Comment by edanm
2 years ago
You think it's cynical to change your argument to fit your audience? I don't understand this.
The basic argument is "If you think it was legitimate when X country did this, then what's different here?" I think it's very valid to find an X that the person you're speaking to will actually agree with.
I think politicians and government officials using an historic atrocity to justify an ongoing one is cynical.
The other details are mostly incidental.
I don't think it's using an historic atrocity, it's using an analogy. And btw, the analogy isn't to Dresden, because Israel is at the very least claiming it isn't targeting civilians in that manner. The comparison is to ISIS/Iraq/Afghanistan/etc.
You can legitimately think that those wars weren't justified, or that no war is ever justified. Some people think that way. I think most people don't think that way.
I certainly don't, and I think a war against Hamas is incredibly justified. That doesn't mean I automatically agree with everything Israel does btw, nor should it.
> And btw, the analogy isn't to Dresden, because Israel is at the very least claiming it isn't targeting civilians in that manner. The comparison is to ISIS/Iraq/Afghanistan/etc.
'The comparison' in fact varies according to what defenders of Israeli disproportionate violence against Gazan civilians actually say. That particular example is one I saw made on television: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewLx9XN8sLc
And indeed the comparison was made specifically to justify the measures that Israel has taken which indisputably affect primarily civilians (the siege, which there is very wide agreement constitutes a war crime). And the Israeli politician in the video does in fact react with opprobrium to the suggestion that the Allied bombing of civilians in WWII might not have been one of the just elements of the war.
There should be no real analogy to Dresden in any case; WWI night time bombing raids were carried from altitude above flak defenses over blacked out cities prior to GPS using dead reckoning and uncertain waypoint identification.
Dresden was defended as the justified bombing of a strategic target, a major rail transport and communication centre, housing 110 factories and 50,000 workers in support of the German war effort.
Had the technology of the time included GPS positioning and laser guided missiles there would not have been widespread bombing across the broader city area "just to be sure".
The issue here today is an incredibly high civilian to justified target ratio despite having centimeter precison targeting and high resolution overview of the region of interest.
Deeper issues go back into the history of strategies of minority groups with decision making powers on both sides that resulted in dragging a majority of civilians into this current situation.
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