How Hot is Israel Gonna Get?

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:

It's easy to get tangled up in all the details about what "they" did and what "we" did and how of course we are justified because X, Y, and Z while they are definitely not. Exact same arguments on both sides, and the discussion never ends.

But I think there's a bigger thing at stake here. The entire Western culture is built on the ideas that we adhere to higher principles, rule of law, human rights, equality etc.

This soft power is what makes people in small countries like my own believe that we are not mere vassals of the US, as the Russians call us, but allies fighting for the same cause.

This is also why we rally behind the US when it comes to Ukraine. We don't want to live in a world dominated by Russia, because that's not a world based on those principles.

If the only difference between living under the US or Russia is whether I get sent to Siberia or Guantanamo if the government decides it doesn't like me, or whether I get assassinated by poison tea or a reaper drone, then why should I care who rules the world?

We're still not in a world where the US and Russia are equally bad. But I feel the US is moving in that direction with this support for Israeli war crimes, which is of course exactly what Russia wants.

Russia wants to leave people in the West confused, divided, indifferent and cynical about everything. If the Hamas attack was somehow orchestrated by the Kremlin, then that was a very effective move.

Amen.  This speaks to the larger issue.  No point "winning" if we have to become the bad guys to do it.  We fight to defend something more than security.  We fight for an idea.  How we fight impacts the integrity of that idea.  Right now the idea of Israel is taking tremendous damage.  This is what we have been supporting for decades?  They are looking worse than Russia right now with respect to indiscriminate strikes...and that was one helluva low bar to get under.  

If the idea is corrupted by "some people are more equal than others", we are dead in the water.  

[Probus]

Being an engineer, something just doesn't settle right with me.  As of yesterday Al Jazeera says that 18,000 civilians have been killed in Gaza. (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/12/12/know-their-names-palestinians-killed-by-israel-in-the-occupied-west-bank-2)

@The_Capt, you mentioned that "My concern at this point is that is IDF appears to be taking out around 10-20 building per hour."  If that's the case, that means that in the last 46 days of fighting, 11,000 to 22,000 buildings have been destroyed.  That puts the number of civilians per building at somewhere between 0.8 to 1.6 per building.  Unless I did the math wrong (which is very possible since I'm a government engineer  ) that hardly seems to be war crime levels of destruction.

[Holien]

Hmmm

Analysis as of the 29th Nov - Look at the pretty graphic just scroll down a bit...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-67565872

As of the 12th Dec estimated at nearly 20%

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/nearly-fifth-gazas-buildings-destroyed-or-damaged-un-estimate-2023-12-12/

Why don't you actually do some fact checking before posting...

The Capt really sums it up well....

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

They are looking worse than Russia right now with respect to indiscriminate strikes...and that was one helluva low bar to get under.  

BTW - I have personal bets on If War Crimes have been committed? If anyone will be held to account? Also on how many buildings Israel rebuilds for the folk of Gaza?

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Probus said:

Being an engineer, something just doesn't settle right with me.  As of yesterday Al Jazeera says that 18,000 civilians have been killed in Gaza. (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2023/12/12/know-their-names-palestinians-killed-by-israel-in-the-occupied-west-bank-2)

@The_Capt, you mentioned that "My concern at this point is that is IDF appears to be taking out around 10-20 building per hour."  If that's the case, that means that in the last 46 days of fighting, 11,000 to 22,000 buildings have been destroyed.  That puts the number of civilians per building at somewhere between 0.8 to 1.6 per building.  Unless I did the math wrong (which is very possible since I'm a government engineer  ) that hardly seems to be war crime levels of destruction.

There's your problem.  Of course the IDF needs to prove that there were 11,000 to 22,000 Hamas fighters in each of those buildings who constituted such an immediate threat that it was worth dropping an entire building to kill...what?  Maybe 0.8 to 1.6 of them?  BBC lists the damage as much more widespread:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67565872

Al Jezeera notes that 50% of residential housing has been destroyed:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/10/israeli-bombardments-damage-more-than-half-of-gazas-housing-units

As to numbers of civilian dead...ok, so what is a "warcrimes level of destruction" then?  2? 12 per building?  The law says that even one civilian killed indiscriminately constitutes murder.  What arbitrary number means warcrime, if it is not "one"? 

