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Israel’s Brutality Is Increasing—and So Is Its Denialism

www.thenation.com Israel’s Brutality Is Increasing—and So Is Its Denialism

The atrocities at Al-Shifa Hospital are clear, but Israeli politicians say not a single civilian was killed. It’s just one of several outlandish claims Israel has made recently.

Israel’s Brutality Is Increasing—and So Is Its Denialism

A human rights monitor documented the sniping of at least 13 children in and around Shifa Hospital, all between the ages of 4 and 16.

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  • There are zero confirmed reports of snipers killing little kids. How does glancing at a body determine if a shot was fired by a sniper rifle or a ricochet stray bullet from a firefight four blocks away? Have you seen what a sniper rifle does to a body? Doesn't leave much to examine. Doesn't look much different from a hundred other kinds of traumatic injuries, especially without an autopsy.

    There are reports. All kinds of reports. A lot of them are third and fourth hand. Virtually all of them are unverified.

    By my dude, building five hundred miles of tunnels in an area only 25 miles wide is literally using the entire area above the tunnels as human shields.

    This is a good example of anti semitism. Hamas uses 2.5 million people as a human shield and that's perfectly fine with you. They get a pass because the news makes you sad. But not Israel. They used twenty five people as human shields and in your mind that's a war crime. That double standard doesn't make any sense, unless of course you give Hamas a pass because they are fielding soldiers to kill Jews. Seems kind of like that's the case. I mean, it's a very stark and obvious double standard.

    • There have been actual independent autospies done, I don't mean a quick glance at a body. And I would build tunnels too if my neighbor had a history of bombing me and seizing my terrority.

      Every non-state militant group is claimed to use the civilian population as human shields. This simply isn't true, it's rhetoric to justify the bombing because it's simpler than fighting on the ground. In assymetric warfare a resistance group has no choice but to be active in the place they are stuck at. Even if they were using human shields, it shows the IDF is heartless because they have no concern for any civilian deaths, including Israeli hostages.

      It's like if a bank robber took a hostage and a cop just blasted through them, killing half the bank. That would be horrific and unnecessary murder.

      • More like if a bank robber took a hostage and the police bulldozed their house, then the rest of the block "just to be sure" and "to send a message".

      • It's like a bank robber took hostages and then stayed in the bank and every fews day for a hundred years he took shots at killed bank customers and staff and then he had his rich uncle pay the media to say he was the victim and you could no longer shoot back at him, so you did, and then he became president of the bank, cancelled all future bank president elections, and recommitted all of the banks resources to killing Jews, and then when you got tired of it and called his house and told him to let his family leave because you're about to hit it with a missile and he doesn't even tell he family about the call, and instead invites a dozen more relatives over to the warzone for tea, and then when you blow him up up, his rich uncles from Qatar and Iran are all "how could you, war criminal!" Give me a break. Hamas causes these people to be killed. They could stop it today.

      • They could, I don't know, surrender, release the hostages, call for elections, etc., maybe have even slight tolerance to other cultures and try participating in trade? Nobody made Gaza put such short sighted leadership in charge. They don't have to choose to be isolated theocratic extremists with a singular purpose of ridding the holy land of infidels, labeled by all of the free world as a terrorist organization. There'd be peace in Gaza tomorrow if Hamas gave themselves up today. Even Japan eventually surrendered.

        • If Hamas wasn't there, an even more effective group would emerge to fight Israel. The offensive on Oct 7th was by a coalition of groups. You say no one made Gaza put them in charge, but Israel has spent millions propping up Hamas. They were chosen by Israel specifically because of their unpalatable extremism. Israel has supported Hamas materially while taking steps to thwart other groups. Israel has used all avenues possible for years to create the situation we see now.

          • Sounds like they had good reason to prop up Hamas at times to consolidate the most insane, most extreme religious ideologues, and it seems obvious that's the way to deal with such intellectual contagions. Like what is it you think Hamas believes in, as far as social order, jurisprudence, and justice? These are actual religious fascists who what to cleanse their holy land of infidels so that a few men can rule as absolute theocratic dictators whose ideas of law, morality, and human rights change with the wind, and they think that this is the actual future in store for them because God has chosen so.

            I haven't looked at your post history but I'm virtually certain that you are lucky Israel and Egypt would prevent you from crossing Gaza's border, because Hamas would almost certainly kill you for your opinions on government, like immediately.

            • What tf does it matter what they believe when there is an ongoing slaughter of thousands of people? Palestine is more than Hamas. You say Hamas is evil but it's a good thing Israel put them in place? You are seriously heartless. I pray Israel is destroyed. According to your logic, it would be justified to kill every other Israeli at random to stop religious extremists in their government.

            • The IDF have been demolishing residential buildings after seizing them. The IDF destroyed medical equipment, supplies and set fires on floors of al-Shifa hospital after raiding it. They target journalists in their home and kill their entire families with air strikes. Can you tell me the 'good reason' for these acts? What reason do you have for supporting atrocities like what Israel has been doing for years?

    • Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967. I didn't realize so much was documented in one place, if you want to read about what's been happening, the full pdf is on the page with citations.

    • There are reports of 500 miles of tunnels and Hamas using people as sheild.

      Idf showing 2 tunnels and claiming 500 miles is just as valid as showing 300 deaths and claiming genocide. If you can trust the first then trust the second too.

      That Israelis are genocidal maniacs.

      • You have to be joking right now with these links?

        First one is a 56 second TikTok video with no credible reporting attached to it. Just the bald statements of someone in social media and some video clips that do not show any gunfire whatsoever. Hardly proves the kid was intentionally sniped. Is this what you accept as credible evidence of something? Also, like, Al Jazeera? Qatari state media with no credibility when it comes to Gaza. They followed none of the usual standards of journalistic integrity. Very clear state sponsored agenda. Obviously they are exaggerating and serving up the most scandalous, unverified "reports" and portraying them as fact. Next.

        Second link, another Al Jazeera, this one is a third hand report that does not have anything to do with your claim that Israel is sniping kids. Even giving you an assumption that every fact alleged is true, at best it shows that the IDF shot a car that happened to have a kid in it. Obviously there are cars all over the place in Gaza, and so the IDF clearly isn't just going in and lighting up any car that they see. Perhaps this car was driving toward the tank that shot it? It is not proof that Israel knowingly targeting a kid, and it has nothing to do with snipers.

        Third link, MEMo this time, also Qatari state media, a 15 second clip with a bald allegation that the kid's hand got shot by a sniper. Nothing in this link doesn't prove that the claim isn't entirely made up by Qatari State media and slapped onto a 15 second clip of a kid with a blurred out hand. You really accept that as proof that the IDF intentionally sniped this kid? How can the kid or the doctor or anyone seeing this know it was sniper fire and not a ricochet, or a piece of shrapnel and not even a bullet?

        Fourth link, now jumping over to Egyptian state media. Still liars but with different motives. At least in this one they concede the kid was trespassing in a secured military area. The description doesn't sound like sniper fire though, sounds like automatic rifles. That's a far stretch from lining up right on a kid and blasting for no reason.

        Fifth one, sounds legit even after sorting through the the extra innuendo and looking at the reported facts. Should be investigated. The tenor of your allegation is that Israeli snipers are literally just out plinking kids. This kid was on top of a building near a firefight and an active special forces raid, watching it go down. Maybe they thought he had a weapon or was acting as a spotter. If the special forces, trained sniper plinked a kid without following rules of engagement, the sniper should spend the rest of their life in a military prison. But I think Netanyahu is like Trump, promotes people who would let this guy off, like that sniper Trump pardoned

        That's all the time I have right now.

        • I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Israel has murdered over 10,000 kids in Gaza. Snipers aside. It's absolutely inexcusable.

          https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/02/gaza-palestinian-children-killed-idf-israel-war

          "Children account for more than one in three of the more than 32,000 people killed in Israel’s months-long assault on Gaza, according to the Palestinian health ministry. Tens of thousands more young people have suffered severe injuries, including amputations."

          And, again, not new. Israel has been doing this for DECADES.

          "Israeli and foreign human rights groups have documented a long history of snipers firing on unarmed Palestinians, including children, in Gaza and the West Bank."

          • They documented it with the same articles you documented it with.

            Then all just cite each other and then ask for more donations, round and round.

            • Again, because Israel has been doing this FOR DECADES.

              • Doing what for decades? You provided like seven links. I looked at five, the first four of them were entirely bullshit that failed to support your claim. The fifth one proved half your claim and not the controversial half.

                If you start sorting through all the bullshit instead of reposting it, it's very obvious who wants the violence to continue and who does not.

                • Killing Palestinian children.

                  • Yeah, sometimes. Kids die in a warzones, especially at this unprecedented level where the non-uniformed fighting force of a criminal enterprise masquerading as a government uses entire cities as human shields, those co-lateral deaths are different in kind to trained sharpshooters of a uniformed army wantonly shooting children, directly (and getting away with it). Blame for every kid rests with Gaza's leadership, who put their own people and families in harms way, even the aid truck. What was October 7 if not an invitation to food aid trucks and their crews to come on out to a warzone, where negligence and war crimes--as well as the how-ever-many years of martial law the Hamas holdouts force upon Gaza during reconstruction and reconstitution--are exactly the sort of foreseeable harm and casualty that make starting or prolonging war so atrocious for humanity in the first place?

                    And I don't give Israel one pass on legit war crime just because atrocity is foreseeable, but like c'mon: 4.5 out of your first 5 pieces of evidence for your claim of Israel sniping kids utterly fell apart under a level of scrutiny mundane to basic media literacy. Doesn't that give you pause to think maybe some of the other views that Qatari state media keep validating for you might be equally misinformed?

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