ICC Judge Guillou loses all US IT accounts after MAGA sanctions [FR]
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Before the arrest warrant by the Judge, before the ICC prosecutor even attempted to ask for arrest, they asked second opinion from a Panel of Experts in International Law that included top experts, including Theodor Meron; Hebrew University (M.J.), Harvard Law School (LL.M., J.S.D.) and Cambridge University (Diploma in Public International Law) who was once was a legal adviser of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, then Israeli Ambassador in Canada, President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and so on.
The panel unanimously agreed with the prosecutor.
This isn’t a debate around this international law, but international law broadly.
The ICC has no jurisdiction in America, Russia or China. Nor India, Pakistan, Indonesia and a host of other states. Most of the world’s population and most of the world’s economy isn’t subject to it. (Even those who are find convenient excuses for not enforcing its warrants.)
International law experts will agree these warrants are legal because per international law they are. The broader debate being missed is what role international law has to play in a multipolar world. Historically, and by that I mean Metternich’s peace, the law that matters in multipolar international politics is only that which the great powers agree to, and only so long as they agree to it.
That is because the ICC has no jurisdiction unless the UN accepted government of the involved territory grants them jurisdiction. The only UN accepted government in Israel is the Israeli government. So according to the Rome statute, only Israel's government gets to decide if a case on Israel's territory (and Gaza is Israeli territory) is allowed to proceed, and of course, they don't want this case to proceed. There is hamas and the PA, who aren't UN accepted governments of any territory whatsoever, who both have signed the Rome statute but have also both sworn to never carry out any ICC judgement.
So now there's ONE exception: The ICC asserts jurisdiction, against the will of the local government, in ONE single location: Israel. In fact the ICC adjusted it's own rules to do this. Is the ICC allowed to change it's own rules? Well, no, of course it isn't. Yet the case is proceeding.
There's another problem, the ICC also has a rule: it does not accept cases unless the government on the ground actually upholds the Rome statute. Now here there's more exceptions. South Africa, Mongolia, Hungary, Sudan, and others have all signed the Rome treaty but have openly violated it, and the ICC has refused their cases ... sometimes. Now of course, Palestine is another example: both Hamas and the PA have signed the Rome Statute (hamas did when they went for election in 2006), have never left it and refused to carry it out when called upon. Now to be fair the ICC refused the Palestinian case, and them refusing to uphold the ICC treaty they signed was a factor in that. But South Africa was allowed to lodge a complaint, despite that they also refused to carry out the ICC treaty (2 cases: against the Sudanese president Assad and sort-of against Russian president Putin). Again the ICC changed it's rules, again, to allow the case to move forward.
Even at the ICC, starting cases after you've declared you'll never accept any judgement if you lose is not allowed. That the case is still proceeding means justice and respecting international treaties has long gone out the window.
The point here is that the government of Palestine shouldn't be allowed to start cases at the ICC, according to Rome treaty rules, because their governments aren't accepted. AND they shouldn't allowed to start cases, because they have declared they have no intention of ever carrying out ICC arrest warrants against Palestinians and have no intention of doing so (in fact both Hamas spokesmen and Abbas have shouted, repeatedly and loudly, on TV that they will never ever carry out an ICC decision against a Palestinian). Oh and Hamas is a terrorist organization that itself is outlawed by the UN.
So there is a bit of a question what a conviction of Israel would prove, now that the ICC has changed it's own rules, "illegally", TWICE to even allow a case to be brought, and will have to do so a third time to convict (that's what the whole intent issue is about). Currently the court has tried "to be fair" by issuing arrest warrants on both sides, but of course nobody, least of all Palestinians, discuss the little detail that Palestine is facing the exact same accusation as Israel (and technically the court has declared that hamas did commit genocide on October 7 2023, with full intent, even if they stopped short of convicting them there and then). Of course changing the law to convict a Jew because of politics is nothing new.
There's also the question of what any outcome of this case would accomplish, since Israel has withdrawn from the Rome treaty long before the case was brought, and so won't carry out any court decision (and that's legal according to UN law), and while Palestine has signed the Rome treaty, they have sworn and openly declared many times they won't carry out any court decision (illegally, as in the signed treaties saying they would carry them out, then just don't do it) (and the question "If Palestine signs treaties then doesn't carry them out, what's the point of any treaties with them?" isn't allowed to be discussed). Neither the court, nor the UN, have any power to carry out a decision themselves. So what is the point of the case, exactly?