I actually do not think anyone can say definitively that Israel is killing civilians indiscriminately and weird deaths per building really does not work as a metric.  Incidents where hundreds were killed in basements have occurred and need to be investigated.  The IDF is one bad shoot away from a horror story.  The potential wacrime we  can see is the level of destruction occurring outside military necessity.  It is a war crime to ethnically cleanse an area by making it uninhabitable.  Now if Israel were to put a few billion into a UN controlled reconstruction fund there could be an argument made.  But my money is that Israel has zero interest in Gaza reconstruction and will likely actively oppose it. 

Hamas needs to be destroyed, no argument.  They committed egregious warcrimes, no argument.  The IDF leveling entire neighborhoods on the flimsy excuse "there are some fighters in there" as a cover for a ghetto clearing...argument.  

 

Edited December 13, 2023 by The_Capt

[Probus]

You are making my point for me @Holien. The more buildings destroyed, the less civilians killed per building. But @The_Capt makes a good point. How many civilians/building is a war crime and an arbitrary number. And Israel is just one bomb away from a disaterous result. 

Now I don't think that before the end of WWII was quite the time to discuss how many billions of dollars the USA was going to spend rebuilding Germany and Japan.  That would have been a political death sentence. Same applies here. 

[Erwin]

Be assured I have great sympathy for that view.  I wish it reflected the reality of war thru the ages and also recently.  The concern that I have is that we could be in a conflict with a nation (cough - China) that is akin to Nazi Germany and which doesn't really care about lovely human rights rules and we would be fighting with one hand tied behind our backs.  By the high standards set out above, we would have to prosecute most of our leaders from WW2.  Eg: Dresden?  Berlin?  All those cities we left in ruins?  According to Google:  "Official casualty sources estimate battle deaths at nearly 15 million military personnel and civilian deaths at over 38 million."  

This is horrible reality of war and the price we should expect to have to pay if a larger conflict sublimates out of Ukraine, Israel, (Taiwan?)...  Am convinced that in the next war, it will be the civilian infrastructure that will be destroyed leading to huge civilian casualties.  Eg: Cyberwar leading to cutting off the water and/or food to (say) Los Angeles and one has a death trap for its 18.5 million (greater LA area).  I wish rules made wars more humane, but am convinced that when the chips are down the rules go out the window...  and the victor writes the history and the rules.

  

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Probus said:

You are making my point for me @Holien. The more buildings destroyed, the less civilians killed per building. But @The_Capt makes a good point. How many civilians/building is a war crime and an arbitrary number. And Israel is just one bomb away from a disaterous result. 

Now I don't think that before the end of WWII was quite the time to discuss how many billions of dollars the USA was going to spend rebuilding Germany and Japan.  That would have been a political death sentence. Same applies here. 

The modern LOAC framework came into place in 1949 so there is that.  I am pretty sure the US had the Marshal Plan and others well into planning before the end of WW2.  The reconstruction of both Europe and Japan were central to their counter-USSR planning.  

There seems to be a "well look at WW2" impulse that keeps coming up.  WW2 is why the international laws of conflict were passed.  No matter what HBO says, WW2 was not a good war.  It was a freakin nightmare of total war where extermination took the reigns in a lot of theatres.  The international laws were passed so that we would not go down that road again...but this time with nukes.

Ball is in Israel's court.  Start acting like a modern state or they could be looking at sitting in the same box as Russia.  I am not sure when the brutal employment of hard military power became an acceptable thing.  If Russia were doing this in Kyiv right now people would be losing their minds.  But is is Israel, so we need to all get on board?

 

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Erwin said:

Be assured I have great sympathy for that view.  I wish it reflected the reality of war thru the ages and also recently.  The concern that I have is that we could be in a conflict with a nation (cough - China) that is akin to Nazi Germany and which doesn't really care about lovely human rights rules and we would be fighting with one hand tied behind our backs.  By the high standards set out above, we would have to prosecute most of our leaders from WW2.  Eg: Dresden?  Berlin?  All those cities we left in ruins?  According to Google:  "Official casualty sources estimate battle deaths at nearly 15 million military personnel and civilian deaths at over 38 million."  

This is horrible reality of war and the price we should expect to have to pay if a larger conflict sublimates out of Ukraine, Israel, (Taiwan?)...  Am convinced that in the next war, it will be the civilian infrastructure that will be destroyed leading to huge civilian casualties.  Eg: Cyberwar leading to cutting off the water and/or food to (say) Los Angeles and one has a death trap for its 18.5 million (greater LA area).  I wish rules made wars more humane, but am convinced that when the chips are down the rules go out the window...  and the victor writes the history and the rules.

