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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

I don't think any of this is a particularly fair summary of the situation. In particular, it ratifies Hamas and the 2022 Netanyahu coalition as the leaders of both sides of the broader conflict; neither are really representative of the populations they serve. Hamas has at least since 2017 been run by a millenarian Bond villain, causing much of Hamas's political leadership to flee the country. Netanyahu assembled a neo-Kahanist fringe coalition as a parliamentary maneuver to keep from losing his post, because it's widely believed he's going to end up in prison as soon as he leaves.

Meanwhile: if we're talking about peace in the context of what happened after October 7, there's no country in the world that would have failed to respond militarily to an attack like that, which was the point of the attack in the first place. Sinwar expected Iran to go all-in on a final war that would wipe Israel off the map; instead, Hezbollah stayed home, and the whole plan fizzled.

The Israel/Palestine situation is widely considered one of the more complicated geopolitical crises, and for good reason. If you think you have a simple summary of it, like "Israel does not want peace", you're probably glossing over a lot of stuff.

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Btw, this happened just as I was replying to your comment. tl;dr Hamas accepted a ceasefire proposal and Israel started attacking Rafah:

Israel’s military is now launching targeted strikes in eastern Rafah, Reuters and AP reported citing a statement. Israel says it is striking Hamas targets in the region. But more than 1 million displaced Palestinian people have sought refuge in Rafah amid Israel’s attacks in Gaza, the Washington Post reported.

Hamas says it has accepted an Egyptian-Qatari ceasefire proposal to halt the seven-month war with Israel. It issued a statement on Monday saying its leader, Ismail Haniyeh, had delivered the news in a phone call with Qatar’s prime minister and Egypt’s intelligence minister.

An IDF spokesperson said Israel will continue to act in a “operational manner” in Gaza despite Hamas announcing that it accepted a Gaza ceasefire deal on Monday. Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said Israel is going to continue to act in an operational manner, saying earlier that Israel has a right to defend itself.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2024/may/06/israel-ga...

Israel does not want peace and there is nothing simplistic in that observation.

This is breaking news from like 4 hours ago. It did not happen just as you were writing these comments.

I don't think you're going to find many people to take the other side of your "Netanyahu is a monster" argument. The IDF has crushed Hamas militarily. There was no reason for Netanyahu not to accept a ceasefire on any terms that gave hostages back. This is why the streets in Israel are full of gigantic demonstrations about the return of the hostages.

Here is the full text of the ceasefire proposal as accepted by Hamas:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/5/6/text-of-the-ceasefir...

I don’t think Netanyahu on his own is able to reject this deal and invade Rafah. Especially with protests in both Israel as well as the USA, and with USA having set a red line here.

No, I think it is wildly simplistic to blame this on him, and there is a deep understanding inside the entire Israeli leadership that the genocide continues, no matter the cost. The Israeli public may not agree with it, however from what I see in the protests, there is very little talk—if any—of the lives of Palestinians. So it doesn’t really seem that Palestinian lives matter as much as the hostages for the Israeli public at large.

If e.g. Benny Gantz were to become the Prime Minister, there is little evidence he would behave any differently, this is for example how he is reacting to Hamas’ accepting of the ceasefire deal:

> “Every decision will be brought before the war cabinet—there will be no political considerations”

> “The military action in Rafah is also an inseparable part of our continued efforts and commitment to return our hostages and change the security reality in the south.”

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/389518

There are not many—if any—political regimes plausible in Israel at the moment who do not take a very hawkish and a criminal approach in denying Palestinians their states. The political reality is that without an intifada, there will be no political avenue for Palestine to gain their freedom from oppression.

You're saying all this and I guess I get why, but I'm coming at this from the opposite angle. I don't believe Israel has any further military objectives to pursue in Gaza beyond getting the hostages back.