Frankly, clearly for Palestinians this case isn't being fought on merit but on politics. And if it's fought on politics, then what is the problem with what Trump and Israel are doing?
Source?
This is half-right - officially only the State of Palestine (really Abbas, the PA president) has signed, Hamas hasn't. Presumably the ICC wouldn't recognize Hamas as a member even if they tried to sign, since they operate under the fiction that the PA is the de jure government of Gaza (despite never having controlled it).
It just seems very impractical to accept the death of your own soldiers in the face of an enemy that hides behind their population as human shields.
It's baffling the lenghts US politicians go to enforce apartheid against the palestinians, on the Tel-Aviv regime behalf, even when it threatens US business interests abroad. Any government worth their salt must be running from US based information technology infrastructure like it were the plague.
It reflects the optimism of the 1990s’ newly unipolar world, one in which a rules-based international order —guaranteed by the United States—would reign supreme. That world started falling apart after 9/11 (specifically, the Bush administration’s response to it). It shattered with Xi pressing into the South China Sea and Russia annexing Crimea, though it wasn’t obvious it was lost until Putin blew into Ukraine and Trump 47.
Washington shouldn’t be sanctioning the ICC. It has no jurisdiction over America; what we’re doing is akin to water ballooning the girls’ sleepover. But the Rome Statute’s signatories should find a new method for ensuring the dream of universal human rights isn’t lost.
Continuing to bet on the ICC is continuing to bet on a dead horse. More of the world’s population, most of its economy, sits outside Statute signatory members. If we let the failed implementation get convoluted with the ideals that gave rise to it, we risk losing both for a generation.
I actually don't mind tyranny on some level if I can't do anything against them. it just feels good having the mask of righteousness & honor fall off so that the world can see the ugly, unvarnished, hypocritical beast under the makeup.
I’m saying all the great powers are rogue regimes by this definition. The only place the ICC applied was Europe, but now even it is ignoring its rulings.
The consensus that restrained the might makes right default of international relations has failed.
Western countries preach about morals, human rights, rules-based order, and all kinds of bullshit but always seem to violate their acclaimed principles every Wednesday.
China sells weapons to everyone who has money, works with all kinds of regimes, and generally have a non-interventionist policy. That's why smaller countries tend to prefer partnering with them. They're not your fairy godmother, but at least they're honest about what they want.
What? China regularly sells itself as a peaceful alternative to America. Russia used to make that pitch until the irony became too ridiculous to maintain.
> China sells weapons to everyone who has money, works with all kinds of regimes, and generally have a non-interventionist policy
They’ve been brazen about Taiwan!
> why smaller countries tend to prefer partnering with them
Except all the ones within shooting distance.
China says that, but they put countries into enormous debt and then control them. They also build naval bases in many of those countries.
> smaller countries tend to prefer partnering with them
Countries near China's borders have turned strongly against their neighbor. The US has built a widespread network of alliances around that.
All the third-world countries that have had their debts to China blow out of control have been able to renegotiate.
>Countries near China's borders have turned strongly against their neighbor. The US has built a widespread network of alliances around that.
I'm not upholding China as a moral actor. They're as utilitarian as anyone else, but they're honest about it, that's all.
Not every country is the same - that's a line used by bad actors to avoid scrutiny. And they are not honest about it - they say they don't interfere and are not acting for political interests, but they do.
> All the third-world countries that have had their debts to China blow out of control have been able to renegotiate.
I haven't read that but would be interested if you know of something. Also, what did they have to give up?
There have been people from Africa put on trial - I would guess more than from Europe. Duerte from the Philippines is being prosecuted now.
You use the username 'churchill'?
I think Russia deserves a lot of credit. It started long before Crimea. They had a military incursion into Georgia, secured a pro-Kremlin dictator in Belarus, nearly got away with the same in Ukraine and some other neighboring republics - all while buttering up the EU with energy deals. I think the European and American (non-)response to that was the death knell of that "rules-based" worldview.
While Russia acted belligerently, China played the long game to cement its geopolitical influence and make itself "too big to fail".
If there was a domestic inflection point in the US and in the EU, I think that was actually the housing crisis / the sovereign debt crisis around 2007-2009. That really undermined the optimism about supranational institutions.
Afghanistan was endorsed by the UN Security Council [1]. Iraq was not [2]. That set a loud precedent that wars of conquest were back on the table. (To be clear, they were never really off. China invaded and annexed Tibet without much of a fuss during the Cold War.)
