The International Criminal Court prosecutor said Monday that he has requested arrest warrants for the leaders of Hamas and for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.
In a statement, the prosecutor, Karim Khan, said he would seek warrants for Yahya Sinwar, Muhammad Deif and Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas. He also said he was requesting warrants for Mr. Netanyahu and for Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant.
I don’t agree with Hamas (I really don’t have an opinion because I don’t know much about them, and what I know is biased as fuck), but I can’t totally fault them.
First, them fighting back is probably necessary, or they probably wouldn’t exist.
Second, they’re fighting a much stronger force. Conventional warfare, even if possible, wouldn’t work. They’d be destroyed in an instant.
Third, they’re in one of the most densely populated areas in the world. Everything they do must involve civilians. They don’t have a choice but to “use civilians as body shields” (as Israel says) because there’s almost literally no space that isn’t occupied by civilians.
Hamas’s actions and methods are out of necessity because of the situation Israel placed them in. They were also propped up by Israel. Israel is essentially to blame for all of it at the end. Hamas’s leaders probably should be held to account just to ensure people can’t argue unfairness, but if things don’t change they’ll be replaced.
Let me get this out of the way. The ICC should have the full opportunity to try and convict Netanyahu. The genocide being committed in Gaza is horrific. The fact that he funneled money to Hamas also makes him complicit in their attack on October 7th.
Hamas has preyed on the plight of the Palestinian people for the past 30+ years, and if the power dynamic was reversed between Isreal and Hamas, the state would have been all but fully cleansed of Jewish people shortly after the conflict began. We may even be living in a world where Palestine and Isreal are two separate states if Arafat wasn’t afraid of hardliners like Hamas killing him and could have accepted the Camp David agreement. The distruction of Isreal is their ultimate goal. Hamas is the reason Egypt keeps their border closed to the Palestinian refugees, as they are considered a threat to the stability of Egyptian society and government, proving so multiple times in the past. Hamas using civilians, hospitals, schools, and so on as sheilds is by design, not logistics. They care nothing for the innocent deaths they cause of their own people. The ruling power of Hamas is not even in Gaza, being in Qatar, ruthlessly manipulating the Palestinian people in their quest to destroy Israel without any threat to themselves. There will be no possible two-state solution while Hamas remains in power.
I don’t know what the solution is for Isreal and Palestine. My heart hurts for the innocents in Gaza, but their situation is being caused by Hamas as much as Isreal. So no, be sympathetic to the Palestinian people, but save none of those feelings for Hamas. You should totally fault them, as their goals are just as evil as ISIS, The Muslim Brotherhood, and Al Qaeda.
I agree with most of your comment except this:
Just open up Google maps and look at Gaza. It might be intent, but it’s also logistics. There is hardly any space that isn’t occupied, and the majority of that is right against the border so not suitable for use by militarized group with inferior power. You don’t “play fair” when your enemy is hundreds of times stronger than you.
Also, I do want to point out that a large bit of why there’s conflict is because Europeans coming to Israel purchased farms in the region. These farms were traditionally worked by Muslims, and this continued for a while. At some point they agreed to only hire Jews, making it so the Muslim people, who had survived by working on farms, no longer could make a living. This is how they started to become displaced and also when the violence started. Hamas exists because of this, and because Jews wanted to get rid of them. Sure, Hamas wants to do the same, but they were put into the position they’re in. Israel chose their position.
Im “sympathetic” to Hamas in that I try to understand the history of it and the reasons for conflict existing. They’re goals are horrible and their methods suck, but I don’t fault the kid on the playground throwing sand in their bully’s eyes because it isn’t fair. Yeah, Hamas shouldn’t exist, and hopefully they don’t some day. They exist because of Israel’s actions and choices though. You don’t get to cause issues and then complain about the consequences without being called out. Hopefully a solution is set up where the Hamas doesn’t have power anymore, but that requires fixing the causes of the problems.
Is it a tiny area? Yes. But they can find other places than schools and hospitals. Sorry no. The blatant disregard for lives is apparent for Hamas as much as it is for the IDF. War isn’t fair by definition, but a force that intentionally puts in danger the lives they are supposedly fighting for as a PR stunt doesn’t need you to white knight them. The Palestinian do.
And to be clear, Jewish Zionists and the west had a major hand in all of this, but didn’t cause this in a vacuum either. 900,000 Jews had to flee Muslim countries from 1948 to 1979 because of ethnic cleansing. Why are Gaza, the Golan Heights, and East Jerusalem occupied? Because of multiple wars started by Arab nations seeking to destroy Isreal. Hamas began in 1987 as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood to operate as violent militants separate from the PLO who was staring to accept comprimise and terms of the Isreali government. There are Islamist that will never accept Isreal, and Isreal’s destruction is the backbone of Hamas’s cause. The only way to “fix the problem” for them would be for the Jews to leave.
Netanyahu doesn’t want a two-state solution to be successful either, and that is why he gave money to Hamas, to help prevent the Palestinian Authority from gaining power in Gaza which would be a much more moderate government. Prime Minister Rabin was killed in 1995 by a Zionist Ultranational because of Oslo. Since then, Netanyahu’s party has done everything they can to destabilize any hope for peace to stay in power by fear. Settlers and apartheid policies abound. I am not giving Isreal a pass on this at all.
But BOTH sides need to decide they are tired of the violence and let moderate voices be heard, those open to both coexistence and comprise. While Netanyahu’s Likur party and Hamas remain in power, this will not be a possibility.