What a joke.

why do in some cases do they attack the targets anyway?

Because Israel isn't full of pussies and faggots who would rather capitulate than fight their self-declared enemies.

Is it ever a case of killing a few Palestinian civs to save several magnitudes more Jewish civs

There's very strong statistical evidence for the direction of causality being Israeli casualties leading to Palestinian casualties, not the other way around.

I thought the title was being sarcastic, but it isn't so her's my thoughts play by play:

Israel being a decent country is an opinion not a fact.
Israel being in the style of Western democracy is a neutral statement not a compliment.
Israel's existence is built on stolen land, of course it has an interest in war.
And nobody would want to destroy it if it wasn't built on stolen land.
"Judaism, with it's unsurpassed moral standards" Is this a fucking joke?
"They don't want to be fighting and they don't want to harm others" Fair enough but why would you try to achieve that in the Middle East? If you want peace then leave the region instead of causing more conflict.
Yes, killing civilians is clearly the pinnacle of National Defense.
At this point the propaganda is getting pretty blatant; TERRORISTS!
I can't have much sympathy for Israel being shot at when they have their iron dome system.
Precision strikes precisely targeting schools and hospitals.
"terror tunnels"
It really doesn't matter what they intended to achieve with warnings, and judging by this video they just wanted to be able to point at something and say "see, we're not the bad guys, we did this much to help the Palestinians"; eating your cake and still wanting to have it afterwards.
Also, how are those phone calls even commendable? "Hey Ahmed i'm gonna bomb your house in a bit try not to die, bye bye now"
And I figure that aborting missions was done again so they could have something to write propaganda about.
No goy, war crimes are war crimes.
"Hamas is evil for hiding weapons amongst civilians, Israel is good for bombing those weapons"
And pray tell where are these videos of the fakes? how hard would it have been to include them in the video description?
A propaganda piece claiming it's the truth, are you even trying Israel?

Meta I can't tell, do you support these people or something else?

Quote from: Cadenza on December 17, 2015, 11:55:02 PM

If you want peace then leave the region instead of causing more conflict.

I agree with almost all of your points except this one. You can't just simply get up and leave. A two state solution would probably help ease a LOT of tension. All a lot of people want over there is some land to call their own, and to be represented. Not oppressed.

I'd support a two state solution; But what I had in mind was that if civilians wanted peace then there is always the option of them individually leaving to somewhere peaceful. Whereas the guy in the video was making it seem that fighting was their only option for peace.

Israel being a decent country is an opinion not a fact.

There are well established cultural mores determining whether or not a country is behaving in a "decent" manner; if you're going to dispute this on the basis that this is an opinion then you're just being fucking pedantic.

Israel being in the style of Western democracy is a neutral statement not a compliment.

Because when it comes to different cultures and political systems, they're all equal! Right? The wealth of evidence on the importance of inclusive political institutions for human well-being is irrelevant! RIGHT?

Israel's existence is built on stolen land, of course it has an interest in war.

As if the Jews stole it? The British Empire is who put them there, why would this automatically make their interest in war any greater other than for self-preservation?

And nobody would want to destroy it if it wasn't built on stolen land.

This is literally the dumbest thing you could say. Who cares? Who cares if the land is stolen? How does that help us now? Are you going to walk through the streets of Tel Aviv with a sign saying "You are on stolen land" and hope they all go "Well fuck me, I'd better move". Historical arguments absolutely do not help us in remedying the present situation, because the fact that the land is "stolen" has no practical implications for us at this point in time.

It's also categorically untrue that they would not be killing Jews if the land weren't stolen; Jews have emigrated to the region since the 1880s and Palestinians have been spontaneously violent to them on several occasions since at least as early as 1920.

"Judaism, with it's unsurpassed moral standards" Is this a fucking joke?

What's the problem?

If you want peace then leave the region instead of causing more conflict.

Lol.

"Don't like it, just leave".

Yes, killing civilians is clearly the pinnacle of National Defense.

It is when the people trying to murder you are storing their weapons besides residential areas, schools, hospitals, orphanages and use fucking human shields.

At this point the propaganda is getting pretty blatant; TERRORISTS!

Are you trying to say Hamas aren't terrorists?

I can't have much sympathy for Israel being shot at when they have their iron dome system.

Great, I'm going to go to Texas and mug everybody since they have concealed carry laws there.

Precision strikes precisely targeting schools and hospitals.

BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE THEY KEEP THE FUCKING WEAPONS, YOU TWAT.

"terror tunnels"

That, at least in one case, 160 Palestinian kids died building.

to point at something and say "see, we're not the bad guys, we did this much to help the Palestinians"; eating your cake and still wanting to have it afterwards.

Except this is exactly what Hamas does by provoking attacks in areas which will inevitably have a high civilian death toll. . . So they can point at Israel and say "Look how evil the Jews are, we're just an oppressed group!".