There are allegedly 4 remaining combat-ready Hamas battalions (Google the ISW's al-Qassam Brigades Order of Battle for more information than you've ever wanted on this topic), all in or around Rafah. The other 15 battalions have all been disabled. Israel is believed to have killed or captured a full 1/4 of all Hamas fighters, but that figure understates the damage they did to Hamas; for instance, it really seems like they've more or less killed Hamas's entire officer cadre. Hezbollah fought the IDF to a standstill a few years back. Hamas did not repeat the performance. The IDF won, decisively.

Netanyahu's ghoulish neo-Kahanist coalition says things about completely eradicating Hamas, and, yes, about collectively punishing Gazans (this whole thing about Hamas being the duly elected representatives of Gaza is one of their talking points). But they're incompetent and these aren't military goals. If you killed literally every Hamas fighter, they'd be in approximately the same place: within 10 years of rehabilitation as a combat force given the same 9-figure p.a. disbursals they get from the IRGC and Syria.

There's a persuasive argument that Netanyahu needs this conflict to stay hot in order to stay in office; his incentives are very like those of the US's ex-President: being in office prevents his prosecution and eventual imprisonment (not unprecedented in Israel). I don't put it past him. Nixon probably prolonged the Vietnam War for electoral reasons. People do awful things.

I'm just saying: there's no coherent security reason for them to continue active combat operations. I think the Al-Aqsa Flood Attack is somewhat like the 9/11 hijackers storming the cockpits; it worked once, but it's never going to work again.

But, of course, Sinwar is no better. I assume Haniya is telling him about the alfalfa they're going to plant for the rabbits, and how Sinwar will get to tend the rabbits. My advice to Hamas people, once this all settles out, would be not to get in a motor vehicle with either of the Sinwar brothers ever again. It's an achievement to piss off Hamas and Fatah, the IRGC, and the IDF simultaneously.

>> (this whole thing about Hamas being the duly elected representatives of Gaza is one of their talking points).

It doesn't matter whose talking point it is. Hamas was elected fair and square in proper democratic elections. They are the only legitimate authority in Gaza. Those are the facts on the ground and there is no world where it makes sense to ignore this.

I suspect you assume this somehow justifies the atrocities committed by Israel, along the lines of Isaac Herzog's comment about innocent civilians in Gaza [1] but that's just nuts. We're not going to ignore reality because a bunch of blood-crazed fascists are trying to twist it to their needs.

_____________

[1] https://www.itv.com/news/2023-10-13/israeli-president-says-g...

I suspect you assume this somehow justifies the atrocities committed by Israel

No, and don't write things like this here.

The election was 20 years ago, with a population that is overwhelmingly very young.

In my country the political landscape was very different 20 years ago.

True, see my comment to you upthread (I think).

>> This is why the streets in Israel are full of gigantic demonstrations about the return of the hostages.

Yes, what may not be clear is that those people are demonstrating for the return of the hostages, not the end of the massacre of the Palestinians. They couldn't care less about the Palestinians. As I point out in another comment there is widespread support among the Israeli public for the war and near zero concern about what it will do to Palestinian civilians, including children.

This is false.

You keep ignoring every link I post here and still insist you understand the situation.

The Israeli public has embraced the Smotrich doctrine

https://www.972mag.com/smotrich-decisive-plan-israeli-public...

As trauma of October 7 massacres endures, Israeli support for Gaza war remains high

https://www.itv.com/news/2023-10-13/israeli-president-says-g...

How Israeli youth helped usher in the farthest right-wing government ever

https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/2/23/23609584/israel...

Even the dumbest Google search will quickly get you examples of protests against the IDF's operations in Gaza right now. Try [protest (some-Israeli-city)]. I don't care what +972 thinks the Israeli public thinks about Gazans.

Those are demonstrations to return the hostages, not to stop killing Palestinians.

First page of results on google and ddg:

Polls Show Broad Support in Israel for Gaza’s Destruction and Starvation

https://truthout.org/articles/polls-show-broad-support-in-is...

Netanyahu might be losing ground, but his politics still resonate with most Israelis

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/menasource/israel-gaza...

Enduring pain keeps public support for Gaza war strong in Israel

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/enduring-pain-keep...

