letting them carry on. 

I keep referencing IRA because the IRA are well known for bombing people indiscriminately to get at 2 soldiers and then killing a bunch of civilians in the process. What is happening in Gaza is both on Israel and the Palestinians.

8 minutes ago, Jareth said:

Have they defended themselves yet? 

In their opinion they haven't until Hamas is dead (which I can understand as Hamas has been actively shooting rockets at Israel and perpetrated wide scale terrorism for years), how they're going about it is wrong and a lot of people are dying due to it. In a wider sense, the death-toll in Palestine is nothing new in warfare, even if that sounds horrible.

Had Ireland defended themselves or settled their grievances with England after bombing several pubs in Guildford, Hungerford and other cities in the 70's? Incidentally, the PLO was one of the few organisations that supported IRA back then, which could explain why there's more support for Palestine in Ireland than other places in Europe.

6 minutes ago, Jareth said:

Israel has a powerful modern army and modern munitions - yet it has somehow annihilated civilians on a breathtaking scale, also targeting and executing British aid workers and many others. These crimes, including intentional famine currently afflicting Gaza, are Israel's fault. Oct 7th = Hamas' fault. I'm blaming whoever is pulling the trigger. 

So the Oct 7th terrorism gave Israel no cause to defend themselves? I'm sorry, but your argument just seems not very well put together, especially when you base your argument on the fact that Ireland is so pure after having funded the IRA for god knows how many years and not managed to stop the violence before there was an agreement that put the various animosity aside and tried to look forward.

It's naive to think that a terrorist attack that caused over 1000 deaths, wide scale rape and torture, including the taking of hostages would not lead to a reaction.

35 minutes ago, Mandy Lifeboats said:

It's bizarre to blame Israel when it's so obviously a complex situation where all are to blame.  

Hamas are hiding amongst the civilian population.  Hamas are using humanitarian supplies for their military.  Hamas are holding hostages in civilian areas. Hamas could surrender. Hamas could give up the hostages.  Hamas could stop smuggling weapons into the area.  

Hamas wanted a war. They got it.  Now they are punishing their own people by prolonging a war that they never stood a chance of winning.  

Agreed. I'd even take it a step further to the point where all these marches for Palestine is extending this, at least when the messaging is as dumb as 'from the riv...' or 'intifada now!'. Hamas and PIJ\Iran feel emboldened that they can continue because no matter what Israel does, it's wrong. They've got people supporting Palestine even if Palestinians instigated the latest conflict, and said people would never in a million years put pressure on the Palestinian entities to change. That would be counter to their opinion that the Palestinians are eternal victims no matter what they do.

There's absolutely no attempt to try to improve the lives of the average Palestinian, it's just the new cause to protest.

2 minutes ago, delboy54 said:

When my kids were younger it was Thomas the Tank Engine narrated by Ringo.....and Wind in the Willows narrated by David Jason, these episodes were genuinely very funny. Not forgetting Sesame Street of course...

In my day it was the clangers, magic roundabout, Thunderbirds and stingray.

Today's kids stuff is total rubbish in comparison, as mentioned on this thread, some of it is very disturbing, odd, and strange stuff that kids watch. I am sure the program makers were/are on drugs.

They're just acutely aware of what keeps the kids in the loop tbh. Short, fast paced content with lots of colours likely to engage dopamine receptors and keep the kids hooked. It was incredibly hard to produce before but with the advent of much more automated production software it's essentially all that's going on atm.

5 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

You got sat in front of the TV and told to watch Cartoon Network for an hour

You're just going to ignore the evidenced produced with a massive number of kids, that says that it is detrimental to kids development? The issue isn't that you were put in front of a TV for an hour, it's both what is on the TV\iPad now a days and how many hours are being consumed.

2 hours ago, Genie said:

I agree, we had things like Power Rangers, Pokémon, Ninja Turtles which were all that same sort of thing. 

But those shows didn't do what the kids shows do these days, open up a ninja turtles episode and see how long a scene is, it's likely 10 times longer than what it is today. That was likely due to production cost and people having to actually draw the turtles, but now it's a completely different beast.

I think a big part of it is also likely down to parental issues over not letting their kids out of sight for a second.

So what if you need to do something for an hour, kids are robust and can handle falling over, falling out of trees and to be bored for 1 hour. If they can't handle that then they need more of it to learn how to entertain themselves. The dopamine hit tv and pad society is in my opinion seriously hindering mental development, and several well known studies back that up, that's why we've been asked to reduce it by health officials.

Effects of Excessive Screen Time on Child Development: An Updated Review and Strategies for Management

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Excessive screen usage can also lead to problems in social-emotional development, including obesity, sleep disturbances, depression, and anxiety. It can impair emotional comprehension, promote aggressive behavior, and hinder social and emotional competence.

Parents play a crucial role in managing and reducing screen time by raising awareness, setting boundaries, and providing behavioral controls. Parental limitations and the absence of screens in bedrooms have been found to significantly reduce screen usage. Parents should also set an example by managing their own screen time. Overall, it is important for caregivers, educators, and healthcare professionals to understand the potential risks of excessive screen usage and implement strategies to promote healthy development in children, including alternative activities that foster cognitive, linguistic, and social-emotional skills.

Associations between screen time and lower psychological well-being among children and adolescents: Evidence from a population-based study

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Percentage not curious or interested in learning new things, by age and level of screen time, with controls, U.S., 2016.

I wonder what people think parents did back in the day when they needed to do something, we really didn't put the kids in a coma with an iPad.. Considering the above was done in 2016, before the advent of many of the short clip dopamine ¤#% on youtube atm I can't imagine it's gotten any better..

I probably sound grumpy again, but I'm honestly worried that kids get ADHD-diagnosed because they're acting out over screen time. If I was a psychologist looking at my granddaughter when she's protesting after my daughter takes her iPad away I'd probably stick that label on very fast. It's frightening.

39 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

This is a concern, but on the other hand I'm certain that the reason my son is good at counting and recognising colours and animals etc is through what he watches on YouTube

Although he's at the age where I can have a certain amount of control over what he watches. I suppose when he gets older I'll have less and less.

He doesn't have the phone/ipad very often, but we do use it now and then. More  often we put YouTube on the TV but that way I can control what he's watching.

 

 

I do think the screen time thing is exagerrated somewhat though just because it's now on ipads/phones rather than televisions.
When I was a kid all I did was watch TV and play video games. Almost literally  

But is it fair to compare the TV-programmes of your youth to the dopamine rush, rigged, 2 second, clippy, horrible shit that is called a children's cartoon these days? I'm not so sure. 

I saw a documentary on this in German the other day, the usual length of a typical 2d scene of a children's cartoon in the 90's was 10-20 secs, it's now 2.5 seconds. It's literally so fast, so nervous and so packed full of impressions that the kids get overstimulated. They checked all the main channels and providers, and everyone was doing it. Bluey, peppa, local national kids stuff - you name it.

The brand of TV you watched is dead and gone, now they're high paced, colourful dramatic voiceover machines that build reactions in our kids. Didn't you learn to count with your calmer, long format programmes back in the day? You don't need fast paced content to learn to count. Let's compare this 90s sesame street episode on learning to count:

with this trippy youtube cocomelon episode which coincidentally my granddaughter loves:

Spot the difference? Count the clip structure in the second video. There's more impressions in 5 seconds than in the whole first video, anxious voices, high tension, lots of bright, neon colours, kids cheering and so on.

As always, the Baltic nations aren't afraid to poke back.