How the fuck are you so blind to such an obvious double standard?

Also, how are those phone calls even commendable? "Hey Ahmed i'm gonna bomb your house in a bit try not to die, bye bye now"

Because, unfortunately for Ahmed, his government is waging war on a neighbouring country while storing weapons in the vicinity of Ahmed's house. I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty fucking grateful for some warning.

This is a propaganda piece, so the linguistics of it is incredibly important: The phrase "I believe Israel acts in accordance with certain standards and is therefore decent" and "Israel is decent" give two very different impressions and are not the same statement.

See, this is where you fall down in your own pedantry. It's blindingly obvious that the video is a persuasion piece--or, if you really want to use such an inappropriate word, propaganda. Pretty much everything is in this day and age. You're using such a wide definition of "propaganda" that you can literally discard anything said without offering any kind of substantive rebuttal.

The speaker is claiming that Israel and it's actions are inherently good because it is a "country with Western values and democratic principles"

Pedantry x2.

The speaker is saying Israel is a good country because it is based on Western values and democratic principles; this is not an outrageous claim to make, given the relative success and prosperity countries based on such ideas have enjoyed. He's not saying, and nor am I, that Israel can do no wrong.

The fact is that what he said isn't a compliment or an insult but a statement of fact, being a democracy isn't inherently good or inherently bad (though I would consider it to be inherently flawed) yet he is twisting that statement to make it carry an emotional approval because this is propaganda. And I never claimed all systems were equal.

Pedantry x1,000,000.

This makes no sense.

Democracy is inherently flawed, but not inherently bad? Not all systems are equal, yet you cannot say any system is inherently superior to the other? This are contradictory statements, the latter especially so.

Democracy, insofar as a country has inclusive institutions and a civil society, is positive for human well-being. We can reasonably call this arrangement good relative to the other options without being propagandists. You're bordering on proposing a system where we cannot saying anything is good or bad without being jackbooted shills for one side or another.

Because having your country founded on conquest and taking land sets a precedent for continuing to do so, and they're still doing so. http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-settlement-expansion-ongoing-but-best-to-keep-it-under-wraps/

Just to put it out there, I don't support the construction of civilian settlements in the West Bank, and PragerU has previously had another speaker talking about Israel who expressed the same opinion.

The speaker was talking as if Israel had done nothing wrong at all and that the the surrounding states wanted to destroy them just for the hell of it, that Israel are the victims here, when in fact the surrounding states quite clearly have a historical justification for wanting their land back.

Except it's not their land. A Palestinian State has never existed, and to be honest the land was never stolen. The Palestine region passed from the Ottomans to the British to Israel--with numerous border changes since then. Transjordan is now Jordan. The surrounding countries had no land taken from them by the Jews, yet attacked their newly founded country anyway the day after the British left. . .

They have no justification at all for wanting to wipe Israel off the map. The Palestinians had no identity under the Ottomans or the British, yet Israel lets them vote, sit in the Knesset and, fuck, there's even one on the Supreme Court. . . And yet Hamas and the surrounding nations have it in for Israel because of their sick ideology, not any historical grievance.

As for that, if you willingly try to live in a place where everyone hates you, you're an idiot.

Would you say the same to Muslims moving to incredibly xenophobic regions of Western countries?

Not to mention, as I've already said, the region was previously administered by the Ottomans and then the British. Compared to Europe, this offered a fairly good--although not ideal--climate for Jewish emigrants.

Or are you telling me you didn't bat an eye at that line?

I'm not telling you anything, I'm asking you to expand on your rather brief outburst.

Killing civilians is a war crime.

Intentionally killing civilians is a war crime; do Israel know civilians will die? Of course, but that doesn't prove intention.

I'm saying that fighting terrorists does not justify committing acts of terror among other atrocities.

So is Israel meant to sit back and do nothing, just relying on its Iron Dome and never retaliating to blatant attacks even when civilians die? Can you imagine how insane it would be for any Western country to limit itself in this manner?

Especially considering the direction of causality is Israel casualties leading to Palestinian casualties, not vice versa.

I just thought the phrase was funny, "terror tunnels" sounds like an amusement park ride, sort of makes the propaganda less effective.

I commend you to sticking to your tactic of ignoring the substance and simply brushing it off as propaganda.

But I'm going to be honest and say I'm not impressed by your flippant reaction to a terrorist organisation working 160 children to death in the construction of tunnels to use in the terrorisation of civilians.

Yes, 18000 homes were all storing weapons

Ahem.

Also offtopic: Fagcicle told me to talk to you about "why outsourcing is good and how immigrants are necessary.", any comments or resources you'd like to share?