  

Do you actually have any wartime experience to draw upon?

I have been in two wars.  The first one, the rules went out the window and trust me, you do not want that.  My first war made what happened in Israel on 7 Oct look like tender-tickles.  So saying "chips are down" and "let god sort them out" is easy to say...it is very hard to live with.  It also comes with consequences that we cannot even begin to see.

But it is your opinion, you are entitled to it....

[Erwin]

5 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

the rules went out the window and trust me, you do not want that. 

I totally get that, Cap.  Am simply saying that the reality is that in the horrors of war any "rules" will go out the window.  They always have... pre and post Napoleonics.  Am certainly not arguing for that horror.  Just bracing for it.  Both my parents' families were wiped out in WW2 and they were left scarred refugees (from different countries) almost certainly with what we now call PTSD so I have that experience.   

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Erwin said:

I totally get that, Cap.  Am simply saying that the reality is that in the horrors of war any "rules" will go out the window.  They always have... pre and post Napoleonics.  Am certainly not arguing for that horror.  Just bracing for it.  Both my parents' families were wiped out in WW2 and they were left scarred refugees (from different countries) almost certainly with what we now call PTSD so I have that experience.   

Well then I think we can agree that fighting to keep some rules and laws that transcend the demons of our worst nature is a good idea.  I do not think it impossible.  Hard, yes.  But not impossible.  If it is impossible then mankind is basically doomed.  The gloves will come off and that will be that.  We tend to forget that.

In all the sabre rattling about China, we forget that they have 6-8 nuclear boomers we cannot track on a good day capable of basically wiping out most of NA.  So if war really has no rules then it is a matter of time until someone goes all the way.  In fact they might get dragged there by uncontrolled escalation.

I dunno, I am getting on but I do not think just because a thing is difficult that we should drop it and just slide backwards.  Civilization is damned hard.  Survival in a chaos based universe is hard.  But I am not ready to accept the IDF breaking the LOAC anymore than I am ready to let the Russian military get away with it. Too many people died trying to make a better world and I think we owe it to them and those that follow to try to keep it up.

[OBJ]

Not sure, this maybe outside the scope of this discussion and this forum, but, lets see.

In addition to us as a community having an abiding appreciation for the game/simulation that is Combat Mission, should we, as a community with direct experience of world events over the last 20-70 years, be tying this thread and the one on UK together into a robust discussion of the theories on cycles of human violence? Would we benefit as a community in this forum from a wider discussion and understanding of these theories, their implications, and potential to impact us as a community? What would the discussion mean for Combat Mission, the game, and the community?

Just one reference, there are plenty more from many other sources. If you are interested google, 'theories on historical cycles of global violence.' In a quick read through this one seemed reasonably objective even with a clear 'western' bias:

https://jfsdigital.org/articles-and-essays/2023-2/vol-28-no-1-september-2023/ukraine-war-and-historical-war-cycles-was-it-to-be-expected-exploring-the-futures-of-the-war-in-ukraine-through-historical-war-cycles/

There are a couple quotes I thought worth including below the graphic.

The take away I got was, at least in this article, the consensus seems to be there will be another global conflagration somewhere between 2025 and 2050.

 

 

'In conclusion, the cyclical nature of violence and conflict is a complex phenomenon that can be attributed to a variety of causes, including economic and political troubles, generational shifts in social psychology, and theories of social cohesion and natural life cycles. While there is no fateful date that can be directly blamed for the outbreak of violence, the similarities between past and present cycles can provide insight into the potential duration and disintegration of civilizations. Through the study of these cycles, we can better understand the history of human conflict and even think about future trends.'

'In the atmosphere of all-encompassing hysteria and bullying, it’s imperative to remind people that life goes on and that staying human is the first and foremost necessity. Any representative of Homo sapiens belongs to humanity first (…), and some national or ethnic entity, way down the list.'

'The real mystery lies in why, despite being aware of the tragedies of our past, we continue to repeat history.'

 

[Anthony P.]

There exists no quantitative definition of what is and is not wanton or uncalled for destruction, e.g. "there has to be 2 enemy combatants in a one story, 50 square meter residential building to justify destroying it", so between that and the lack of independent research, it's hopeless trying to reach any serious conclusions at such an early stage.

