“No one is looking at us or the extent of this disaster or the crimes that we are experiencing in Gaza,” he said. Still holding his microphone, he slid off his flak jacket marked with the word PRESS and unstrapped his helmet.
“These protection jackets and helmets don’t protect us,” he said, flinging the equipment to the ground. “Nothing protects journalists. … We lose our lives for no reason.”
They’re the ones with control over the course of the war and how long it will take before it ends. They are the ones who control how many Palestinians die, at least until and unless Palestinians get tired of falling victim to the violence Hamas inflicts on them and does something about them.
I’m asking about your opinion. If Hamas refuses to cooperate, how many Palestinians does the IDF have to kill for it to be too many in your mind? When does the mass murder of Palestinian civilians exceed a reasonable metric for “defense”?
Well, I would say as few as reasonably possible to eliminate Hamas.
If Israel was mass murdering people, this would be very, very different. We don’t know how many people have died, but we do know that Israel has been taking significant steps to avoid collateral damage, and we know that has been frustrated by war crimes perpetrated by Hamas (using ambulances as military transport, using hospitals as military bases, shooting civilians who try to leave the conflict zone) so I’m not sure what you want for me.
I want Israel to take reasonable actions to limit civilian casualties while they prosecute the war against Hamas which Hamas started and is continuing. I want that war to end immediately, but I recognize it can only reasonably end with either Hamas surrendering or Hamas being degraded past the point of it being a threat.