Let's recap:

Bill Haywood calls it a "boycott app", citing a Forbes article that describes its use against Israel.

The author, when asked by a journalist about this use, says that it was not intended for the purpose implied by forbes (and BH), and takes active steps to combat its use for that purpose.

SenorKeeed concludes that he is whining and posts this Shakespearean reply.

Take a bow, SenorKeeed. Good show.

Wtf is this in reference to?

Who gives a **** what the app's author thinks about boycotting Israel? The purpose of the app is to give people a tool to make it easy to organize and implement a boycott, for whatever cause they feel like.

Look, I get that the Israel-haters' strategy is to just throw a whole bunch of bad **** at the wall and see what sticks, so people can say "bad Israel".

This post is about reporting from Gaza. What you're reading in the news from reporters is skewed by Hamas censoring anything that doesn't fit the "Israel is killing Palestinians" storyline.

So Israeli civilians are threatened by Hamas. You acknowledge that. But you don't acknowledge that Palestinian civilians often turn out not to be civilians, that kids being blown up by Hamas rocket malfunctions get reported as air strikes, that Hamas coordinates attacks on Israelis from the operating room at al Shifa hospital when the army warns, then strikes at it, that rockets are being fired from UN compounds, that shells are being fired from schools, that arms being stored at mosques, dead children being moved and posed on top of rubble to portray maximum carnage, Israeli "attacks" that didn't happen, etc etc.

None of that gets reported because Hamas blocks it.

And of course the civilian casualty numbers that nobody, not even the UN, scrutinizes all that closely - though they are starting to now that reporters have left Gaza. But the damage is done.

If Hamas want to do all that, that's their prerogative. But don't blame Israel for too many "civilian" deaths and don't blame Israel for being uncompromising in negotiations. Which you do regularly.

wow this is just such terrible, terrible logic. Hamas does bad things ergo no blame for israel is allowed.

Lol that's not the logic, and it takes a special kind of illiteracy for anyone to have gleaned that as the logic of my post.

You say not to blame Israel for too many civilian deaths and not to blame them for being uncompromising in negotiations. One can debate whether or not it is fair to do so, but it OBVIOUSLY doesn't follow from your gigantic post rightly excoriating hamas. If that isn't the logic, how the **** did you manage to get from complaining about hamas putting dead bodies more visibly on the top of rubble to saying we can't blame israel for being uncompromising. It is just a complete non sequitur.

Israel is always going to be under the threat of war; at least for the forseeable century. Nationalism is a good way to unite a nation and needs an other to blame: Jews have been good scapegoats for 2000 years, and when they have an independent nation that fights back instead of dieing they become even better scapegoats.

Even if Hamas is thrown out of power and Gaza is run by an Egyptian protectorate which allows socioeconomic development there will still be tensions with Hezbolla, Syria, etc.

There will never be a shortage of countries who shout 'Kill the Jews' in the streets. After a brief hiatus, even Germany is back to the old refrain.

And for Israeli politicians, not having a massive rocket pad paired with tunnels that are going to kill your neighbors, friends, and family is worth getting rid of. As for the religious zionist elements (kinda Jewish Home), saving Jewish lives is a great cause and trumps other concerns (politics).

Jesus Christ. It is not that Hamas is bad, we all know that. I get that the anti-Israeli MO is just to point out bad things about Israel without thinking too much about it. But not me.
But I am more concerned with the effect of what Hamas is doing. Ill set it out for you.

1) Hamas intimidates journalists and misrepresents reality. This is beyond dispute. But why care, if you're an Israeli?

2) Because of that intimidation, the important facts that clearly and completely mitigate the army's culpability in dozens of this conflict's tragedies don't reach media, public, activist, or even diplomatic awareness.

3) because those important facts don't reach public awareness, we get card-stacking, where Palestinian narratives get repeated over and over and over by western media, NGOs, diplomatic organizations (UN), etc. New conclusions are built on top of the old unchallenged "conclusions".

So we get canards like indiscriminate attacks, disproportionate response, etc etc. Nothing in Israel comes anywhere close to those concepts under international law, but every time some Palestinian kids are killed, it is <i>of course Israel <b>targets</b> innocent kids</i>.[/QUOTE].

