Hindsight is 20-20, I suppose.

…Though in this case, so was foresight.

8 years and a number of Prime Ministers I’d find embarrassing as an Australian after the referendum, and we’re still discussing what the Brexit deal should look like. Great job, lads.

It’s shitty, but you will get one of them in power, and it’s encumbent on you to vote for the obvious lesser of two evils.

If you like the Greens (or whoever else’s) policies, work to fight for them the other 1,458 days of the election cycle - polling day is for buying a few more years of moribund US democracy - not for pissing away your vote and letting the fascists in.

That, and it was a good story set in the Star Wars universe rather than a Star Wars story where entire universe is the same 3 characters and their friends - every. goddamn. time.

Still waiting on that definition of genocide or a meaningful distinction from the Nazis.

Meanwhile, I don’t need to make an argument - I’ll just let the Israeli leadership do that for me…

Prime Minister Netanyahu 

They (Israel/IDF) are committed to completely eliminating this evil from the world,”

and 

You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember.

and

I don’t call them human animals because that would be insulting to animals

“Defence” minister Galant

We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly

Kallner…

Nakba to the enemy now! This day is our Pearl Harbour. We will still learn the lessons. Right now, one goal: Nakba! A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48. A Nakba in Gaza and a Nakba for anyone who dares to join!

Atbaryan… 

erasing all of Gaza from the face of the Earth. Gaza needs to be wiped out.

Halevi…

goals for this victory. One, there is no more Muslim land in the land of Israel. After we make it the land of Israel, Gaza should be left as a monument, like Sodom.”

Suit yourself, Rudolph Jitler.

Your inability to point to a meaningful distinction between those you’re supporting and literal Nazis or provide a consistent definition of genocide (because you can’t manufacture one that describes Hamas without admitting Israel is committing one) says far more than Godwin’s law ever will.

A neutral news outlet like Reuters generally won’t apply characterisations like “genocide” themselves - they’ll report on the ICJ ruling.

In the meantime, we can apply the UN definition the ICJ uses, or the dictionary definition for ourselves. That makes things very clear.

Why not just take the Israeli leadership at their word and compare their actions to either the UN or dictionary definition of genocide? It’s pretty straightforward.

Here’s the full UN definition:

A mental element: the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such"; and
A physical element, which includes the following five acts, enumerated exhaustively:
    Killing members of the group
    Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
    Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part
    Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
    Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group

A major portion of the Palestinian territory has been flattened, and supplies to rebuild have been blocked, people can’t return, and are kept in concentration camp conditions. Israel have killed more civilians than the total number of Hamas members in existence, and are showing no signs of “progress” - let alone slowing down. There’s also the small fact that they funded the rise of Hamas over the secular moderates - seemingly to create the pretext for the genocide they’re now committing. Tens of thousands of dead isn’t isolated incidents - particularly when they’re just stating their genocidal intent. Here’s some relevant quotes… I can provide admission that they were funding Hamas too if you’d like.

Prime Minister Netanyahu

They (Israel/IDF) are committed to completely eliminating this evil from the world,”

and

You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember.

and

I don’t call them human animals because that would be insulting to animals

“Defence” minister Galant

We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly

Kallner…

Nakba to the enemy now! This day is our Pearl Harbour. We will still learn the lessons. Right now, one goal: Nakba! A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48. A Nakba in Gaza and a Nakba for anyone who dares to join!

Atbaryan…

erasing all of Gaza from the face of the Earth. Gaza needs to be wiped out.

Halevi…

goals for this victory. One, there is no more Muslim land in the land of Israel. After we make it the land of Israel, Gaza should be left as a monument, like Sodom.”

If someone tells you they want to commit a genocide before killing tens of thousands of civilians in a few months while subjugating the entire population they’ve said they want to exterminate, I think it’s safe to believe them.

Right? No human could possibly find genocide to be abhorrent - it must be the bots.