What Israelis Think of the War With Hamas

https://time.com/6333781/israel-hamas-poll-palestine/

War on Gaza: Majority of Israelis support withholding aid to Gaza until captives returned

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/war-gaza-majority-israeli...

You've reached the point where you're trying to make a point by citing Truthout. That's fine, you can take places like that seriously, but I do not, and a list of analyses about how Israelis really want the hostages returned isn't refuting my point. It's fine if we simply disagree here.

I’ve mostly been getting my news about these protests from English language news (particularly Democracy Now!) so I may be wrong about this, but I don’t recall at any point they even mention Palestinians in these protests. They seem to be against the war, and against the current government, solely because they want the hostages home.

Now, I want to be clear, I’m not blaming the protestors (I know many here on HN are going to these protests, and all the power to you for that). And I’m certainly not going to accuse any individual protestor of not caring about Palestinians. But from my eyes, through the English language news, it certainly does not seem to be a priority, nor even a consideration, for the public at large in Israel, that Palestinians get justice and liberation from these years and years of political neglect and human rights violations.

If you compare this to the Iraq war protests in the USA, which I will not deny were more about bringing the troops home then about the lives of Iraqis, but the lives and conditions of Iraqis was always at least a part of the conversations. I’m not seeing this int the “Bring Them Home Now” protests in Israel. The hostages are not the main focus, but the only focus. Consideration for Palestinian lives is completely absent.

When I see protests which actually consider Palestinian lives, it is not these mass demonstrations like we see with the “Bring Them Home Now” protests, but rather, very few individual anti-Zionist activists, who seem to get pretty disproportionate treatment from the Israeli police.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel%E2%80%93Hamas_war_prote...

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/2/14/israels-wa...

I also get my news from Democracy Now :) There was an interview with Omer Bartov last week, where I think he broached the subject of the Israeli public's concern about the lives of the Palestinians and it wasn't good. I think this was the video:

https://youtu.be/Ie3InYIVXF8?si=E0bdNNTQ2vr3Ysfs

Apologies but I don't have time now to search it to find the place where he talks about Israelis' opinions, or to check that's the right one. I'll try to do it later today, if you're interested.

Bartov is one of the calmest and most sensible voices around these days. He seems completely incapable of accepting that his country is committing a genocide and has argued eruditely and logically against it, but I guess that's understandable. I listen to that guy every chance I get.

For what its worth, I was watching Al Jazeera live last night, and they did cover last nights protests in Israel (I don’t know where they got their footage though). There were three protestors interviewed and all of them mentioned Palestinians lives[1]. So I was wrong about it being completely absent. There are at least some protestors which do use these protests to advocate for justice for Palestinians.

Daniel Levy’s interview at Democracy Now! this morning was also insightful[2]. Particularly the answer to Juan González’ question:

> JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And I wanted to ask you also about the protests, the continuing massive protests within Israel, even while the war continues. Your sense of the impact of these protests on the Israeli government?

> DANIEL LEVY: It’s a very important point, Juan. What I think we have seen is the intensity of those protests — and those protests tend to center around the prioritizing of getting the hostages out, saying, “Do the deal. Get the hostages out.” The intensity, especially those led by members of family of those being held, by family, friends, those have increased. The volume, the extent to which this is disruptive and is impossible for Netanyahu to stare down, I do not think we are anywhere near that moment.

> The internal pressure is such that the soft opposition, who will run against Netanyahu in the next election, led by this guy Gantz, former chief of staff, former defense minister, and Eisenkot, they are still in the government. They have still not unequivocally said that if Netanyahu turns down the deal, they will quit. Even if they quit, Netanyahu has a majority.

> But the pressure does not feel sufficient that Netanyahu’s politics needs him to accept a ceasefire. He still thinks he can wiggle out of this, which is where the question of the external pressure becomes a key factor, because it’s going to be that combination of internal and external. So I think the next question one would have to address is: Where does the external pressure stand?

