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Comment by candiodari | Hacker News Reader

Whereas Palestine's signature is fake. I don't know how else to call it. I mean are we now to believe the "state of Palestine" is going to arrest and deliver Sinwar, Deif AND deliver the hostages to Israel just because this guy asks?

And they didn't waste any time in stating they would never actually execute the signed treaty. At least we already know that:

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cmllykpwgdyo

(Yes, I know what the BBC title says, Hamas statement that they won't follow the treaties they agreed to uphold is there, for their own people. In THE SAME STATEMENT they complain that it isn't applied faster to their opponents)

(Also: obvious conclusion, if Hamas has no intention of holding up treaties they signed, then that makes any peace with them worthless, even if it's a signed treaty. Without a trusted counterparty there is no choice)

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I think you need to make a distinction here between the Palestinian Authority (which signed it) and Hamas (that supplanted it through violent uprising). The PA still exists and would happily comply, they just don’t have a presence in Gaza.

So? Hamas agreed to abide by international treaties signed by Palestine.

AND they "demand" it is held up against Israel.

Plus the basic point stands. With people who think like this, treaties aren't worth the paper they're written on.

Absolutely true; Gaza’s system of government has collapsed since long ago, and the “democratic” election, that many people use to justify the equivocation of the Gaza population and Hamas, involved less than half the population of the enclave and had numerous other issues that make the Hamas rule a farce.

That being said, even those that didn’t vote for Hamas would probably not have elected the PA, as public trust of Palestinians in the PA has eroded due to Mahmoud Abbas’s unwillingness to step down and the perception that the PA is a puppet government.

All this to say that Palestinians lack a trustworthy government, much less a government that could be responsible for turning in the Hamas members the ICC wants to arrest.

If you think like this, then "warcrimes" are bullshit. The whole point of the UN, the Geneva convention, warcrimes legislation, ... is that it would apply 100% in situations where government collapses, in situations where there is nothing but violence, in civil wars (arguably worse than the current situation). That genocide is forbidden AND punished even in the total absense of public trust, in the absense of government, in war, ...

So that's the problem I have with the statement: it's true, absolutely, but if we think like this then human rights aren't human rights, but merely subject to governance. Your statement is true, but is a denial of international law. If your statement is true, you may as well abolish the international criminal court. After all, if a government exists, there's no need for them and if a government doesn't exist (or doesn't apply) then, as you say, the rules don't apply. So what's the point?

Your statement is true, but the world would be a much better place if your statement was false, and therefore we'll at least pretend it is false.

(and, of course, if you think like this, then absolutely anything goes in war)

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