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Comment by tety | Hacker News Reader

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The sheer amount of times that Israel's [1] lies [2] have been exposed [3] again and again [4], in the current conflict and from before, leads to the only conclusion that IOF's claims that benefit their narrative must be assumed false until proven true by independent investigation. Their own investigations frequently prove their own initial claims are false.

Moreover, "murky definition of a journalist" is a weasel word if I've ever seen one. It matters not if someone is a seasoned journalist (many of which have been killed as well) or new. In some cases, these new journalists are the only ones revealing the horror of the genocide Israel is conducting inside of Gaza right now.

The scale of war crimes and targeting of noncombatants by Israel in this genocide is unprecedented.

[1] https://theintercept.com/2024/02/07/gaza-israel-netanyahu-pr... [2] https://hebhjamal.substack.com/p/a-list-of-israeli-lies-prop... [3] https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-27/ty-article-op... [4] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/information-missteps-led-...

Do you have a refutation of the specific claim regarding Al Jazeera journalists doubling as Hamas agents?

Where is the burden of proof here?

I generally think that militaries and governments in international relations, and especially regarding warfare, are not trustworthy; they will lie if it helps them. Israel in particular focuses on information for the Western public (which I'm sure they would agree to; they even have a word for it, and especially in this war (they are well-organized and there is plenty of recent journalism about it). I don't think Israeli - or Hamas - claims are credible on their own.

Is there some other basis for this claim?

https://twitter.com/AvichayAdraee/status/1756728159158812921 This tweet has many photos of the above journalist participating and commanding a Hamas exercise, I think these are pretty incriminating.

https://twitter.com/idfonline/status/1745158775567175764 This tweet contains an Islamic Jihad document listing another journalist as a member

Twitter/X, especially for an issue like this one, is not at all a credible source IMHO. Disinformation and misinformation on Twitter is a cliche; it's overwhelming.

These are photos published by the IDF, not random users on X

even if you don’t trust the IDF, you could easily verify if those are the photos of the same journalist by looking at them.

That doesn't tell us whether the photos are actually from the IDF, whether they were modified, where and when they were taken, what the context for the photos is, whether the narrative added to the photos (the one you are asserting and apparently someone else originally put forward) is accurate. It's just two collections of bits that someone posted online.

People are easily misled by those things, including you and me. We don't have time or skill or resources to do the verification. But one efficient solution is for someone to develop those skills and resources professionally, and to spend the time to use them. Those people are called journalists, among other things.

Stop reading X, which we can't interpret accurately (as is extremely well demonstrated billions of times) and start reading something professionally verified. That's my advice, at least.

If you are pro-Israeli, realize that Hamas uses X to mislead and influence public opinion. If you believe there is truth to Israel's position, then X - probably the world's leading mechanism for disinformation and misinformation - is a threat to Israel.

These are official IDF accounts, the photos are said by the IDF to be found on the journalist laptop and have backing articles published by journalist who received the same information from the IDF.

Psychological warfare campaigns are usually done under false flag, so I doubt this is the case

Look at the images and judge for yourself

This was honestly the first I heard of it, so no opinion yet. That said, OP put forward evidence and the comment I responded to basically put forward that governments lie.

> the comment I responded to basically put forward that governments lie

I appreciate you seeking something substantive, but in this case, doesn't that simplistic assertion still effectively discredit government claims?

I remember reading US government claims re Afghanistan and Iraq - where they were under much less pressure than the Israeli government today: Did that strike kill civilians? The answer was always 'no' until someone could prove 'yes' - you learn that the 'no' didn't mean anything.

I’d assume not otherwise he’d have linked to it too.

I never understand how people will make the case that the other side is evil without showing that their side isn't also evil.

Yes, sure, Israel is committing war crimes. This whole thing started because Hamas attempted to commit textbook genocide and has 80% support along the West Bank population.

The US set half a million Japanese on fire for less. There is not a country in the world that wouldn't be doing what Israel is doing in Israels position.

> not a country in the world that wouldn't be doing what Israel is doing in Israels position

Many would do it better. To my knowledge, there have been zero prosecutions of misbehaving soldiers on the Israeli side. Netanyahu should be removed from power—his chaos created the opening for Hamas, and he’s tainted as a partisan in America. And insisting on a permanent military occupation of Gaza is such a stupid thing to commit to ex ante.

Find me a list of countries which have suffered a proportional death toll in civilians to a terrorist attack and have a response as measured as what you're describing.

In terms of dead per total population this would be the equivalent of 13 9/11s.

Find me a list of countries that ethnically cleansed a population of millions and put them under occupation and treat them like less than humans. You know that history of human being did not start in 2023.

Israel is not in a normal conflict. It is an occupation force and their government seeks to prevent Palestinians from having their state and some elements want to destroy them once and for all.

Edit: sorry I thought that you did not want to go in pointless discussion. Cannot delete that now.

>Find me a list of countries that ethnically cleansed a population of millions and put them under occupation and treat them like less than humans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1508wboZXk

Closer and dearer to Palestine one only need to look at how the Copts are treated in Egypt, the Kurds in Turkey and the Marsh Arabs in Iraq.

>You know that history of human being did not start in 2023.

Very good, so you should remember that the Palestinians are under occupation because of the failed pan-arabic genocide against the Jews of 1948 and the many attempted rematches since.

>Israel is not in a normal conflict. It is an occupation force and their government seeks to prevent Palestinians from having their state and some elements want to destroy them once and for all.

Which state? Hamas has been in open rebellion against the Palestinian authority for 20 years.

Another thing worth noting, some of the casualties mentioned in this site is of Palestinians journalists dying on October 7 and the following days, which only show how problematic their claims are.

As the airstrikes didn't start yet in Gaza, these obviously died inside Israeli territory after they crossed a border, so they can film a massacre among other horrifying acts inflicted upon civilians such as rapes and mutilations.

I don't think these are the same journalists that people think about when they imagine journalists, but rather the same kind of 'journalists' that filmed the isis decapitation videos

i've yet to see reporting on this that is not sourced directly from the IDF - who are accusing dead men based on "intel" that they've found after a bombing

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