There is an argument that Israel's right to self-defense is irrelevant with regards to Gaza. There's an ICJ ruling about the West Bank that notes that since Israel is an occupying force and has military control over the Palestinian territories - therefore it's not actually defending itself. Their actions are part of their occupation activities. IOW, putting down the "natives" so you can clear out space for your shopping malls is not "self-defense" even if the "natives" fight back. This post isn't about that argument. I do think it is entirely reasonable and actually part of Israel's duty to its citizens to try to protect them from terrorist attacks. Even if it isn't "self-defense" under international law, I think it is justified and expected for Israel to go to some measures in order to defend its population.
My argument about self-defense is that this is very blatantly and obviously NOT what Israel is doing. Looking at the damage unleashed upon Gaza and calling it "self-defense" is gross and disgusting. If someone threatens to kill you, destroying their entire neighbourhood with air strikes is not "self-defense". If a violent gang kills a member of your family, it's not self-defense to raze their entire city to the ground. I mean, come the fuck on.
But this post isn't really about that either. The point I'd like to get at here is about what would count as self-defense. About what Israel could do to protect its citizens from terrorist attacks. Now obviously, the answer is "End the Occupation". The generations of oppression and apartheid is why we have Hamas - that's the root cause - and the entirety of the Israeli apartheid regime isn't benefitting anyone other than arms manufacturers and the terrorist settler movement that's somehow become the controlling political force in Israel.
This is the question that the gross assholes with their throbbing war boners keep asking. "Hamas won't honour a ceasefire! Imposing a ceasefire means REAL genocide because non-Muslims will get killed in October 7 like attacks forever and ever!!!!"
It's a deeply offensive and stupid point. It is founded upon the racist assumption that Palestinians are inherently violent terrorists and that they will violently murder Jews by the thousands unless they are bombed to oblivion. You see, 30,000 Gazans had to die and many more also need to die because otherwise, they will violently attack Israel. Such a deeply stupid and idiotic position.
BUT what makes it worse is that even if it were true, it's still not relevant. No seriously. It isn't.
Hamas has been working overtime since October 7 to demonstrate that they still have the capability to strike back. Even after the aerial bombardments over the past three months, Hamas rockets have been reaching further and further north, deeper into Israel than ever before. And yet how many Israelis have they killed with these rocket attacks? None. The only non-military casualties inflicted by Hamas since the initial attacks were three Israelis in West Jerusalem - and the IDF killed one of the three.
The fact is - the Iron Dome is actually very effective. The massive walls and machine gun equipped checkpoints - also effective. Hamas fighters actually do not have the ability to effectively attack inside Israel unless they catch Israel by complete surprise.
October 7th was a long time in the planning phase. It could not have happened without Israel being caught completely by surprise. And now that it has happened - it's not possible again. This type of surprise swarm attack is now a known threat and Israel, if they aren't being stupid motherfucking idiots, can prevent it from happening.
AND it shouldn't have happened in the first place! A reminder - Israel had the Hamas Battle Plan a full year in advance. They knew the strategy and tactics, they knew the crossing points that would be attacked. The IDF knew the plan was credible and that they should have paid attention to it because the plan contained accurate secret Israeli military information. They saw that Hamas knew where their Gaza fence military posts were and how many people staffed them. And they knew it was coming because they saw Hamas doing dry runs of the exact same tactics that were described in the Battle Plan. And they should have known the exact day of the operation - the 50th anniversary of the sneak attack that kicked off the Yom Kippur War. But what did Israel do despite having these clear and obvious warnings? They moved their forces AWAY from Gaza to support settler terrorism in the West Bank.
Just try to wrap your head around this. They knew the attack was coming. They should have known the date of the attack. And they had the full strategy guide to figure out counters and strategies to prevent damage and capture attackers. A full year they had to prepare - and they literally did their best to make it easier for Hamas. A number of the people killed in that attack were killed by the IDF - because the IDF was so flatfooted, their response included shooting hellfire missiles at random cars. Just a clusterfuck of deadly incompetence.
Even without ending the occupation - there is an answer to preventing October 7th from ever happening again. The resignations of most of the IDF senior officers and getting Netanyahu and his stupid ass cronies out of government. Giving people that aren't "mow the grass" pilled some positions of authority. It's not hard - October 7th wasn't prevented primarily because Israel just fucking dropped the ball in the worst way imaginable. Just moronic stupid assholes making the worst decisions imaginable. Israel can stop Hamas even without doing the right thing. They can prevent attacks on Israeli citizens merely by not falling into the trap of hubris and overconfident leaders who are dumber than a bag of rocks.
This is of course, a short term solution. Power looks after its own - so even if they did purge the incompetents and got some people other than ass-kissing bootlickers into important positions - time leads to complacency and the rot will set in again. Soon, a new batch of "but what can Hamas do really?" assholes will take over - convinced that they are invulnerable and that they've "solved" the problem of Palestinians being upset with the oppression, blockade, and apartheid. Hubris is a disease that can never be fully cured. Only ending the occupation and granting Palestinians self-determination will make the region safe in the long run. But that doesn't make the stupid racist "But Hamas!" argument any less stupid or racist.
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