Country A attacks vastly more powerful neighbor. They have no defensive infrastructure (for civilians), no plans for minimizing civilian deaths, no hope of actually winning the war they started. There strategy is to fight in a dense urban environment among their own civilians while firing thousands of unguided rockets at their enemy, knowing the retaliation is going to be horrific with no way for them to stop it (other than surrendering, but they would rather all die).
Country B has possibly the best missile defense system in the world; mainly because their neighbors shoot unguided rockets into their city. They work to defend their citizens at all costs even with expensive missiles and a protracted military campaign. They design cutting edge laser missile defense to help them alleviate the burden of protecting their citizens. The only reason they do not have to completely annihilate their neighbor who's shooting rockets at them is because they are able to intercept most of them. If those rockets were actually landing and causing tens of thousands of civilian casualties their retaliation would have to be far more deadly.
People on the internet: "actually its the civilians from country A who need defenses"
Country A is resisting a 75 year violent occupation and apartheid (see stats posted earlier) and currently suffering genocide. Anyone denying that is no different than anyone denying the holocaust - equally vile and reprehensible. But everyone somehow seems to conveniently forget that part. Don't take my word for it, list of apartheid and genocide reports below.
The reason this doesn't make the discourse, even on communities like Hacker News which are supposed to be "smart", is because of decades of the West being brainwashed to the point where Islamophobia is normalized and ubiquitous.
Nobody else comes close to Israel in protecting civilians in combat zones.
And let's take a critical eye to that data you linked. I'm having a hard time with the filters but we can see enough without: The fatalities are nearly 90% male. That implies that probably 80% are in some fashion combatants or combatant-adjacent.
And note that the death toll for the recent war includes all deaths. Natural causes, internal combat, rockets falling short (historically, ~25% of Gaza deaths, but probably not this time), combatants and civilians. As well as some that are fake.
And Hamas had the power to end the war at any time--return the hostages, the world would quickly have stopped Israel. Thus we can conclude that Hamas wanted the war despite what it did to their population.
Tell me, given all adult, non-ultra-orthodox, Jewish Israelis, regardless of gender, must mandatorily serve in the military and remain reservists for decades, does this mean most Jewish adults are “combatant adjacent”?
Defensive weapons technology is how you get less conflict though.
When some idiot in the ME decides to shoot something at Israel, the character of the response demanded by the population depends heavily on whether any Israelis die or property is destroyed.
Israel didn't aggressively bomb Gaza till October 7 killed a lot of Israelis, even though they were regularly shooting down Hamas launched rockets with Iron Dome.
There is a practical gulf in political and diplomatic options depending on if an attack lands or does not, so much so that whether or not someone can shoot down incoming weaponry is a factor in some diplomatic decisions (I.e. Iran firing missiles at US bases in Qatar).
> Defensive weapons technology is how you get less conflict though.
I'm not convinced. Responding purely defensively allows your attacker to systematically probe every weakness in your defenses without risk of harm to themselves (e.g. how Russia is playing cat&mouse with the EU).
Israel invests in defending their civilians with technology like Iron Beam.
In contrast the Gazan government strategically uses humans shields [2, 3] and despite this the majority of Palestinians still support starting this war by attacking civilians on Oct 7th [1]. Defense technology doesn’t help if you don’t want it unfortunately.
Hamas also has hundreds of miles of tunnels which civilians aren’t allowed to use.
To say that israel invests in defense is at least 1/4 untrue, since the US sends billions every year. The US gave them about 7b cash last year, which is around 1/4 of their defense budget, and doesn’t include things like stationing carriers nearby, or doing airstrikes on houthi blockades.
> the Gazan government strategically uses humans shields
This just means Israel knows they're hitting women and children every time they send a bomb their way.
> the majority of Palestinians still support starting this war
Palestine isn't a democracy with well documented preferences. Israel is though, so why don't you say that a majority of Israelis are fine with the killing of women and children in Gaza?
elcritch, you're beating around the bush but strongly suggesting there's a reasonable justification (not just an explanation) for killing women and children if it suits someone's needs. Does this apply just to Israel killing people in Gaza or universally valid? Because I distinctly remember the US going to war over WMD that never existed. So elcritch, are you saying US women and children are fair game now?
hersko|1 month ago
Country B has possibly the best missile defense system in the world; mainly because their neighbors shoot unguided rockets into their city. They work to defend their citizens at all costs even with expensive missiles and a protracted military campaign. They design cutting edge laser missile defense to help them alleviate the burden of protecting their citizens. The only reason they do not have to completely annihilate their neighbor who's shooting rockets at them is because they are able to intercept most of them. If those rockets were actually landing and causing tens of thousands of civilian casualties their retaliation would have to be far more deadly.
People on the internet: "actually its the civilians from country A who need defenses"
LtWorf|1 month ago
recroad|1 month ago
The reason this doesn't make the discourse, even on communities like Hacker News which are supposed to be "smart", is because of decades of the West being brainwashed to the point where Islamophobia is normalized and ubiquitous.