> China played the long game to cement its geopolitical influence and make itself "too big to fail"
Nobody was ever bailing out China if it fails. It’s unclear it would be bailed out today. Too big to fail doesn’t apply.
What China has done is become too big to ignore. (Though Xi, being a dictator, seems unable to not squander goodwill every time China earns it. First with the Wolf Warrior nonsense. Now with these rare earth export restrictions on everyone.)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Counci...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Counci...
The blow was significant - the US fabricated and misinterpreted evidence to justify the invasion, not only conducting an effectively illegal international war and violating that most fundamental of international laws, but also undermining the integrity of the international order's leader, the US itself. The rest of the West was so happy when Obama took over, he got the Nobel Peace Prize before he did anything - I think just for supporting the liberal order.
But like all recent Democratic leaders, he didn't fight much for it or for its values. Then Biden particularly was egregious, abandoning the cause of freedom (in Afghanistan, west Africa, India, China, etc.). His support for Ukraine and Taiwan appeared, to me, strictly geopolitical. In fact, I remember hearing that US officials had a policy to argue not for Ukraine's freedom and democracy, but for its sovereignty - and they seemed to observe that policy.
Without values, you have no direction, no force, no way to lead or organize. Biden's enemies have clear values - nationalism, ethnic nationalism, power (as value in itself). What were Biden's? What are the Democrats'? They've shut down the government over no value, only healthcare funding.
> On 12 September 2002, Netanyahu lobbied for the invasion of Iraq, testifying under oath as a private citizen before the U.S. House of Representatives Government Reform Committee regarding the alleged nuclear threat posed by the Iraqi régime: "There is no question whatsoever that Saddam is seeking and is working and is advancing towards the development of nuclear weapons…"[74][75] He also testified, "If you take out Saddam, Saddam's regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region."[75]
I must’ve missed something: when was the GOP federal power trifecta broken?
In their own words, during the last shutdown: if you control Congress you own the shutdown. Period.
As for Belarus, the country only had free and fair elections once: in 1994, when Lukashenko became the president. Lukashenko was already a dictator when Putin was still a civil servant in Saint Petersburg.
As a global institution it certainly has. It has no jurisdiction over most of the world, and has net lost signatories since its birth [1]. And even where it has jurisdiction, it’s unceremoniously ignored [2].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_parties_to_the_Rome_Sta...
[2] https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20241127-france-says-n...
Countries do not join because ICC is a failure.
More countries do not join because ICC is is not failure and is not compromised.
It’s international law. Everything is, by definition, a political matter between sovereign states.
The ICC as an ideal may not be a failure, sure. As an instrument of practically effecting the world, it has failed. More than that, its impotence seems to have emboldened the notion that not only is its specific international law obsolete, but so is the concept of universal rights that states can’t deny.
So for instance, the ICC refused to hear a case brought against China on the Uyghur issue. The ICC refuses to hear cases on the Congo/Rwanda conflict. It initially refused the case against Duterte (and may refuse it again). The ICC refuses to hear a LOT of cases because governments refuse to accept ICC jurisdiction.
But the ICC has now chosen to deny the government of Israel that right. Israel withdrew from the Rome treaty, and denied the ICC the right to accept cases on Israeli territory ... and the ICC accepted this case on Israeli territory. And this isn't even the only Rome treaty rule that case violates.
The ICC itself has now chosen to ignore the rules in the treaty that created the ICC.
Israel doesn't have any legal right to Gaza under international law, which was part of the 1947 plan's Arab State.
SCOTUS and the lower courts now selectively use history and tradition to skirt legislative texts to do whatever they want. For instance, the Second Amendment is clear and absolute that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and arms did not used to be forbidden when traveling — much less from airports, which did not exist, or even nautical ports. Yet the federal government prohibits carrying arms on airplanes, or even around the airport. Even my combo utility knife and bottle opener, with blade removed outside the airport, got confiscated recently.
Obviously, the usual rules do not apply to Trump (but do apply to similarly situated Democrat presidents).
And for something more quotidian, Florida state judges usually just do whatever the hell they want, summary-judgment and other rules be damned. And it's a rarity to get any appellate relief: the appellate courts typically affirm per curiam — that is, without any explanation whatsoever, on account of which the litigant is prohibited to seek further review in the Florida Supreme Court!
We are now a government of men, not of laws, and illogic and injustice reign supreme.
> Continuing to bet on the ICC is continuing to bet on a dead horse.