So, in short, Daniel Levy does not believe these protests will do anything to change Israel’s policy, nor will any pressure from within Israel. He believes the only thing which will change this policy is external pressure, especially from the US. Meaning the student protests in the US are more relevant to the future of Palestine. The ball is not in Hamas’ courtyard, nor in Israel’s, it is—and has been this whole time—in the US’.

1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-NKhRVV2gU

2: https://www.democracynow.org/2024/5/7/daniel_levy_israel_raf...

I'm looking randomly at an RT from Rasha al Aqeedi right now of a Tel Aviv protest with signs like "STOP BOMBING RAFAH" and "DROP FOOD NOT BOMBS".

It is simply false that "Israelis" don't care about the lives of Gazan civilians. There are Israelis that don't (they are disproportionately likely to be Israelis of Middle Eastern descent, for demographic reasons similar to the urban/rural political divisions in the US), just as there are Americans that don't care about Mexican lives and Palestinians who don't care about Jewish lives and Zaydi Yemenis who don't care about Sunni Yemeni lives. People are awful and wonderful and complicated all at the same time.

This one here right: https://twitter.com/OrenZiv_/status/1787891404313628749

I just saw it now. All the power to these people, they are absolute heroes. Also power to the protestors in the Al-Jazeera clip I cited earlier in the Bring Them Home Now protest for talking about Palestine.

I think, however—and it seems I’m not the only one—that far more is needed. This is not a large demonstration, especially given the stakes and the seriousness of Israel’s crimes.

The anti-zionist movement in Israel certainly exists, and is doing an amazing job. When I was in university I followed the works of Anarchists against the wall very closely (I don’t know if they are active any more though). I was also a member of the Icelandic Red Cross which worked closely with Israeli organizations (don’t remember which ones) in aiding victims of settler violence on the West Bank. If I remember correctly these organizations were mostly giving legal aid and monitoring checkpoints in the hopes it would prevent violence. Some of my colleges actually went to the West Bank to work with them.

But this was 15 years ago, and thinks have only gotten worse since then. I’m not optimistic that the current movements will have any more effects on policy than those of the last decade and a half (but they absolutely should still try). Like Daniel Levy says above, the pressure needs to come from the outside.

Wait a minute. I'm not talking about an "anti-Zionist movement" in Israel.

If the OP of the RT was indeed Oren Ziv, then you cited an anti-zionist journalist, that works for an anti-zionist news paper, photographing a what looks like an anti-zionist rally.

[Examples of protests against the IDF's operations in Gaza right now]

These are also described as "rare", and tend to get broken up by authorities for "harming the feelings of the public" and whatnot. The vast majority are led by the Bring Them Home Now movement or are otherwise unequivocally focused on the return of the hostages.

It's not hard to find explicitly anti-war protests from organizations on the Israeli left, but if you yourself were building a program to mobilize opposition to the war in Gaza, what would you lead with? Every march for the return of hostages is implicitly (or explicitly) demanding that Netanyahu complete a ceasefire deal with Hamas. 3/4 of polled Israelis now want Netanyahu gone, and the numbers don't get much better for his defense and intelligence teams.

Is this the conversion getting more thoughtful as it goes on? If even "the dumbest" Google search can show what you're saying, maybe you could provide these dummies with a link? You're dismissing their sources out of hand without any rebuttal while at the same time quoting various figures with no source at all.

I don't understand what you're asking, but 'runarberg upthread just posted a clear example. I'm uncomfortable with the whole enterprise of trying to characterize the thoughts and feelings of 7 million people, so the idea of doing a dueling cites thing is unappealing to me. If anyone on this thread wants to read that as a concession, I'm fine with agreeing to disagree.

"Netanyahu assembled a neo-Kahanist fringe coalition as a parliamentary maneuver to keep from losing his post, because it's widely believed he's going to end up in prison as soon as he leaves."

It may be "widely believed" but that doesn't make it true. It's highly unlikely that Netanyahu would end up in prison. The only case with a real threat of prison (case 4000) has been collapsing steadily since the start, with dismal prosecution witnesses, and judges were pushing the prosecution team for a plea bargain [1] due to the low chances of successful conviction.

