Protesters call for Israeli government to do more to secure release of loved ones, as south of Gaza sees worst violence since war began

Family members of Israelis held hostage in the Gaza Strip have stormed a parliamentary meeting in Jerusalem to demand that Israel’s government does more to return their loved ones, as fighting in Khan Younis reached unprecedented levels.

About 20 relatives of people seized as captives by the Palestinian militant group in the 7 October attack disrupted a Knesset finance committee meeting on Monday, chanting: “Release them now, now, now!”

One woman, who has three family members taken by Hamas, cried: “Just one I’d like to get back alive, one out of three.” Other protesters held up signs reading: “You will not sit here while they die there.”

On Sunday, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, rejected new Hamas conditions for ending the war and releasing the hostages including the Islamist group retaining control of Gaza and Israel withdrawing completely. In response, a Hamas official in Qatar said Netanyahu’s refusal to end the military offensive in Gaza meant there was “no chance for the return of the captives”.

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    • 【J】【u】【s】【t】【Z】@lemmy.worldEnglish
      14·
      10 months ago

      You have misread or misunderstood my point of view, then.

      Everytime someone cites some horrible atrocity, I take five minutes to look into it and every time it is more complicated than presented and always involves mitigating circumstances on one side and exaggeration and reckless disregard for human life on the other.

      Someone says “oh Israel indiscriminately bombed this apartment building and killed a hundred people.” And you look it up and find out that before the bombing, Israel called every cell phone in the area and fired warning shots, and that the 100 people in the building were a Hamas commander and his extended family, who he forced to stay behind specifically so that they would be killed, so that gullible westerners would be tricked into sympathizing with an actual terrorist organization.

      Do you agree that Hamas is a terrorist organization that must be eliminated for the good of the Palestinian people?

      • ???@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        10 months ago

        I think a lot of us noticed this and maybe you don’t notice it yourself, but literally when presented with any terrible unspeakable thing the IDF has done, you somehow are able to find an excuse for them… Sometimes you admit they did war crimes, but you never take it to the next level.

        Honestly just saying this because I’ve been discussing things with you for days and it’s just something I noticed.

        • 【J】【u】【s】【t】【Z】@lemmy.worldEnglish
          12·
          10 months ago

          Yeah I appreciate your point of view but the evidence is patiently obvious that there is no formal campaign of genocide or “indiscriminate bombings,” and there is a very simple and evidence-based explanation for the high number of civilian casualties.

          Can you admit that high civilian casualties is the goal of Hamas, that such martyrdom and human shields are two their weapons?

          Can you admit that even if Israel was at fault in the manner you suggest, that Hamas is nevertheless at least 50% at fault for refusing or inciting the civilians to ignore every warning and stay behind to be bombed?

          • ???@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            10 months ago

            No one is a human shield because they live where they live. The IDF is bombing schools and shelters and universities. Hard pill to swallow, but yes…

            I’m sure many here have tried to explain this to you over and over… It’s not hard, just go and read about what a human shield is.

            Goodbye and have a nice life. I do hope you one day understand, though I don’t place any hopes too high on it.

            • 【J】【u】【s】【t】【Z】@lemmy.worldEnglish
              21·
              10 months ago

              Hamas built tunnels under the schools and shelters and university.

              Again. When they launched terrorist attacks from their tunnels, underneath schools and shelters and university, digging under the foundation, isn’t it Hamas that made those buildings inhabitable?

              The whole place needs to be paved over and rebuilt because of the unsafe tunnels.

              https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_shields_in_the_Israeli–Palestinian_conflict

              Hamas has also been accused of using human shields strategically by NATO, the UN, EU, US, Israel, and several European countries. This strategy has included launching rockets and positioning military infrastructure in civilian areas, and aimed at exploiting Israel’s efforts to minimize civilian casualties and Western public opinion, has been observed in various conflicts, including the 2008, 2014, and 2023 Israel-Hamas wars. This tactic of human shields has been cited as a form of ‘lawfare’ by NATO, utilizing legal and public platforms to challenge adversaries, and has been offered as an explanation for Israel’s attacks on civilian infrastructure.

              • ???@lemmy.worldEnglish
                11·
                10 months ago

                Just fyi for other people reading, proximity shielding is questionable and unlike classical or basically real human shielding.

                Here, some more Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_shield

                Authors Neve Gordon and Nicola Perugini, elaborating on their book, Human Shields: A History of People in the Line of Fire, discuss “proximate shields”, humans as shields merely due to proximity to belligerents and assert that this type has become “by far the most prominent type of shield in contemporary discourse”. They say that the proximate shielding accusation has been used by States to cover-up war crimes against civilian populations and that human rights organizations frequently fail to question this charge which they claim is being improperly used to justify civilian deaths.[9]

                Sorry, not really replying to you in particular, but it’s hard to let this one slip. Proximity shielding is horse-shit invented by hateful people to justify killing civilians. Israel demonstrates a classic use of this.