That would be quitting by the ICC's supporters in the middle of the game. It amazes me how many non-neo-fascists embrace surrender and quitting like it's wisdom; like they are troops who actually listen to wartime propgandists like Tokyo Rose. The other team has scored; so you quit? Your app hasn't reached it's full market; so it's pointless and you stop now? On that basis, you'd never get started. (Particularly, the idea that lack of full success now is evidence of hopelessless - that is bizarre.)
The narrative of reactionaries has long been similar to the parent: It's childish idealism, it will die soon, etc. They find the narrative effective: it has emotional power - the childish part, the alarmism - and connects to that traumatic side of people that says ideals are pointless, that a hard cold world is 'reality'. It's power is when people believe it. Maybe the reactionaries actually believe it, and that's why they don't support those projects.
For example, I've read that the EU is on its last legs, may not last more than ____, since I started paying attention to such things. Even today, liberal democracy, after centuries of outstanding success, spreading around the world and being the most politically and economically (and militarily) successful political system in human history - is called a childish dream that will never work.
> It reflects the optimism of the 1990s’ newly unipolar world, one in which a rules-based international order —guaranteed by the United States—would reign supreme.
I think that also reflects that reactionary narrative - the idea that it's just a pipedream of a momentary trend; they also say universal human rights, which is written into the 18th century US Declaration of Independence and Constitution (which had their own predecessors), is just a fantasy of post-WWII liberalism. Some of these arguments are laughable.
The optimism long predated the end of the Cold War. After WWII, for example, aggressive warfare was successfully (not perfectly) outlawed, and institutions such as the UN, World Bank and IMF, EU (its ancestor), and many more were created after WWII - and by people who experienced the hard, cold aspects of the world than we are. And they weren't the start; they built on accomplishments of their predecessors.
> For starters, all accounts opened at US providers (Amazon, Airbnb, Netflix, Paypal, etc.) are immediately closed. The delivery companies whose capital is American stop delivering the ordered parcels, and the magistrate says that a hotel reservation taken for a stay in France has been blocked by the Expedia platform in the name of the sanctions to which he is subject.
> This is further complicated by the possible interruption of the payment methods that pass through the Visa or Mastercard networks. Nor can it make bank transfers via intermediaries like Western Union.
Is Google required to essentially brick the phone of any sanctioned user using any of the international vendors here [2]? Certainly I would say the answer is at the very least "maybe," especially with how export restrictions have historically treated cryptography of all kinds.
It's really important to keep this in mind - it's not just about your ability to install unapproved apps, it's about basic levels of access to one's contacts, photographed memories, and fundamental ability to communicate. And this can be applied to anyone the increasingly-authoritarian U.S. government considers not even a threat, but politically expedient to paint as one.
[0] https://9to5google.com/2025/08/25/android-apps-developer-ver...
You can't expect not to be arrested if you start actually fiddling with people's computers, even indirectly like that.
The USA as we knew is long dead.
Sanctions abroad can't allow you to refuse service in this way. Depending on whether legal action is taken all these firms may be blocked from operating in Europe. There's also a specific blocking state further reinforcing this kind of thing.
Because of the blocking statue, contractual terminations because of sanctions are forbidden, so these firms still have to deliver. Apparently you may only void contracts due to terminations if you apply for a derogation from the European Commission.
Targeted sanctions against an allied state can be good: they're a tool for a state to say that as as friends we won't help you with a specific thing (often an ill-advised military action). General sanctions against a non-ally can be good too, and extending the sanctions to politically-important figures makes sense (for example, Russia and oligarchs).
General sanctions against individuals where their country isn't sanctioned? That's bullying. The ICC derives its authority from its members, and if the US doesn't like that then it should take that up with the member states, not the individuals.
International politics is fuzzy enough (and the current public face of the USA is unstable enough) that it's definitely not a good idea -- but I'm tempted to say that we (as in: the UK) should draw a line and tell the US that if they want to play silly games then they're going to win silly prizes. And that if they want to sanction ICC officials (or, indeed, officials of other organisations that we participate in as a country) then they'll need to sanction the whole of the UK. It's probably a good thing I'm not a politician.
The fact that this would probably cost the governing party their rule is why the ICC has been failing. Elites love it. Ordinary people couldn’t be fucked.
Can I ask you why you approve of them? The only people they hurt are the average everyday citizens, the working poor in the target country. And while the naive expectation might be that the economic hardship would lead to them turning on their government and pressuring them to correct the behaviour that lead to sanctions, in turns out in practice it actually boosts support for their government as they come to see the sanctioning countries as their enemies.
