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Comment by austin-cheney | Hacker News Reader

> Again, try to be rational. Is it tribalism, or do they just want a future where citizens don't have to worry about terrorist attacks or getting rocketed anymore?

That’s exactly what Milosevic argued to justify attacking his neighbors. We have to get them before they get us

I am being rational and cannot imagine any justification for the complete eradication of Gaza or the illegal settlements in the West Bank.

If this is, after all, only about safety and security then why isn’t Israel annexing those people into citizenship? Rationally speaking it would eliminate most of the domestic threat simultaneously legally qualify the West Bank settlements. Again, it really appears Israel would rather have tribalism than security.

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>We have to get them before they get us

In Israel case, its "we have to get them so they don't get us again". Not sure why this is so difficult to understand.

Not sure why you haven't bothered to read the rest of my comment as I addressed your two other points.

It’s not difficult. I apparently guessed your sentiment accurately even though I was actually describing the first head of state to be convicted of war crimes for promoting genocide and ethnic cleansing.

But, let’s make this even less difficult. Is the goal here security or dominance? Security suggests reducing hostilities but dominance suggests removing a group of people from an area of land. I really don’t see any reduction of hostilities.

Illegal according to who? The concept of legal doesn’t apply to nation states. “Legal” presupposes an enforcement framework and process which simply doesn’t exist as it applies to sovereign countries.

But more to the point you can’t claim to be rational while using terms like “the complete eradication of Gaza”. The population in Gaza has grown since the war started.

Meanwhile in southern Syria the Druze are actually being exterminated by self-proclaimed jihadis (and Palestinian “refugees”) and the whole world is turning a blind eye while Israel desperately tries to prevent a larger catastrophe. Now the Syrian Druze are requesting to be annexed by Israel and to be under IDF protection. You don’t care about Palestinians, you just hate Jews.

>The concept of legal doesn’t apply to nation states.

So when the US government repeatedly calls the Russian invasion of Ukraine illegal, you are saying they are wrong, right?

"Two years ago, Russian forces launched an illegal and indefensible all-out invasion of Ukraine"

https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/368495...

Yes, lol a press release by the Biden DoD is propaganda not factual information.

Obviously Russia is wrong on a moral level for invading its neighbor but legality doesn’t enter into the conversation.

Don't be disingenuous. Its far from "just a press release"; its the official position of the government of the United States. There are many other instances where different parts of the government call it illegal.

It is just a press release and regardless, what any country’s official position is, is irrelevant. Legality generally doesn’t apply to international relations as each state makes their own determination on what does and doesn’t apply to them.

For example the current US ambassador to Israel just announced that France will be partitioned into two states, one for France and one for Palestine, France isn’t bound by that.

> Illegal according to who?

Everyone else in the world.

I can use terms like complete eradication. What percentage of buildings in Gaza remain in safe enough conditions for people to live in? The entire strip looks like a flattened dust pile.

Yes, killing civilians is bad regardless of their identity. It seems like you are trying to shift ground to something unrelated because you have nothing of actual substance.

Now how is the conduct by Israel not tribal warfare on a nearly genocidal scale?

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