The extensive destruction and refugee streams inside Gaza may be proof of wanton and uncalled for bombing, possibly with the ambition of causing (permanent) large scale migration out of Gaza. The extraordinarily low Israeli casualties on the other hand may also be indicative of the bombing being necessitated to deny Hamas the opportunity of drawing the IDF into costly, manpower intensive and slow moving urban combat as they have before.

[Probus]

22 minutes ago, Anthony P. said:

The extensive destruction and refugee streams inside Gaza may be proof of wanton and uncalled for bombing, possibly with the ambition of causing (permanent) large scale migration out of Gaza.

I believe, and this is wholey a guess, is that Israel wants to evacuate all of Northern Gaza to the South. Kill off Hamas in the North. Then evacuate all of the Gazans, through a strict filtering system, back into Northern Gaza. Rinse and repeat. Painful but may be effective with minimal IDF and civilian casualties in the long term.  Whether that is going to be considered a war crime or just the new way to deal with lawless genocidal terrorists, only time will tell.

After doing the math (<2 civilian deaths per building destroyed), with Al Jazeera's own numbers mind you, I am having a hard time believing Israel is bombing Gaza as indiscriminately as the press would have you believe. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but the numbers I'm seeing just don't lie. With the numbers @Holien supplied, it is only 1 civilian death per 5 buildings destroyed (18,000 civilian deaths divided by 96,000 destroyed or damaged buildings).  

Even though that seems to be a huge number of buildings destroyed or damaged, just imagine how many civilians would have been killed if Gaza was just indiscriminately carpet bombed with 2000 lb bombs dropped by something like B-52s. At least an order of magnitude more deaths I would say.

I just feel very sorry for the Palestinians.  They are the real losers in this conflict. But I guess that's true of all civilians in all wars.

[Anthony P.]

I can no longer bring myself to regard al Jazeera as any more credible a news network than Newsmax or OAN. It's a state controlled news network operating out of a totalitarian Middle Eastern dictatorship, which among other thing recently has published articles seriously claiming that Swedish social services are scheming to kidnap children from Muslim families to give them to LGBT couples (yes, for real).

Nothing published by a "news" network like that can be trusted.

Edited December 13, 2023 by Anthony P.

[Probus]

42 minutes ago, Anthony P. said:

I can no longer bring myself to regard al Jazeera as any more credible a news network than Newsmax or OAN. It's a state controlled news network operating out of a totalitarian Middle Eastern dictatorship, which among other thing recently has published articles seriously claiming that Swedish social services are scheming to kidnap children from Muslim families to give them to LGBT couples (yes, for real).

Nothing published by a "news" network like that can be trusted.

Yeah.  I agree with you 100% @Anthony P.. I was looking for numbers that most reflect what the Middle Eastern community claims.  Even if you flip the numbers from worst case to best case or somewhere in between, it still shows that civilian deaths per building destroyed is relatively low.

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Probus said:

Yeah.  I agree with you 100% @Anthony P.. I was looking for numbers that most reflect what the Middle Eastern community claims.  Even if you flip the numbers from worst case to best case or somewhere in between, it still shows that civilian deaths per building destroyed is relatively low.

Civilian deaths per building is not really a reliable metric.  Were they all in a few of those buildings. Were they evenly distributed across all of them.  What we have are a series of shoots that resulted in a large number of civilian deaths.  A full review and investigation would have to be done to determine if those deaths were simply background collateral damage or criminality occurred.  

By the metrics of deaths per building then Hiroshima wasn’t “that bad either”.

https://www.atomicarchive.com/resources/documents/med/med_chp9.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki

At the high end, Hiroshima “only” resulted in about 2 deaths per building.  So what is all the fuss over?  By your initial estimate, you calculated up to 1.6 deaths per building in Gaza.  So if we play the statistics game: Gaza is only 0.4 civilian deaths per building less than Hiroshima (OMG !!!!!).   This is frankly silly.

As to “let them back in through some sort of filter system”…let them back into what?  The area is uninhabited.  Water, electricity and transport are all blow to hell.  Medical and government services will be non-existent until major reconstruction is done.  “Welcome home good Palestinians!  That crater is all yours!”  Those “good Palestinians” are likely to spark up new insurgencies and terror groups in minutes because the IDF just blew up their homes and left them ruins without power and water.

Finally, we have no idea how many dead civilians are left under those buildings.  One cannot drop a high rise and expect good morgue services.  Without a longer more extensive investigation all we can say is that an investigation is needed.

