Comment by sebzim4500
1 year ago
Both of these numbers pale in comparison to the civilian losses of Germany in WWII, and the Allies are not generally considered to have performed a genocide.
Clearly the absolute number of casualties (not even civilian casualties in this case, that is allegedly more like 15k) is not sufficient on its own to define a genocide.
The raw number of people killed isn't indicative of a genocide, it's intent and actions against a specific population. Over 1.5 million (out of 2 million) Gaza residents are displaced and facing starvation. Almost all of the hospitals in Gaza have been destroyed. Many would say Israel is committing genocide and the court today said they will continue the investigation because it's plausible.
Indeed, you don't even need to kill to commit a genocidal act, you can also prevent people from having children.
That alone doesn’t amount to a genocide:
- They’re displaced because there was active fighting in their homes.
- Hospitals were destroyed because they were being used as military outposts.
Neither of those violates the rules of war, though Hamas using hospitals as outposts is a war crime.
I think it’s a tragedy the government of Gaza brought this disaster down upon them by committing war crimes against their stronger neighbor and then further war crimes using their own population as human shields.
But that’s not a genocide.
Gaza can surrender any time and the collateral damage isn’t out of line with modern urban conflicts. Eg, US in Iraq.
Hamas was not using hospitals as outposts. That's been debunked time and time again.
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I don't think it's controversial to say that the Allies did ethnically cleanse parts of Eastern Europe to remove as many Germans as possible into German borders or internment camps, and they weren't too fussed if they died as a result. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_German...
For example, look at the section for Czechoslovakia (selecting it since it's inarguable Germans had lived in the country formerly known as Bohemia for centuries) alone:
> Between 700,000 and 800,000 Germans were affected by irregular expulsions between May and August 1945.[108] The expulsions were encouraged by Czechoslovak politicians and were generally executed by order of local authorities, mostly by groups of armed volunteers and the army.[109] [...] Transfers of population under the Potsdam agreements lasted from January until October 1946. 1.9 million ethnic Germans were expelled to the American zone, part of what would become West Germany. [...] More than 1 million were expelled to the Soviet zone, which later became East Germany.[110] The West German government estimated the expulsion death toll at 273,000 civilians,[115] and this figure is cited in historical literature.[116] However, in 1995, research by a joint German and Czech commission of historians found that the previous demographic estimates of 220,000 to 270,000 deaths to be overstated and based on faulty information. They concluded that the death toll was between 15,000 and 30,000 dead, assuming that not all deaths were reported.[117][118][119][120]
It's just that 'forced population transfers' were historically considered not outside the bounds of propriety.
Don’t forget that these international laws and treaties were born out of a desire to prevent the horrors of WWII from occurring again. Lots of actors in that war including the Allies did terrible things that are prohibited by those laws. The genocide laws, as I understand, came about as a result of the Holocaust, but the use of WMDs against civilian targets (eg destroying a city with nuclear weapons) would not be legal either.
Given this historical context, we don’t need to “whatabout” with the Allies. Surely we can agree that we do not want a repeat of WWII.
In terms of whether Israel’s actions constitute genocide, we have yet to find out. Are they grossly disproportionate compared to Oct 7, and appalling in terms of their destruction of civilian life and property? I believe yes, and whether or not that is “genocide” is, to me, somewhat besides the point. Making it stop NOW is the point!