It's also clear that the court proceedings would last until the end of the decade, so extending the war by months wouldn't buy him much time. Not to mention that the war cabinet is a unity wartime cabinet that is made up of the main centrist leaders too.

The idea that Netanyahu's war strategy is based on him clinging to power is lazy thinking that keeps on getting trotted out in order to bolster the argument that the war is unjust. In fact, the Israeli public are clearly behind the war aim of dismantling Hamas, the only significant split in public opinion is whether to risk a hostage deal that may not result in many living hostages released in practice and will only encourage further hostage taking by terrorists in the future.

Only ben-Gvir can be accused of having neo-Kahanist tendencies, the rest are "merely" right wing. And forming a coalition with a large parliamentary majority after an election is hardly a "parliamentary manoeuvre", it's democracy and all too predictable after multiple elections and failure for 5 years for centrist coalition to stick together.

[1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/prosecution-rejects-retreat-fr...

All but a tiny fringe of people everywhere favor the dismantling of Hamas --- something that has largely been accomplished at this point. For normal people who aren't poisoned by Twitter, the contention isn't that Hamas is worth saving, but rather that Israel's operations amount in practice to a collective punishment of Gazans for the actions of Hamas. I am deeply sympathetic to this argument, and disagree with most of what you have to say.

I was pointing out that the simplistic theory that Netanyahu is at real risk of going to prison is not true. It's a view that's put out to turn Natenyahu into a "monster" and make it easy to glibly view the war as serving Natenyahu's interests instead of the harder to swallow reality that it supported by the vast majority of Israelis (who don't have the luxury of merely "favor"ing Hamas' destruction, but as a existential necessity to ensuring Oct 7 is not repeated).

The rest of your comment is predicated on the fact that Hamas is a spent force which is nonsense. If there was a ceasefire today it's clear Hamas will regroup and reestablish. Most media sources claim 4 of their battalions are almost fully intact in Rafah.

The war aim, supported by vast majority of Israelis, is that Hamas is no longer a fighting force and will never threaten Israel again. Yes, there may be new terrorist groups that pop up, but the essential deterrent - that Israel is capable and will fully dismantle any good group that wars against it - will be reestablished. (Plus Israel has learnt a lot of lessons about how to ensure Hamas 2.0 is less of threat, including a renewed focus on insisting to the world for a Marshall-plan-style deradicalization, and the realisation that there are no bounds to what terrorists will do even if you ply them with cash and improve work opportunities for Gazans as Netanyahu and many previous governments did prior to Oct 7).

This war involves the most difficult urban warfare the world has ever seen - it's Mosul or Raqah combined with Vietnam, with extensive extensive secret tunnels and the use of civilian infrastructure to wage war. The civilian casualties and destruction where inevitable and the "collective punishment" argument simply does not stack up in this war.

I disagree with all of this. Hamas could be eliminated root and branch and still reconstitute within 10 years. My claim is that Israel has already accomplished the goal you lay out in your third paragraph. I don't believe there is any such thing as "Marshall-plan-style deradicalization".

Of course, what's really happening here is that our premises are too far apart for us to productively discuss things. To continue talking, we'd just be playing to the crowd, hoping to attract some other commenter on this benighted threat to chime in our side. Maybe there's some value in us just calling out the places where we disagree and leaving it at that?

Only Ben-Gvir can be accused of having neo-Kahanist tendencies, the rest are "merely" right wing.

Though that certain other major cabinet figure you're not mentioning (Smotrich) avoids the explicit affiliation and more obvious rhetoric -- his actions clearly resonate with the Kahanist agenda.

Other coalition members seem to be "out there" on the Kahanist spectrum. Meet Orik Strook (aka Minister of Settlements and National Missions), for example:

In 2007, Strook's son Zvi was convicted of abusing a Palestinian boy and killing a young goat, and spent thirty months in an Israeli prison as a result. In response to the ruling, Strook stated that, "Unlike the Court, who preferred to believe the Arab witnesses, we are sure of Zvi's innocence, and are hurting from the success of his haters and would assist him to deal with the difficult sentence imposed on him".

