this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml
Israel is definitely complicit in genocide
The intent is probably the most important part of this definition and I don't believe that Israel fulfills that part. There are extensive measures taken to prevent civilian deaths. However this is still a war, in which civilians die.
There are also rules about human shields which defines using human shields as "... intentional co-location of military objectives and civilians ...". Which Hamas has undeniably been doing.
The burden to keep civilians out of military targets falls to the governing authority, which is Hamas.
It is important to recognize, that all these rules around war are designed to protect some groups (civilians) while still allowing for military operations. The problem is, that if these rules were to prevent nations from pursuing military objectives, because the other party commits war crimes (such as using human shields) nobody would follow these laws.
For that reason civilians kind of loose most protections when used as human shields (§3). As well as proportionally laws taking effect, that permit civilian harm to an extend if it is necessary to pursue proportionally valuable military objectives.
THAT DOESN'T MEAN IT'S NOT BAD, just probably not illegal under international law. It is reasonable to demand change and to condemn Israel on moral grounds however. Personally I also believe Israel needs to do some big changes in regards to settlements and humanitarian aid. But also the status quo needed to change. I don't understand Hamas' goal, they obviously will never win. Idk why they are refusing ceasefire agreements etc. I understand resentment against Israel, but let's be real, their negotiating power just becomes less and less.
And obviously everything needs to be investigated, but I don't know if any damming convictions actually come from this.
Blocking food aide at the borders and targeting hospitals with precise missile strikes isn't intentional? That's a stretch.
The more I read it, the more I agree with you. The other part of genocide is you must prove intent to eliminate more than just a political group. Right now the Israeli are killing a lot of innocent people, but they keep saying their goal is to eliminate Hamas, not Gaza. They know what they're doing, and likely chose that language to avoid being accused of genocide.
You could take that to mean that Ukraine is committing genocide against the Russians because they are "destroying a national group in part" by "killing members of the group." Literally any warfare would be defined as genocide under this. It's utterly meaningless and needs to be better defined.