1,770 karma · joined June 21, 2012
While Pakistan is Muslim they are not the same as Iran in any way. The current rulers of Iran do not operate by western logic and would be consider a "holy death" as a direct path to heaven.
Iranian populace isn't behind that, the people themselves are reasonably secular and aren't behind that. However, the leadership is dangerous and you should not assume they would use western logic.
Iran doesn't just call death to America and death to Israel in every rally. They mean it. When they publish photos of their facilities I was shocked to see the US flag, then I understood it's on the floor. They walk on the Israeli and US flag every day in these places as an insult. As a westerner I find this pretty hilarious... But they are serious.
For reference I will point you to the Huttis... The main damage they do to Israel is waking up Israelis due to a missile alarm. As a result they lose hundreds of lives in bombings and crucial resources. That doesn't deter them. Hell, they don't even like the Palestinians since they are Sunni... It's a matter of being part of a Jihad.
Notice that this isn't true for all Muslims. The extremists are a death cult who believe that dying in a Jihad will send all of them to heaven. If they get a bomb it is very possible they won't care about the consequences in the same way a "normal" country cares about them.
One of the main reasons for the Israeli attack was the mounting stockpile of missiles. Even the small fraction of conventional missiles that hit Israel created a great deal of damage. They were on route to create enough missiles and launchpads that would make Israels air defense irrelevant. The equivalent of two nuclear bombs.
Iran repeatedly calls for death to Israel and the USA. Israel never did that.
People aren't happy if they yearn for the life they had before.
In order to get a Kosher stamp you need an "observer" who is some guy you pay to hang around and make sure you do everything right. Sometimes the guy is actually helpful, but usually it's just some nephew of the Rabbi who hands out the kosher certificate.
Their main focus is to keep you purchasing only other products deemed kosher. Not the quality of the food or even cleanliness. If you annoy the wrong people you can lose your certificate and essentially get black listed. You can't open on a Saturday etc.
I used to joke that the easiest way to gauge the quality of the restaurant is in an inverse proportion to the size of its kosher sign. Most restaurants in Tel Aviv (excluding, Humus, Falafel or Shuwarma places) are not kosher.
The ICC decided it has jurisdiction, since Israel isn't a member that is pretty problematic.
> b) The court doesn’t deal with evidence directly when issuing indictments, but rather reasonable grounds[2], or as the news of the warrants stated:
Sure. Again another reason why this is just insane. People accepted this when the court was dealing with a rouge dictator or warlord but it's an insane law to apply towards a western democracy. Imagine them issuing an arrest warrant for GW Bush or Tony Blair... Or Churchill for that matter.
I'm not comparing the a*hole Netanyahu to any of them. But the concept is the same. Israel is upheld to a standard that no other country on earth has ever been upheld to.
> the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare;
I agree this is awful. But that ignores the robbery and hoarding of food by Hamas. Israel lets in trucks with supplies which get robbed the moment they cross over. Hamas hoards supplies in the tunnels and lets the civilians starve as a tactic.
I agree that Israel should still let the trucks through despite that. However, blaming Israel alone essentially gives Hamas the incentive to keep stealing the supplies which they are doing.
Worse, Netanyahu points at that and blames the antisemites who blame Israel unjustly. So he's back at it again. That didn't help and made things worse.
> and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.
That's just general nonsense. This is a war that was started by an inhuman genocidal attack by a body whose own goal is the destruction of Israel (not freedom). Hamas is still holding hostages as of now and was still firing missiles not too long ago (as it has been for the past ±20 years. Before that it was blowing up busses and restaurants.
> The alleged crimes are summarized in [2] (I’m not quoting them here because it is basically 2/3 of the whole article, so go read it your self if you care).
This is all in relation to the deprivation of food/electricity/gas and water. I generally agree this is awful.
But that's exactly what the extreme right and Hamas are trying to do and the ICC has made things worse.
> But I have to agree with the court there is reasonable grounds here.
Reasonable grounds doesn't justify an arrest warrant. The only thing that worked was pressure from Biden. This should never have gone to trial which has made things far worse for everyone who is moderate on both sides.
> Other courts (like the ICJ) and human rights organizations, like the Human Rights Watch[3][4] and Amnesty International[5][6] have provided plenty of evidence to support the claim of reasonable grounds.
Most of the "evidence" is based from Gaza and is in-effect tainted. These organizations are deeply biased e.g. the article was literally from Beirut.
I get what you're saying, but blaming Israel for war crimes when the other side is a terrorist nation that is still holding hostage civilians... That's pretty insane.
>> > This is a political problem, not a legal problem.
> I disagree. This is moral problem, and is fundamental to the rule of law.
That's exactly the mistake.
First off, which law?
Sharia law like they have in Gaza where a gay person is buried alive using a spoon by his brother (real story)... The ICC law doesn't apply. Hell, even the Palestinian authority who joined the ICC hasn't been in control of Gaza since 2005.