Outsourcing is good due to comparative advantage; it allows economies to specialise and devote their resources/productivity to the production of X, while the country that has temporarily lost jobs due to outsourcing can now focus on the production of Y which is usually a higher-cost, higher-wage service. Standard go-to is Krugman's "In Praise of Cheap Labor".

Immigration literature is a bit more disparate, though, I'll have to look through my databanks.

Quote from: Cadenza on December 18, 2015, 05:48:21 AM

This is a propaganda piece, so the linguistics of it is incredibly important: The phrase "I believe Israel acts in accordance with certain standards and is therefore decent" and "Israel is decent" give two very different impressions and are not the same statement.

See, this is where you fall down in your own pedantry. It's blindingly obvious that the video is a persuasion piece

So it's pedantry when I call it out, but it's not pedantry when you defend it? pretty fucking hypocritical.

--or, if you really want to use such an inappropriate word, propaganda. Pretty much everything is in this day and age. You're using such a wide definition of "propaganda" that you can literally discard anything said without offering any kind of substantive rebuttal.

Watch the video again, read the title of the video again, listen to the tone of the speaker's voice and pay attention to the graphics. It is in fact possible to have an impartial video discussing any topic, but this is nowhere near impartial, it's entire purpose is to shove down your throat that Israel can't be blamed for anything and it's enemies can be blamed for everything; you would need to have undergone a lobotomy to not recognize this as propaganda. And because it is propaganda I will respond to it accordingly.

Quote

The speaker is claiming that Israel and it's actions are inherently good because it is a "country with Western values and democratic principles"

Pedantry x2.

The speaker is saying Israel is a good country because it is based on Western values and democratic principles; this is not an outrageous claim to make, given the relative success and prosperity countries based on such ideas have enjoyed. He's not saying, and nor am I, that Israel can do no wrong.

A Western democracy with Western values can do both good and bad, but the speaker is saying that because Israel is such a country it can't do anything bad, the entire point of this video is to convey that: literally "the world's most moral army" how are you not seeing this as propaganda?

Quote

The fact is that what he said isn't a compliment or an insult but a statement of fact, being a democracy isn't inherently good or inherently bad (though I would consider it to be inherently flawed) yet he is twisting that statement to make it carry an emotional approval because this is propaganda. And I never claimed all systems were equal.

Pedantry x1,000,000.

This makes no sense.

Democracy is inherently flawed, but not inherently bad? Not all systems are equal, yet you cannot say any system is inherently superior to the other? This are contradictory statements, the latter especially so.

Inherently flawed in that it isn't efficient at running a country; for reference here in New Zealand the democratic process goes something like this:
National party wants to pass a law
Everyone else opposes them
Parliament spends the next few weeks/months yelling back and forth
National wins
If the majority party is always going to be able to do what it wants then there's no point to the elections or the role of other parties in parliament other than to slow everything down and waste money - democracy is inherently self defeating and I could go on further (and probably will in another thread). However, none of his means that democracy is incapable of doing good or doing bad, so it's not inherently either.

Now in relation to the propaganda video, it's also clear that the speaker is trying to make Israel appear to be "just like you but in the middle east" but effectively everyone in a Western democracy is against killing civilians.

Democracy, insofar as a country has inclusive institutions and a civil society, is positive for human well-being. We can reasonably call this arrangement good relative to the other options without being propagandists. You're bordering on proposing a system where we cannot saying anything is good or bad without being jackbooted shills for one side or another.

None of those good things are exclusive to, or even defining traits of, a democracy. I'm proposing that people who try to twist language get called out on it.

Quote

Because having your country founded on conquest and taking land sets a precedent for continuing to do so, and they're still doing so. http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-settlement-expansion-ongoing-but-best-to-keep-it-under-wraps/

Just to put it out there, I don't support the construction of civilian settlements in the West Bank, and PragerU has previously had another speaker talking about Israel who expressed the same opinion.

Quote

The speaker was talking as if Israel had done nothing wrong at all and that the the surrounding states wanted to destroy them just for the hell of it, that Israel are the victims here, when in fact the surrounding states quite clearly have a historical justification for wanting their land back.

Except it's not their land. A Palestinian State has never existed, and to be honest the land was never stolen. The Palestine region passed from the Ottomans to the British to Israel--with numerous border changes since then. Transjordan is now Jordan. The surrounding countries had no land taken from them by the Jews, yet attacked their newly founded country anyway the day after the British left. . .

They have no justification at all for wanting to wipe Israel off the map. The Palestinians had no identity under the Ottomans or the British, yet Israel lets them vote, sit in the Knesset and, fuck, there's even one on the Supreme Court. . . And yet Hamas and the surrounding nations have it in for Israel because of their sick ideology, not any historical grievance.

