Michael Meeropol says: "again -- apologies for sounding like a blockhead --- but suppose there were no rapes and the Israeli government did NOT make up stories --- would the Israeli people therefore NOT react as violently to the murder of civilians, including babies? would they have forced their government not to engage in violent ethnic cleansing??"
Michael seems to accept the claim that Hamas murdered civilians, including babies. This has been questioned in a number of articles. Jonathan Cook, for example, says: "Admittedly, the claim about 40 beheaded babies has been quietly shelved<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/12/white-house-walks-back-bidens-claim-he-saw-children-beheaded-by-hamas>, because there is precisely zero evidence for it. According to Israel’s own published figures<https://www.timesofisrael.com/14-kids-under-10-25-people-over-80-up-to-date-breakdown-of-oct-7-victims-we-know-about/>, only two infants died that day." https://jonathancook.substack.com/p/why-is-the-media-ignoring-evidence Many civilians were killed during the Israeli counter-attack on October 7. This included hostages held by Hamas who were killed when Israeli forces fired on or bombed their captors. This is not to say that Hamas did not commit any war crimes on October 7. But there has been no impartial investigation to get a comprehensive picture of what happened on that day. We can certainly question the wisdom of taking hostages. The aim was to exchange them for Palestinian prisoners. But it was predictable that Israel would use them as a pretext for massive retaliation. Of course, Israel would have reacted extremely violently to the Hamas-led attack on October 7, regardless of what Hamas did. But the hostage issue provided them with a propaganda theme. For a time, concern about the hostages overshadowed concern about Palestinian victims of Israeli bombing in Western media coverage. This may have slightly delayed the building of the solidarity movement with the people of Gaza. Chris Slee -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#29599): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/29599 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/104996214/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