Genocide accusations:
- Amnesty International - https://zeteo.com/p/amnesty-concludes-israel-genocide-gaza
- Human Rights Watch - https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/12/19/israels-crime-exterminat...
- Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) - https://msf.org.uk/issues/gaza-genocide
- University Network for Human Rights - https://www.humanrightsnetwork.org/projects/genocide-in-gaza
- B'Tselem - https://zeteo.com/p/israeli-human-rights-group-says-israel
- Al-Haq - https://www.alhaq.org/publications/25781.html
- Palestinian Centre for Human Rights - https://pchrgaza.org/category/genocide-against-gaza/
- Physicians for Human Rights - Israel
- United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied - Palestinian Territory - https://zeteo.com/p/united-nations-un-gaza-genocide-israel
- The International Association of Genocide Scholars - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/01/israel-committ...
Apartheid accusations:
- Amnesty International - https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/03/israel-opt-is...
- Human Rights Watch - https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/isra...
- B'Tselem - https://www.btselem.org/publications/fulltext/202101_this_is...
- Al-Haq - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/16183.html
- Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/16183.html
- Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/19761.html
- Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/20931.html
- UN Special Rapporteur Michael Lynk - https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/03/israels-55-y...
- UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/16324.html
- Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/7207.html
- International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) - Referenced in multiple coalition statements
- BADIL Resource Center - https://badil.org/press-releases/592.html
- Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/17012.html
- Palestinian Coalition of 8 Organizations - https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/20931.html
LorenPechtel|1 month ago
Nobody else comes close to Israel in protecting civilians in combat zones.
And let's take a critical eye to that data you linked. I'm having a hard time with the filters but we can see enough without: The fatalities are nearly 90% male. That implies that probably 80% are in some fashion combatants or combatant-adjacent.
And note that the death toll for the recent war includes all deaths. Natural causes, internal combat, rockets falling short (historically, ~25% of Gaza deaths, but probably not this time), combatants and civilians. As well as some that are fake.
And Hamas had the power to end the war at any time--return the hostages, the world would quickly have stopped Israel. Thus we can conclude that Hamas wanted the war despite what it did to their population.
phs318u|1 month ago
That’s some newspeak right there.
Tell me, given all adult, non-ultra-orthodox, Jewish Israelis, regardless of gender, must mandatorily serve in the military and remain reservists for decades, does this mean most Jewish adults are “combatant adjacent”?
belter|1 month ago
"Israeli military’s own data indicates civilian death rate of 83% in Gaza war" - https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2025/aug/21...
falcor84|1 month ago
XorNot|1 month ago
When some idiot in the ME decides to shoot something at Israel, the character of the response demanded by the population depends heavily on whether any Israelis die or property is destroyed.
Israel didn't aggressively bomb Gaza till October 7 killed a lot of Israelis, even though they were regularly shooting down Hamas launched rockets with Iron Dome.
There is a practical gulf in political and diplomatic options depending on if an attack lands or does not, so much so that whether or not someone can shoot down incoming weaponry is a factor in some diplomatic decisions (I.e. Iran firing missiles at US bases in Qatar).
tremon|1 month ago
I'm not convinced. Responding purely defensively allows your attacker to systematically probe every weakness in your defenses without risk of harm to themselves (e.g. how Russia is playing cat&mouse with the EU).
richardwhiuk|1 month ago
Gibbon1|1 month ago
delichon|1 month ago
elcritch|1 month ago
In contrast the Gazan government strategically uses humans shields [2, 3] and despite this the majority of Palestinians still support starting this war by attacking civilians on Oct 7th [1]. Defense technology doesn’t help if you don’t want it unfortunately.
Hamas also has hundreds of miles of tunnels which civilians aren’t allowed to use.
1: https://www.pcpsr.org/en/node/1000#:~:text=The%20Trump%20Pla... 2: https://stratcomcoe.org/cuploads/pfiles/hamas_human_shields.... 3: https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2023/11/01/hamas-officials-admi...
kennywinker|1 month ago
Us $ to israel: https://usafacts.org/answers/how-much-foreign-aid-does-the-u...
Israel defense budget: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-raise-defen...
LorenPechtel|1 month ago
I do agree the Hamas strategy was explicitly about getting civilians killed, though.
buran77|1 month ago
This just means Israel knows they're hitting women and children every time they send a bomb their way.
> the majority of Palestinians still support starting this war
Palestine isn't a democracy with well documented preferences. Israel is though, so why don't you say that a majority of Israelis are fine with the killing of women and children in Gaza?
elcritch, you're beating around the bush but strongly suggesting there's a reasonable justification (not just an explanation) for killing women and children if it suits someone's needs. Does this apply just to Israel killing people in Gaza or universally valid? Because I distinctly remember the US going to war over WMD that never existed. So elcritch, are you saying US women and children are fair game now?
throw-12-16|1 month ago
it_learnses|1 month ago
[deleted]
MomsAVoxell|1 month ago
[deleted]