What we can see is highly suspicious levels of destruction (eg If a Hamas fighter would have been in every single building the IDF would have wiped out Hamas twice over by now).  Either Hamas is much larger than estimate gave, like twice the size.  Or the IDF has one helluva crappy targeting enterprise and keeps missing while knocking buildings down.  Either way, the most obvious potential violation of LOAC remains the indiscriminate destruction of civilian infrastructure with intent that Palestinians never can come back.  That matches the evidence we can see and a plausible Israeli motive.  There is easily enough suspicion that destruction at those rates should be placed under scrutiny and the international community has every right to say “hey wait a minute”.  
 

 

Edited December 14, 2023 by The_Capt

[Probus]

9 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

What we can see is highly suspicious levels of destruction (eg If a Hamas fighter would have been in every single building the IDF would have wiped out Hamas twice over by now).

Yes. I noticed that too.

Well I tried to apply a metric to the invasion by the IDF.  I still believe the numbers are telling, but we may have to agree to disagree. At least I may do some more research into those kind of numbers. (BTW, 7 buildings were destroyed in the 9/11 attack)

 

Here is a bit of combat footage that appears to show the IDF clearing a building:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/s/EeXFfGO4zb

Dangerous work.

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Probus said:

Yes. I noticed that too.

Well I tried to apply a metric to the invasion by the IDF.  I still believe the numbers are telling, but we may have to agree to disagree. At least I may do some more research into those kind of numbers. (BTW, 7 buildings were destroyed in the 9/11 attack)

 

Here is a bit of combat footage that appears to show the IDF clearing a building:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/s/EeXFfGO4zb

Dangerous work.

Well full points for the attempt but in the end an Investigation will be required.  Was it a specific unit or formation where the civilian deaths mostly occurred?  When were most civilians killed, air strikes or ground action?  Who was in command?  How was release authority handled?  What was the target info provided to shooters.  What was the collateral damage estimate?  How did that estimate compare to real losses.  How was collateral damage calculated?  How was military necessity calculated?  What were the ROEs?  Who was running the targeteering (matching munitions to targets)?  What were the civilians told and how?  Did they ever target an area they said they would not/how tight were the control lines?  How heavy were the strikes and on what cross section of targets? 

If the IDF is as clean as new driven snow they would open the books and clear the air.  They would likely run a parallel investigation of their own and we could all argue in the end.  My money is that there will never be an investigation.  Unless we see something truly horrific.  The damage is largely done because the IDF look like they are playing cover up while blasting block by block.  This may be unfair because the court of public opinion is not supposed to rule…but here we are.

My blunt assessment is that Israel is losing this thing.  They are playing directly into the hands of Hamas and their backers.  Iran is laughing its @ss off as any deals between Saudi Arabia and Israel are very likely dead.  Israel is heading towards outcast status and isolation.  The US as champion of a rules-based order is taking a royal beating. Russia and China will be dining out on this for years.  And meanwhile we are getting soft on Ukraine.  And the human tragedy in Gaza is just getting warmed up.

Final note:  how on earth does Egypt get let off the hook in all this?  Why have they not been called out for keeping 2 million Palestinians trapped in a shrinking box in Gaza?  

Edited December 14, 2023 by The_Capt

[Sojourner]

4 hours ago, Probus said:

destroyed or damaged buildings

There's an awful lot of wiggle room in that word "damaged" - could be nothing more than a broken window. For every building destroyed there's probably dozens of buildings damaged.

[Erwin]

19 hours ago, The_Capt said:

we can agree that fighting to keep some rules and laws that transcend the demons of our worst nature is a good idea.

Yes indeed...  But am not sanguine about it.

 

18 hours ago, OBJ said:

https://jfsdigital.org/articles-and-essays/2023-2/vol-28-no-1-september-2023/ukraine-war-and-historical-war-cycles-was-it-to-be-expected-exploring-the-futures-of-the-war-in-ukraine-through-historical-war-cycles/

Fascinating and disturbing data.  Never saw that b4.  Thank you for your post.

