Comment by ceejayoz
4 hours ago
> Hamas itself parades in uniforms but fights in civilian clothing… But Israeli soldiers as a rule wear uniforms and Palestinians do not - ever.
Not even in parades?
> The west bank incident is also completely irrelevant.
How convenient.
> the IDF soldiers wear uniform and fight according to international laws
They are widely and credibly accused of not fighting according to international laws.
> You can't seriously suggest that Israel should equip Hamas with "thousands of items of military clothing, including boots, coats and combat vests, all in camouflage colors."
What military doesn't have boots, coats, and combat vests in its uniform?
You can't claim you get to treat them as illegal combatants because they don't have uniforms when you are embargoing the uniforms, lol.
> That said the Hamas tactics of being "civilian" do endanger their civilians in situations that could be ambiguous.
IDF HQ is right by a shopping mall. Fair to target?
Is there a way that we can actually take this discussion beyond propaganda?
I served in the IDF (a long time ago). I talked with soldiers who fought with Gaza. I'm not making stuff up based on what I saw on social media. The IDF does not just go around shooting every military aged male in Gaza. Are there scenarios where a military aged male in civilian clothing can get shot at in certain places - absolutely. Those are not the same thing and that's an important distinction. If your tactic is for people to drop in and out of being a civilian, like go to a weapon cache in civilian clothes, grab an RPG, fire it at the enemy, then drop it and become a civilian again, then those tactics have consequences. Especially in areas where civilians were ordered to evacuate.
So the original statement is false. Is there nuance when it comes to civilians operating around the front lines in areas under evacuation in a war. Totally. Those are very different things.
IDF HQ is not "right by a shopping mall". The Kiryah in Tel Aviv is clearly delineated from the civilian area. The UK and France as random examples also have their military HQs in civilian areas. But yes, the Kiryah is in Tel Aviv and not far from civilian areas. It is a very large army base that's distinct from the surrounding civilian areas. I've been there.
Targeting the Kiryah is absolutely legal. If the Hamas had similar delineation between the military and the civilian then there'd be something to talk about.
> They are widely and credibly accused of not fighting according to international laws.
Widely yes. Credibly no. Most accusations have nothing to do with actual laws and actual facts on the ground. That's not to say there haven't been incidents that are questionable but as a rule (and what the rules and the law says) soldiers are supposed to conduct themselves, and broadly do, by those laws. When you have 100's of thousands of soldiers fighting this sort of war in a dense civilian area you're going to see incidents and all western militaries do (like the original topic, the US hitting the Iranian school).
You really got me there with the parades. Yes, they do wear uniforms in parades. So they got them. No Israel is not required to equip its enemy with military gear. They can saw uniforms or wear blue shirts or whatever. But they do have uniforms.
> The IDF does not just go around shooting every military aged male in Gaza.
The NAZA movie begs to tell a different story. Hasbara mission begs every Israeli to stay silent. Even in a conversation on Israeli TV, complaining about Ben Gvir saying the quiet part out loud, the same lady says “Sure I feel bad about children dying but they are going to grow up to be terrorists”.
Shining the light on Hamas wont make Israel look better. Mud slinging hamas wont make IDF better. You having served in the IDF makes you a war criminal.