But most importantly, who enforces the law? Who returns the hostages? Who disarms Hamas?
It's super easy to sit in a western country and pass judgement. Hold people to a standard that you will never live to. Where is the justice for the people in the tunnels?
Hamas can stop this at any moment in time by releasing the hostages. They want this conflict to continue. Netanyahu wants it to continue as well. These people give it fuel instead of chocking out the conflict.
> But Israel’s crimes are so grave, and so obvious,
You were too far from the Iraq war to actually know what really went down there. Also, notice that America lost Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc. It isn't because they don't have the best weapons. They do. It's because they don't fight to win. Here's why America is losing wars: https://www.amazon.com/If-Takes-Thousand-Years-Jihadists/dp/...
Israel just can't afford to lose here. Despite what Hamas fantasizes about, Israelis won't go back to Europe. Most Israelis were born in Israel and over half were chased out of Muslim countries.
I 100% agree that Israel should find a way to take care of the Palestinian civilians. To its credit it tried to do just that by going around Hamas to one of the local powerful families. Hamas assassinated the head of the family as a warning to the other families.
> that if we let that slide because of some vague—and honestly suspiciously convenient—notion of politics, there is nothing stopping bad actors from creating a political crisis to start the next set of atrocities.
The ICC trial didn't work and to my recollection never worked in stopping bad actors. Only in punishing them after the fact. I agree that the current Israeli government is a bad actor, but so is Hamas and I would argue much worse. Unlike Israel, Hamas is willing to sacrifice its own people and children for its ideology. Its ideology is the destruction of Israel. When you're dealing with an enemy like that it's very hard to stay within the lines.
Wars are terrible and the only way to stop them is to bring people to the table. That can only be accomplished with politics. That notion of justice you have... I wish I was able to still believe there was such a thing in the world. It is a rare thing even within the boarders of countries and not on the international stage.
Right now the Israeli court system is prosecuting the individual assaults from Sde Teiman (the rape claim). During the evidence stage it turns out that the allegations seem to be very overblown, there was an assault. Not rape. The problem is that it's very hart to have a properly functioning justice system when people from the extreme right are blaming you of "working with the enemy". External action and social media are causing a problem instead of focusing on specific wrongdoings.
This is deeply problematic and doesn't help.
> > The people who literally go out and demonstrate against Netanyahu and his government every day.
> That is fine and dandy, but completely irrelevant while he is not being charged for war crimes by the Israeli justice system. If he goes to prison for corruption that isn’t exactly justice for the war crimes he has ordered committed.
Because there is literally no evidence of that. The only evidence ICC brought forth is declaratory intent. Members of the government said some pretty horrible things. That is indeed awful, but not a war crime, genocide or even ethnic cleansing.
After the last ceasefire, Palestinians returned to their homes disproving a large part of the ethnic cleansing allegations. By modern definitions of war in an urban area this was relatively clean.
Like all western democracies Israel has separation of branches. The army is separate and even if a minister wants to perform a war crime, he can't just command it. There is a chain of command and the legitimacy of the orders is evaluated along the command chain.
That means war crimes do happen, like they do in every war. Due to social media and the nature of this specific war they are far more visible (and often faked). Should they be prosecuted, sure. But focusing on that alone is problematic as it again, incentivizes the worst players and escalates the conflict.
This is a political problem, not a legal problem.
There's a trial in Israel going against Netanyahu for his corruption. That's how countries work. A leader isn't above the law.
However, your country can't be on trial by another country. Worse, Israel isn't a part of the ICC. It didn't sign any of the treaties and the ICC has no jurisdiction. So why is it in Israel?
Because the Palestinians joined the ICC. This is pretty problematic and one sided. The judge presiding the case was from Lebanon who was firing missiles daily at Israel... Not exactly jury of its peers.
> In that case, multiple one including war crime, geneva convention on prisonner of war breachs, including but not limited to rape.
That's what people who just read the initial headlines and social media spin say. The evidence is very flimsy and mostly based on reporting from Hamas controlled Gaza. In terms of standards for warfare. I haven't been there and I wouldn't trust most people who have (from either side). I'm sure there were war crimes (and I'm pretty sure Hamas did far worse) and I don't want to make excuses for them. But there's a huge difference between individual action and organized genocide/ethnic cleansing which are the false claims.
Here are some different takes:
* https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/05/12/gaza-israel-war-hamas-a...
* https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/04/05/far-past-time-to...
* https://honestreporting.com/media-unquestioningly-parrot-amn...
> This is not a left-wing viewpoint, this is a right of law viewpoint
Law is within the borders of a country. International law is a very different thing.
> (and it is _extremely_ damageable that some people conflate the two).