That's like saying that the Native Americans never had an official state so their land wasn't taken, or that the Maoris and Aborigines never had an official state so no conquest actually took place. The fact of the matter is that the land originally belonged to the people who lived there, and now it belongs to people who stole it. If the speaker was honest about it I wouldn't have mentioned it, I live in land stolen through conquest by the British empire, I'm not going to act as though that didn't happen, but the speaker is doing exatly that, twisting history to make Israel the victim. And again, I don't support Hamas, I don't need to oppose Israel.

Quote

As for that, if you willingly try to live in a place where everyone hates you, you're an idiot.

Would you say the same to Muslims moving to incredibly xenophobic regions of Western countries?

Yes, I'd say it to anyone that lacks a sense of self awareness.

Not to mention, as I've already said, the region was previously administered by the Ottomans and then the British. Compared to Europe, this offered a fairly good--although not ideal--climate for Jewish emigrants.

Is that still the case?

Quote

Or are you telling me you didn't bat an eye at that line?

I'm not telling you anything, I'm asking you to expand on your rather brief outburst.

The speaker made a bold claim about Judaism's moral superiority and expects us to take it as a fact without giving any justification or examples or quotes from scripture. Nothing at all, we're just meant to believe that Judaism is the best religion in the world for morality and Israel is the most moral country in the world because of it. That is a joke of a statement and I'd call out any religion that makes such a claim without backing it up.

Quote

Killing civilians is a war crime.

Intentionally killing civilians is a war crime; do Israel know civilians will die? Of course, but that doesn't prove intention.

International case-law has indicated that war crimes are violations that are committed wilfully, i.e., either intentionally (dolus directus) or recklessly (dolus eventualis)

Pick your poison, they either intentionally killed civilians or they accidentally killed them, but the fact remains that they killed civilians.

Quote

I'm saying that fighting terrorists does not justify committing acts of terror among other atrocities.

So is Israel meant to sit back and do nothing, just relying on its Iron Dome and never retaliating to blatant attacks even when civilians die? Can you imagine how insane it would be for any Western country to limit itself in this manner?

No Western country is engaged in such a situation for starters, so this is a unique situation. The first problem I have isn'tthat they're retaliating, but that they are killing civilians in the process either deliberately or accidentally, and it's inexcusable in either case. The second problem is with the propaganda video that we're discussing, the speaker is talking as if Israel is completely defenseless and the graphic shows a person cowering under several misslies, but this isn't the case at all and it is a lie to claim that it is.

Especially considering the direction of causality is Israel casualties leading to Palestinian casualties, not vice versa.

The possibility that Hamas is intentionally acting randomly and/or is incapable of doing so is raised in that paper and it is plausible, but even without that I'll again say that I don't support Hamas, they're also trying to kill civilians and as I've made it clear, I'm opposed to that.

Quote

I just thought the phrase was funny, "terror tunnels" sounds like an amusement park ride, sort of makes the propaganda less effective.

I commend you to sticking to your tactic of ignoring the substance and simply brushing it off as propaganda.

But I'm going to be honest and say I'm not impressed by your flippant reaction to a terrorist organisation working 160 children to death in the construction of tunnels to use in the terrorisation of civilians.

Mate I wasn't making a serious point there, as I said my entire first post was just my reactions written down as I was watching the video, and I found that line to be funny.

Quote

Yes, 18000 homes were all storing weapons

Ahem.

So much for precission air strikes.

Quote

Also offtopic: Fagcicle told me to talk to you about "why outsourcing is good and how immigrants are necessary.", any comments or resources you'd like to share?

Outsourcing is good due to comparative advantage; it allows economies to specialise and devote their resources/productivity to the production of X, while the country that has temporarily lost jobs due to outsourcing can now focus on the production of Y which is usually a higher-cost, higher-wage service. Standard go-to is Krugman's "In Praise of Cheap Labor".

Immigration literature is a bit more disparate, though, I'll have to look through my databanks.

I'll make sure to read through that and get back to you on this, and thanks for the effort if you find anything on immigration.

Israel is a wretched hive of scum and villainy.

The Jewish people are a disgusting lit, who need to be exterminated from the earth.

This video is just propaganda to try and convince you that the aggressor of the middle east is really the victim.

Quote from: Cadenza on December 18, 2015, 07:07:00 PM

and thanks for the effort if you find anything on immigration.

Not going to respond to the rest of your post for now, since it's 1 am and I'm still fighting off an aggressive form of bacterial tonsillitis.

Immigration lit, however:

• Impact of immigration on native wages: (X)(X)
• Impact of a large influx of Cuban immigrants on the Miami labour market: (X)
• Impact of immigration on the British government's fiscal position: (X)(X)
• Potential impacts for global output given open borders: (X)
• Impact of low-skilled immigration on labour market clearing: (X)
• Impact of high-skilled immigration on native compensation and employment: (X)

Thank you kindly.