It should be abundantly clear how much of a failure sanctions are from how easily Russia ignores them while continuing to invade Ukraine for three years and counting. North Korea has been subject to a virtually global embargo since 1950, a full 75 years at this point. It has not affected the position of their government in any way at all, nor did it prevent them from obtaining nuclear weapons, but has rendered the people utterly desolate to the point of mostly not even having electricity. See also Cuba, Iran. I would really like to know what people see in this policy that seems to only exist to inflict undue suffering.
I think a key part of my thinking is "projecting political pressure". That's not what's happening in Cuba, there's no "we want you to stop doing $X and then the sanctions will end".
Whether the Iranian sanctions can be effective is a matter for debate -- and for a while at least, it seemed they were, and we appeared to be making good progress towards not needing them any more.
Modern sanctions are tending towards embargoing specific classes of goods, and things that affect the elite more than the general population. For example, the UK is refusing to sell weapons (directly) to Israel. And various countries have impounded assents owned by Russian oligarchs.
My preference would be for sanctions to come with a clear policy objective stating what they're trying to change (or to avoid) and what conditions need to be met in order to have them withdrawn. The Cuban (and ICC) sanctions instead look like punishment, and the Iranian and North Korean sanctions appear to me to be a mix.
What's even in it for America? This is "Make Israel Great Again" politics.
Washington has brokered a peace deal that it’s very proud of and expects a Nobel Peace prize for if it holds. At this point, we’re dealing with one man’s ego more than any policy position of the United States.
This is just a rogue state going mask-off.
Imagine if China or Russia even suggested the same willingness during a press conversation, let alone making a law to that effect.
Previously: I think you mean Dutch citizens, given that the Hague is in the Netherlands and not Switzerland.
Sure. Every one of the great powers is currently engaging in killings that are highly illegal under international law.
> “Admiral,” Miller asked, “the military has aerial drones, correct?”
> “Yes,” the Admiral answered.
> “And some of those drones are equipped with missiles, correct?”
> “Sure,” the Admiral said, beginning to catch on.
> Miller pressed further: “And when a boat full of migrants is in international waters, they aren’t protected by the U.S. Constitution, right?”
> The Admiral clarified that while technically true, international law still applied.
> “Then tell me why,” Miller said, “can’t we use a Predator drone to obliterate that boat?”
> The Admiral, a veteran of military command, was dumbfounded. “Because it would be against international law,” he replied. You can’t kill unarmed civilians just because you want to.
> Stephen Miller didn’t appear interested in the legal implications. Indeed, he seemed more interested in whether anyone could stop Trump from committing such acts.
> “Admiral,” he concluded, “I don’t think you understand the limitations of international law.”
(From: https://archive.ph/20250922161327/https://www.treason.io/p/r...)
And then: "Stephen Miller takes leading role in strikes on alleged Venezuelan drug boats"
(From: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/29/stephen-mill...)
"Every great power" is not currently doing this kind of shit. This is a straight-on white supremacist murder party.
What the fuck do you think Russia is doing in Ukraine and Africa? Israel in Gaza? China in Xinjiang and Tibet?
International law is currently not protective against great powers. And not every issue in the world collapses into the American White-Black dichotomy.
We’re pretty even to each other at this point. Threats of annexation, no rule of law, murder on the high seas, allegations of genocide.
The next series of horrors will emerge around robotics, lasers and potentially the collapse of free navigation of international waters. (I don’t see deëscalation until both Trump and Xi are dead.)
That's true for any negotiated, i.e. conditional, armistice. If you want one side to be happy, you have to press for unconditional surrender. Palestine doesn't have the capability to force Israel to unconditionally surrender.
In any case, what we call it is irrelevant. (What the Norwegian Noble Committee calls it is irrelevant.) What matters is what the President thinks. And he thinks it's a peace deal that could make him a Nobel laureate. Which gives him an interest in not letting, as he sees it, an ICC judge mess with his deal.
> Palestinian resistance got nothing out of it
No shit. The October 7 attacks were terrorist attacks. The literature on terrorism is they extremely rarely achieve their political goals.
It's still not a peace deal. It does look more akin to surrender of fighting by the palestinian resistance, motivated by the civillian population reaching a breaking point because of the starvation and bombing. Moral of the story is that collective punishment works, I suppose.
