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Comment by newspaper1 | Hacker News Reader

Does it look the same in the Ukraine? I haven’t seen any footage of entire cities leveled like this.

Many of the towns along the front with Russia are also wastelands. Nearly every single building from homes, to schools, to shops are rubble.

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/10/28/how-russias-invas...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-26/damage-data-reveals-e...

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/5/24/satellite-...

And that just from the start of war.

Yeah, we can look at how Mariupol looks on satellite images. It looks nothing like Rafah. You have to be completely blind to not see the difference.

Here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/TncezF72LxaWAKYY7

That’s Bahkmut which is still close to the frontline. They were talking about Mariupol which the Russians have actually rebuilt already, see here: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mariupol,+Donetsk+Oblast,+...

No, Mariupol was just one (arguably not the best) example answer to the original question, "Does it look the same in the Ukraine? I haven’t seen any footage of entire cities leveled like this."

"Russia is claiming it as theirs for the last four years and has largely rebuilt it" is not really counter-evidence to destruction during the fighting

Mariupol probably did see less destruction. But for the actively contested regions, the biggest difference between Russian destruction and Israeli destruction is that the Russians use artillery, which leaves shells of buildings standing, while Israel uses bulldozers that are a lot more thorough in leaving no stone on the other

Also the Palestinian buildings are practically made of cardboard because that's all the supplies they can get (because mysteriously supplies keep not arriving, oh well, no way to know why they don't)

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mar'inka,+Donetsk+Oblast,+...

Seriouslly?

You can find lots of videos of Russia firing thermobaric weapons into populated areas - you will find none fired by Israel into Gaza. And I don't think that's because IL doesn't have them.

(i can't edit apparently): why the downvotes? Serious question I don't understand, is there anything I said above false? The parent comment is questioning whether RU cruelty in Ukraine is anything close to what IL did - and the answer is yes, it's actually much worse, especially when you factor in that it's completely unprovoked.

There is no way it’s worse. To be comparable the Russians would have to have flattened Kyiv and most other cities which is extremely far from reality. The cities being flattened are all in the frontline as there is no way to take a city by force without basically destroying every building.

> The cities being flattened are all in the frontline as there is no way to take a city by force without basically destroying every building.

It's exactly the same in Gaza! You basically justified Israel's actions here... Check the distance between Gaza City & Israel border, vs distance beetween Bakhmut & Russia's border. Tell me which one is farther away - I'll wait

I wonder why Israel put the border there. It didn't used to be the border.

The destruction in Ukraine is mostly focused on the front line. Gaza was treated as a front line almost in its entirety, with almost no place to hide.

To busy using white phosphorous on kids.

Red herring, my argument was not "everything IL army did was good", it was "RU army's behavior is so much worse, how can you even question that?". IL obviously was at the very least "not very concerned" about civilian population; but I don't think there's established evidence that they were actively trying to kill civilian population, just for the sake of it, with no military advantage. Whereas, e.g. "human safari" is a well documented thing in the Russian army.

I think your distinction is a valid one, Israel has some war crimes going on whereas russian invasion of Ukraine was a war crime festival but you are fighting an uphill battle because trying to make distinctions in levels of evil is generally frowned upon because to many people it looks like justification. The reason is because most people can't imagine any other value to making distinctions in evil. I personally can but each time you are going to do it, you should be prepared to defend why, in fact, making those distinctions is useful while being clear that the purpose is not justification of evil acts. It's a thin line to walk on.

Well, Russia's use of white phosphorous during the invasion and ensuing occupation of Ukraine is well documented

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