You've also got Zvi Sukkot:

In 2012, [Sukkot] was expelled from the West Bank under suspicion that he was part of a group of 12 that had planned and carried out violent attacks against Palestinians and their property. ... On 6 July 2017, he was arrested on suspicion of engaging in "price tagging". ... At the onset of the Huwara rampage, Sukkot tweeted that "Huwara's killers' nest needs to be taken care of", and posted a picture of himself among a group of settlers gathering at Tapuach Junction, to the immediate south of Huwara.

Finally, it's important to note that the vast majority of the folks who helped the Nazis do their dirty work throughout Europe were not members of their local Nazi parties (or if so, only on paper and sometimes under duress). By and large, they were "merely" right-wing or apolitical.

Looks like a duck, talks like a duck ...

No, I think it is your account that is attempting to over-simplify world politics into a Tolkien-esque story of good vs. evil, with Yahya Sinwar as a Bond-like villain and Iran as the secretive puppet master, pulling the strings, pulling the strings from the shadows. The problem is that this simplistic story doesn't seem to have much to do with the facts on the ground, as we can observe them, and not imagine them.

For example, I cannot find any information about Ismail Haniyeh having left for Qater with his merry band of revelers because of Sinwar. The scant information we have about the support of Hamas among Palestinians suggests that Hamas is popular enough among Palestinians in Gaza, and certainly in the West Bank, that if there was another election they would easily win it [1].

The same goes for the Israeli government. Certainly everyone agrees that Bibi is doing everything he can to prolong the war to save his ass, but at the same time his government coalition enjoys the support of a majority of the Israeli voters, whom, after all, it represents [2] [3]. And a majority of Israeli civilians support the "war" [4]. Scare quotes because that's not a war but an unhindered massacre of a defenseless civilian population.

>> Sinwar expected Iran to go all-in on a final war that would wipe Israel off the map; instead, Hezbollah stayed home, and the whole plan fizzled.

There is absolutely no reason to assume any of that is true. We do not know what were the strategic goals that Hamas had in invading Israel. They have given some reasons but they're not exactly a trustworthy source so the best thing to do is to avoid launching into wild speculation.

_______________

[1] Palestinian poll shows a rise in Hamas support and close to 90% wanting US-backed Abbas to resign

Overall, 88% want Abbas to resign, up by 10 percentage points from three months ago. In the West Bank, 92% called for the resignation of the octogenarian who has presided over an administration widely seen as corrupt, autocratic and ineffective.

At the same time, 44% in the West Bank said they supported Hamas, up from just 12% in September. In Gaza, the militants enjoyed 42% support, up slightly from 38% three months ago.

https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-palestinians-opinion...

[2] The Israeli public has embraced the Smotrich doctrine

The terrifying Smotrichization of the Israeli public is embodied in the total willingness to sacrifice the lives of every last Palestinian in Gaza for the ultimate victory that the far-right minister promised in his plan. It is the terrifying indifference to the astronomical number of dead children, and the complete internalization of the idea that any thought of struggle and freedom on the other side of the fence must be extinguished, no matter the human cost.

https://www.972mag.com/smotrich-decisive-plan-israeli-public...

[3] How Israeli youth helped usher in the farthest right-wing government ever

Recent polling backs that surprising observation: A joint poll published by the Israel Democracy Institute last month found that 73 percent of Jewish Israelis between ages 18 and 24 identify as right-wing, compared with only 46 percent of Jewish Israelis over 65. Young Jewish Israelis are showing up to rallies and polling stations for the extremist politicians whose November electoral victory ushered in Israel’s farthest right-wing government ever.

https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/2/23/23609584/israel...

[4] As trauma of October 7 massacres endures, Israeli support for Gaza war remains high

https://www.timesofisrael.com/as-trauma-of-october-7-massacr...

It is not my contention that the IRGC controlled Hamas leading up to October 7. The IRGC has trained and funded Hamas for over two decades.

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