You don’t understand what a comparison is, do you? If you’re comparing 2 things, they’re definitionally not the same single thing - I asked for meaningful differences between the two.

If there’s no meaningful difference, I think it would be sensible to respond as though they’re dealing with the rise of the Nazis.

Some similarities - they’re far-right authoritarians that have pivoted their leadership around the creation and subjugation of a ethno-religious “other”, while spouting openly genocidal rhetoric, and beginning the early steps of the genocide they’ve laid the plans for. They’re hostile to their neighbours, and will undoubtedly move on to annexing them given the opportunity once the Palestinian annexation is complete.

Some differences would be that Israel is less homophobic than the Nazis were at that point, and that Israel established an apartheid state and (open air) concentration camp as a preparatory step, which the Nazis didn’t. Israel also funded Hamas’s rise to power over the secular moderates to manufacture pretext, which I didn’t see from the Nazis (who had less need, as they were less reliant on external support) - I’d argue all that makes Israel worse on balance.

Feel free to take another run at it if you like.

I’m sure you’d call Hamas’s actions a genocide, but based on what definition or metric?

No differences between Israel and the Nazis?

No difference between Israel’s self-defence and Hamas’s attacks?

I’m inviting you to respond to the topic of the thread you responded to.

So it’ll be easy for you to draw meaningful distinctions between current Israel and Novemberpogrome-era Nazi Germany, right?

What definition of genocide are you using? There’s no way to credibly dispute the fact that Israel’s actions comfortably meet both the UN and dictionary definitions.

Do you have any thoughts on my question about the meaningful differentiation between Novemberpogrome-era Nazi Germany and modern Israel?

TL:DR: Israel isn’t defending itself by committing a genocide against a population they’ve subjugated.

There are a series of issues with this…

• Genocide isn’t an act of defence - it’s an attempt to completely exterminate a group of people, and is the greatest act of aggression a group could possibly commit.

• The response we’re seeing is in no way proportionate, and causing a completely unacceptable level of civilian casualties (10k+ children alone in response to 1,200 total killed according to Israeli counts).

• Israel have killed more Palestinians than the total number of Hamas members in existence with zero indication of progress, and no sign of stopping.

• Israel have maintained Palestine in conditions described by the UN as an open air concentration camp, and have placed severe apartheid restrictions on Palestinians for years.

• Israel have killed orders of magnitude more Palestinians than Hamas have killed Israelis.

• Israel funded the rise of Hamas (who were no less violent then) over the secular moderates - as confirmed by both IDF leadership at the time she Arafat. I see no reason for them to do this other than to manufacture pretext for the genocide while maintaining US support.

• Palestinians seem to have a lot more to “defend themselves” against - between the numbers killed and displaced and the very restrictive living conditions they’re subjected to.

• Israeli leadership have said pretty plainly and repeatedly that they intend to exterminate Palestinians - if all Palestinians were to lay down arms and submit to the apartheid conditions, movement restrictions, and conditions we’ve seen over the past decade, the well funded nuclear power with modern military simply won’t stop.

What makes Israel’s actions self-defence while Hamas’s lesser actions are not?

Well that… that… that changes everything!

I think they’re delusional enough that there’s value in giving them the space to lay that delusion out for all to see. They’re one of the best arguments against themselves.

Democracy Now have a left-wing bias, but are a factual source. . That said, I’m not here to defend them - nor do I have much interest in this particular article or event.

I was asking about the broader situation, action, policy and rhetoric. My views are based more on the history of the situation, the casualty counts, reporting from the likes of AP and Reuters, UN oversight, and significantly, the words of the Israeli leadership themselves. If nothing else, when a political leader tells you they want to exterminate a group they’ve been keeping in brutal conditions, then kills tens of thousands of them, I tend to believe them.

I’m not going to call you a genocide denier, but I will ask you - are you denying the genocide, and if so, on what grounds. If you have any thoughts on the differentiation from the Nazis of that era, I’d like to hear those too.