I very much agree. Imagine someone blaming from another country taking over your country... This is literally what the ICC is trying to do to Israel, and I'm saying this as a person who despises Netanyahu with every fiber of my being.
> And with all due respect, "support the centrists"? Who do you call "centrist" here? The extreme centrists? The "moderate" bourgeoisie? The military new aristocracy?
The people who literally go out and demonstrate against Netanyahu and his government every day. The people who are trying to get a deal made so they can see their children again who were kidnapped from their homes by Hamas. Those people!
> But you're right in a sense, because what happen when those centrist are loosing their power base and they have to choose between loosing power or catering to the violent is now history.
Centrist are indeed moving to the right thanks to the pro-Palestine demonstrators. They demonstrate to a lot of Israelis that there's only one country that accepts Jews and why it's crucial to fight for it. Israelis in general look at this as: "We tried giving Palestinians a country (twice arguably more), they attacked us repeatedly." This is pushing a lot of Israelis into the scary "it's either us or them" territory.
Israel is a democracy, it is trying to get the government out through the only way possible: protest. There will be an election next year. But until then there's very little you can do. Israel is not a member of the ICC and didn't sign the treaty. That makes sense since the UN is inherently biased against Israel by a huge margin.
Imagine if the ICC was trying to arrest Bush or Trump. Both terrible leaders who arguably committed war crimes. Hell, literally every American president in the past century with the exception of Carter would probably fit that bill. Probably most European countries too.
The current situation is difficult, but right now protestors are busy framing it as "Israels fault" which is both false and harmful to the Palestinians. Hamas is still holding hostages which is giving legitimacy to the war. This is giving them an incentive to keep holding these hostages as only Israel bares the blame. For the Israeli right wing this is also good. They want the global isolation which will push Israelis against the wall. They want Israelis to feel like "it's either us or them".
> Raping prisoners
This was contested. There was an assault that was illegal and included a sexual incident (although was not intended as such). It's terrible, sure and it's on trial right now. That has nothing to do with what I said. You're trying to turn the conversation into something else instead of focusing on the facts.
The fact is that you're strengthening one zero sum player (Hamas), which works against Palestinians. This doesn't strengthen Palestinians in any way. On the contrary, it forces them into conflict with Israel which isn't good for anyone.
This is a strategy of chaos agents in a world where two zero sum players are in conflict. The right strategy is to calm things and support the centrists without strengthening these a*holes. It isn't about Israel, it's about the terrible government Israel has right now. This isn't about Palestinians, it's about Hamas.
Corrupt people like Khan inadvertently give Netanyahu legitimacy and hurt the voices within Israel that are trying to stop him. Biased reporting like the BBC is responsible is a huge part of the problem.
Avoiding multi-threading doesn't remove concurrency issues. It just moves them to a different point in the application execution. A point where you don't have debuggers and need to create overly fault-tolerant behavior for everything. This is bad for performance but worse for debugging. With a regular synchronous threaded application I have a clean, obvious stack trace to a failure in most cases. Asynchronous or process based code gives me almost nothing for production failures or even regular debugging.
Because F35 parts are manufactured all over the world a single country could theoretically ground your planes if they don't like your policies.
If it existed there it would mean remote connection in some way. These planes aren't connected to the internet. For this to work you would need hardware.
He fought it against the wishes of the senate. Notice I didn't say he was a dictator "while fighting it".
> The Gauls and Germans his armies fought against were not some kind of peace loving hippies. Their armies waged war just as violently and invaded and slaughtered (including Romans) in the same way.
Sure. Notice the size of their armies in the link I provided vs. the count of dead people and enslaved people. These were civilians.
Also notice I specifically said I didn't judge him because he's a product of his time. I just criticized the parent post for misrepresenting him and comparing him to more contemporary figures.
> The narrative that Pompey was defending the republic against a tyrant is more ancient propaganda than reality.
Agreed. Both sides were terrible in that conflict. That doesn't make him a non-dictator because he won over another dictator wannabe.
> A reasonable and accurate summary is that Julius Caesar led a violent army against enemies, fought a civil war with unrivaled clemency, and was a benevolent dictator until his assassination by the envious people he had granted clemency.
I think that's revisionism. I don't know all of these things and they are very much a matter of perspective. Frankly, I don't care since none of that is grounded in fact. It's interpretation of facts.
The two facts I provided were: he was a dictator and he was violent.
Those are indisputable objective historic facts. Were others dictators and even more violent?
Sure. That doesn't dispute these facts. Notice I very specifically avoided passing judgement on him and on the OP article.
I don't want to compare to these other guys because obviously it was a different time/culture and you can't really make such broad sweeping comparisons. I won't judge people for admiring him because I also appreciate a lot of his political and strategic savvy. But he was a very violent dictator.
The numbers are bad because OP is using manual benchmarking and falling for the microbenchmarking traps with JIT optimizations. There's no warmup or anything...