> The October 7 attacks were terrorist attacks
There is no logically-consistent definition you can provide that would make that raid a terrorist attack without also capturing Israel's actions as terrorist attacks. The aggressive actions they took that day have been outdone 100-fold by Israel. The prisoners they took were a drop in the sea compared to the number of people Israel held in "administrative detention" alone, let alone all the people they randomly snatch with some bogus accusations. The state in which those prisoners returned compared to the state in which palestinian prisoners returned are day and night.
When their acts are compared objectively, the conclusions never go in Israel's favor.
Sure, whatever, it’s an armistice. Practically, it means Palestinians aren’t dying at hundreds or thousands a clip. And it means Trump can think he’s in line in Oslo.
> Moral of the story is that collective punishment works, I suppose
Moral is we’re in a multipolar world. America is no longer world cop, which means we’re back to 19th century great power dynamics.
> no logically-consistent definition you can provide that would make that raid a terrorist attack without also capturing Israel's actions as terrorist attacks
Granted. But Israel also waged a military campaign against Hamas infrastructure (and allegedly the Gaza population).
I’m not making a moral argument. Just a practical one. Killing a kidnapping civilians is a goading into war. Sinwar was explicit about his expectation of war with Israel.
He thought Iran and its proxies would be more capable. That’s a fair miscalculation. But after being faced with evidence of that fuckup, he didn’t sue for peace or attempt to return the hostages.
At the same time, Israel could have absolutely prosecuted this war more precisely. (They didn’t, and that has and probably will cost them a great deal until someone realises turning Netanyahu over to the ICC is a get out of jail free card.)
In the end, since October 7, the best Gaza could hope for was ceasefire and international occupation. The idea that an independent Palestine was ever on the table from anyone relevant, i.e. Israel and Palestine’s geographic neighbors and defence and trading partners, was always wishful. (I mean independent as sovereign. A demilitarized Gaza that is independent on paper but in practice bordered by the region’s most powerful military is the West Bank all over again.)
Is every act of violent resistance against one's oppressor a "terrorist attack", what does the literature say? What distinguishes a terrorist attack from a counter-offensive?
Is it the targeting of civilians? But that didn't start on October 7th, so if that's the case, why isn't Palestine getting everything they want, and why aren't you arguing that Israel shouldn't expect to get anything out of their terrorist attacks against Palestine?
Last one is a rhetorical question, we know the answer by now. Israel and the US have all the power therefore their actions are righteous and any sort of retribution is terrorism, propped up by a million different ways to try to erase and rewrite history.
Argue what you mean. You believe those terrorist attacks are _justified_. There are lots of ways to argue that point. But one of them is ends justification. Did it work out for the people it was supposedly on behalf of?
"Palestine doesn't get what they deserve because they engaged in terrorism" is a hypocritical, useless argument.
P.S. Everyone is "justified" in doing anything they can to regain their freedom once all legal options are exhausted. If you lock a person in your basement I believe they're entirely justified in bashing your face in the first chance they get. It's absurd to imply that they aren't, and it's even more absurd to try to use "but they bashed my face in" as a moral justification to further victimize your basement prisoner.
Objectives. Targeting military infrastructure and symbols of a regime can deplete martial capacity and domestic support. Targeting civilians pretty much always results in unifying the enemy—this goes back to Hitler trying to bomb Britain into submission from afar.
> that didn't start on October 7th, so if that's the case, why isn't Palestine getting everything they want
Huh? Nobody argued that everything except terrorism is a winning strategy.
> why aren't you arguing that Israel shouldn't expect to get anything out of their terrorist attacks against Palestine?
They’re the stronger military. Absent international law or pressure, might makes right.
> Last one is a rhetorical question
Literally answered it. If you’re saying you’ve presumed an answer and don’t wish to hear others, sure.
> Israel and the US have all the power therefore their actions are righteous and any sort of retribution is terrorism
You’re getting lost in your own analogies.
We can construct convincing moral models that indict both sides of this conflict because multiple actors have behaved abhorrently. (One or two have more capability and thus can act on their impulses more fully.) If you’re writing as a historian, sure, apportion blame.
If you’re thinking as a strategist, however, outcomes are what matter. And on an outcome basis, October 7 was strategically stupid (it could has been genius, but Hamas and PJ have no discipline), while the current ceasefire saves lives.
"It didn't work therefore it was stupid to even try" is one hell of a way to judge strategic decisions. When all your options have a near-0% chance of success, everything is going to look "stupid" in retrospect, by that logic.
Solid play on the part of the US' adversaries to have their agent perform this move on their behalf.
/s