Well said.

What's the line on the cease fire being extended?

You missed the point of my objection completely and instead seized the opportunity to type out your little spiel one more time despite it not being challenged at all. Let me repeat:

I wasn't objecting to your spiel and there was no need to re type it out. What I am objecting to is what I have labeled 2. It is the thing that immediately follows the spiel about hamas.

2 doesn't follow from 1. That hamas does all the things you say and that this has all the effects you say doesn't mean we shouldn't blame Israel for being uncompromising in negotiations or anything else. Those stand or fall on their own merits. It is a basic logical fallacy to connect the two. Of course, you insist you were not doing such a fallacy...but what possible other implication is there? Generally when one types out a long spiel the conclusion of it is meant to follow from the body. It would be profoundly bizarre if you typed this out and DIDN"T mean these statements that follow literally to follow logically. If this isn't the case, please explain why you tacked on this final sentence to a long post about hamas if they are not meant to be directly related.

Post 1 describes Hamas media manipulation by falsifying evidence, with the intention of manipulating the "West" (in addition to its own population but that's not important for this). We all agree that is indisputable. But why does Hamas care about what the "West" thinks?

Because the "West" is naturally outraged at dead babies on their TV screen. Every one is caused by Israel, according to that manipulation. But it's a manipulation, not reality.

Carrying on, in the West, where there is democracy, opposition politicians see opportunity to gain support over elected governments if they demand to act now! To save lives in Gaza! They attend rallies against Israel. Not so much against IS or Assad. Those don't have cachet. Or telegenic dead babies.

This all puts enormous internal political pressure (protests, foreign policy promises) on governments to push Israel to make concessions to "end the bloodshed."

But that pressure is all based on bulls*** information coming from Gaza, and bulls*** assumptions about Hamas intentions once they get a ceasefire.

If you still can't see this I can't help you.

Dude, you just repeated for the third time your spiel. I'm not objecting to the spiel. My question is how you get from the spiel to this:

I can blame hamas for everything you said, think the consequences of hamas' actions are everything you said and STILL that doesn't relate (like at all) to whether or not I find Israel to share blame for being uncompromising in negotiations or the civilians death toll it caused. It is just a complete non sequitur.

But please, don't type out your spiel a fourth time because that is simply not the point of contention.

Those damn Gazans, always staging photo-ops of their most telegenic dead children! It's just SO UNFAIR to Israel, the real victims here.

4) Israel bombs schools full of kids and wipes out entire cities for having lost 3 civilian lives.

Everyone with any moral reasoning will condemn both parties as murderers.

So don't be surprised we're not going to bat for Team School Bombing.

You have to be just trolling at this point.

1) kids die
2) Hamas manufactures evidence/narrative about Israelis shooting kids. Threatens photographers/journalists if they take pictures of rocket launcher next to scene, or point out the dead adult male with gun next to kids, or weapons bunker in house.
3) media can only report kids dead, evidence points to IDF!
4) UN condemns IDF killing kids based on sketchy evidence
5) reader: "Israel targets kids! UN agrees! Make it stop!"
6) reader's government: "BiBi, my voters will go ape**** if you keep killing kids. Sign, or we're not your friend"
7) BiBi: "but we didn't kill those kids... And if we did, it is because Hamas posed a threat to us from on top of them. You should pressure Hamas. If we compromise they'll just rearm so more kids will die in a few years... God dammit."

I'm going to keep dumbing it down for you until you get it.

5) Tien posts something spectacularly dumb in a twisted attempt at moral equivalence

Murdering of children:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...gaza-un-school

Wiping out cities:



This isn't libel. You root for Team School Bombing and you're proud of it.

Why did you repeat the spiel for a fourth time? I just told you I wasn't objecting to the spiel. I'm trying to see how you get from the spiel about what hamas is doing and its consequences to the idea that you can't blame israel at all for civilian deaths or uncompromising diplomacy? It simply doesn't follow. For instance, it is possible for Israel to have been far too egregious in its bombings of civilians AND for Hamas to apply all its spin games. Just talking about the spin games doesn't deduce that you can't blame Israel. Logic is hard, isn't it?