> was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal
That was based on a deal Trump made with the Taliban. I don't know if Trump would have botched it too. I would put that on Bush who f*ed up that war completely.
But ultimately it boils down to the moral inability of Americans to fight an uneven war. The problem here is the appeasement policy that unfortunately both sides suffer from.
> projected tremendous weakness
I think that's overblown. There are cases where it was true and others (such as Ukraine) where Biden showed how he can hold back Russia without risking a single US soldier. That was pretty good.
> Biden did nothing for Silicon Valley
The CHIPS act? Intel etc. got a ton of money. Battery manufacturing moved back to the states with multiple factories opening up.
He brought back manufacturing to the USA and gave a lot in that sense. The fact that he kept policies going (no tariffs etc.) was a huge benefit to tech which relies on stability and globalization.
> Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal.
I think using language like that goes counter to free thinking. I despise Trump as a person, but I accept that some of the policies and stances aren't wrong. Unfortunately, discourse is at a level where we can't even have adult conversations on the issues without name-calling.
> So, as long as one bank exists somewhere in the US?
Not an American but that's generally a tradeoff yes. My main bank closed the branch next to me. They are not app only, that's what they do. That's why we have regulators (sorry Americans) to make sure a level of service exists.
But regulators shouldn't "break the market". I use two banks. One does have branches and I use it for my business accounts. Another is app only and far cheaper. A regulators job is to make sure both have room to exist and compete on a level playing field.
Will that mean branches closing? Maybe. The alternative is more cost to the shareholders/customers.
> Would you say that so long as one bank has handicap access, the other banks should save money and provide lower interest rates by not being handicap accessible? I hope not.
That's a straw man argument. Even the apps are required to have accessibility and handicap access is protected by law in practically every western country.
I live in a small country. We have 5 banks. If all are forced to have branches everywhere a 6th bank will never form since the cost/time to build up a bank becomes prohibitive. Thus no competition. Indeed we hadn't had a new bank for 50 years or so. Until we allowed an app only bank which gives much better rates.
This isn't different in the states, competition is difficult when the big banks can crash you and the public is afraid to step into a smaller bank. That means you need to build accessible branches to service a community that will never set foot there. You're effectively saying: "make the barrier of entry so high that no competition can happen".
> The cantons of Geneva and Neuchâtel in Switzerland voted for the fundamental right to live offline. What's wrong with having that everywhere?
That's fair. You 100% have the "right" to live offline. I agree with that and I'm very much against a cashless society.
But this isn't that. What you're asking is for people who are interested in living online to give up potential benefits of the modern age. That's a very different thing from "able". Progress always meant some things went away or became harder to do as a result, this is no different.
> We have Braille on elevator buttons even though not having Braille on elevator buttons is not discriminatory in the vast majority of cases.
Because having Braille on the elevator or having the elevator say the floor we're on doesn't impact the rest of the population. E.g. when I go to the hospital the elevator waits forever in every floor. That makes sense, disabled and elderly need time to reach the open door.
In my building it is much faster, don't the disabled and elderly deserve this in my building too?
Well, they do. But the tenants in my building don't want to wait every time the elevator stops and have a cascading effect on all the floors due to that delay. We can provide localized solutions by holding the door and helping. It's a tradeoff.
> Because the vast majority of people don't need Braille. > More people don't have smartphones than need Braille.
Sure. I'm 100% for the "right" to avoid smartphones and apps. I think every public service and infrastructure should be accessible without them.
However, demanding that it would be in the same price and with the same current level of convenience is problematic as it would impact everyone. I think the analogy you gave is great. Braille on elevators should stay forever when we can. They should also speak, accessibility here is free and doesn't impact people who don't need it. Slowing the elevators for the elderly (of which there are quite a lot) is problematic and probably not what most of us want.
One of the banks I use requires an app since it's an online only bank. I pay lower rates as a result. Does this bar some people from using that bank?
Yes. But as long as other banks exist that shouldn't be a problem. Would it make sense to require that bank to offer branches, phone access etc?
No. Because then it won't be as cheap. Should the regulator make sure banks that provide "full service" exist?
Yes.
I didn't say it's not OK to complain. In fact I gave a personal example in which I chose not to use an app for my sons public transport and as a result am consciously paying more. I did say that:
* Calling it tyranny is nonsense and bad journalism. The entire article is hyperbole and just silly.
* Cheaper pricing and app specific features make sense and are not discriminatory in the vast majority of cases.
Just as a disabled person would have a caretaker sign as a proxy for them, such a caretaker could use the app for them in such a case.
Better yet. A person who is bedridden or incapacitated could use an app from the convenience of their own home instead of physically going to a bank. A blind person could avoid the walk to a distant location. It's a mixed bag in terms of accessibility.
We're giving them something that provides value and saves on costs.