And please, next time don't repeat the spiel for a 5th time. That has never been the issue.

ALL CAPS DOESN"T MAKE YOUR POINT ANY LESS ILLOGICAL

Can you conceive of the idea of both israel and hamas doing things that I don't approve of, that I might blame both sides (not equally, btw) for the different things they each do I don't approve of? That "blame" is not 0% or 100%? Hamas surely can make it so that the blame to Israel is less than might first appear (a dead baby was actually causes by a Hamas rocket or whatever) but there are, how to put it, plenty of dead babies to go around. The basic error you make is to jump to not being able to blame Israel at all, because Hamas does these inflating tactics that make it seem worse than it maybe is if you aren't paying attention.

Let's take just one example, the infamous four boys struck on the beach with intimate details provided from a respected western reporter. Can I be critical of that? Can I blame Israel for that?

This point to the now very familiar issue of your reverent hyperpartisanship. Effectively everything in the war just manages to get whitewashed by you because it is "likely" that Israel just didn't do whatever it is being blamed for. So what happens, well you relentlessly criticize the one side and relentlessly defend the other.For partisans like yourself it is a good rhetorical tactic to saying a lot of true things (bad about their side, good about yours) because the truth of the things you say can't be combated (as in, yes of course Hamas does much of what you say). But you make the rhetorical error of going to far, of revealing your true colours. At the end of the list of true bad things about hamas, you ended up concluding - and that is what it was - that one simply could not blame Israel. It doesn't follow and could only have been utter by someone with a myopic agenda to cast precisely that impression. It is pathetic.

IN ORDER TO ASSIGN BLAME YOU MUST HAVE A REASONABLE DEGREE OF CERTAINTY AS TO WHAT HAPPENED.

FOR THE REASONS GIVEN TO YOU FOUR TIMES NOW, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO HAVE ANY CERTAINTY WHATSOEVER ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED IN ANY PARTICULAR INCIDENT.

UNTIL A CREDIBLE INVESTIGATION HAS TAKEN PLACE IT WILL REMAIN IMPOSSIBLE. AN INVESTIGATION MAY TAKE MONTHS OR YEARS, OR MAY BE IMPOSSIBLE PERMANENTLY BECAUSE OF THE TAINTING OF THE SCENE.

HERES AN IDEA - ******INSTEAD OF JUMPING TO BLAME, YOU MIGHT SAY THAT NOBODY KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED IN THESE INCIDENTS AND WE SHOULDNT BLAME ANYONE UNTIL WE DO.******

jfc.

This is amazing self pwnage.

You set up this very silly standard (shouldn't blame anyone yet because of like uncertainty dude) but you IMMEDIATELY FAIL YOUR OWN STANDARD ALLCAPSRAGE. Indeed, you concluded the post in question with "don't blame Israel". Not "don't blame either side just yet". Indeed, it was a unilateral attack on Hamas and then saying no blame allowed for Israel. This isn't waiting for a "credible investigation" this is you - a relentless hyperpartisan - making a ridiculously hyperpartisan statement that completely exonerated Israel in a completely illogical way (that Hamas doing these things someone meant don't blame Israel).

Note that your comment was not about one specific incident where sure, fog of war, we never know exactly what happens, it was very general. Besides, even for specific incidents like the one I mentioned and you refused to engage, it seems fairly clear cut and we can absolutely assign blame on the available evidence and reserve the right to change that later if the evidence changes. But such nuances will be lost on you I think...I suspect "don't blame Israel" will start and finish as the rallying call for all your posts on this forum. That you can't support this - that your own erected standards reject such statements - won't stop you one iota.

Makes sense that one of you would call that a city and the other would call it a house.

Still a couple of hundred thousand Palestinians displaced from their homes because of the carnage brought upon them with thousands of their homes damaged beyond repair.

I'd say wrecking havoc on the cities would be a fairer description than 'IT'S ONLY ONE BUILDING!'

"Wiping out" is what what said before, not "wreaking havoc."

I'd say there was havoc wreaked.