[OBJ]

With respect to in-conflict and post-conflict war crimes accountability, what entity in the world has the practical ability to hold in theater on the ground war crimes investigations and prosecute and punish those found guilty? If the ICC, Israel is not Serbia, neither is Gaza, or the West Bank. I suppose the ICC could issue arrest warrants as was done with Putin, and potentially condemn those found guilty in absentia, but that doesn't seem to have had much practical effect in Ukraine.

https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/statement-icc-prosecutor-karim-khan-kc-cairo-situation-state-palestine-and-israel

https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/09/02/qa-international-criminal-court-and-united-states

The list of those not agreeing to be accountable to the ICC is interesting and informative (2nd article, underlining is mine).

'The US is not a state party to the Rome Statute. The US participated in the negotiations that led to the creation of the court. However, in 1998 the US was one of only seven countries – along with China, Iraq, Israel, Libya, Qatar, and Yemen – that voted against the Rome Statute. US President Bill Clinton signed the Rome Statute in 2000 but did not submit the treaty to the Senate for ratification. In 2002, President George W. Bush effectively “unsigned” the treaty, sending a note to the United Nations secretary-general that the US no longer intended to ratify the treaty and that it did not have any obligations toward it. However, since then, US relations with the court have been complicated but often positive.'

[Anthony P.]

13 hours ago, Sojourner said:

There's an awful lot of wiggle room in that word "damaged" - could be nothing more than a broken window. For every building destroyed there's probably dozens of buildings damaged.

Agreed, that's another aspect to @Probus' argument: there's an awful lot of wiggle room in how "destroyed" and especially "damaged" is qualified. A leveled house is clearly destroyed, but how does a house count if a wall has been blown out? Does a broken down door mean that a house is counted as damaged? Etc., etc.

Another aspect is the absurdity of the refugee situation: in a normal war, Israel wouldn't have had to be concerned/made responsible for bouncing 2 million Gazans around like some kind of migrant ping pong game, because they would simply have crossed the border into Egypt and stayed in refugee camps there for a couple of months while the IDF and Hamas duked it out.

But to the Arab world, accepting the prospect of Palestinians crossing a border is basically tantamount to putting on a kippah and announcing that the country will be joining itself to Israel as a new municipality (the slew of civil wars and political assassinations which Palestinian refugees have brought with them to their Arab brethren likely doesn't help make a compelling case for accepting them either).

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Anthony P. said:

Agreed, that's another aspect to @Probus' argument: there's an awful lot of wiggle room in how "destroyed" and especially "damaged" is qualified. A leveled house is clearly destroyed, but how does a house count if a wall has been blown out? Does a broken down door mean that a house is counted as damaged? Etc., etc.

Another aspect is the absurdity of the refugee situation: in a normal war, Israel wouldn't have had to be concerned/made responsible for bouncing 2 million Gazans around like some kind of migrant ping pong game, because they would simply have crossed the border into Egypt and stayed in refugee camps there for a couple of months while the IDF and Hamas duked it out.

But to the Arab world, accepting the prospect of Palestinians crossing a border is basically tantamount to putting on a kippah and announcing that the country will be joining itself to Israel as a new municipality (the slew of civil wars and political assassinations which Palestinian refugees have brought with them to their Arab brethren likely doesn't help make a compelling case for accepting them either).

Well likely more than “a couple months”.  The levels of destruction for high density urban populations would likely make this displacement more than a family camping trip. 

But the underlying point is a fair one.  With all the heat and light on Israel, why is no one holding Egypt to account here?  Locking 2 million people into a war zone is pretty un-humanitarian as well but no body appears willing to call Egypt on it, nor put pressure on them.  I suspect they will cry “cross border terrorism” which is particularly rich.  There are risks of a cross border haven situation as well.  But at this point those are far lesser evils than a slow motion genocide.

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, OBJ said:

With respect to in-conflict and post-conflict war crimes accountability, what entity in the world has the practical ability to hold in theater on the ground war crimes investigations and prosecute and punish those found guilty? If the ICC, Israel is not Serbia, neither is Gaza, or the West Bank. I suppose the ICC could issue arrest warrants as was done with Putin, and potentially condemn those found guilty in absentia, but that doesn't seem to have had much practical effect in Ukraine.

The short answer is the Israeli justice system itself.  If Israel is truly a functioning democracy then first level of prosecution is within the state where the warcrimes occurred, up to and including the PM and cabinet.  The Israeli judicial system is supposed to be separate and impartial from the parliament or executive.  Unless of course Israel is not a functioning democracy.  

If they are not, beyond raising questions as to who exactly are we supporting here, then the ICC would have to take jurisdiction.  That would be a long and laborious affair that would not likely see many actual prosecutions.  In the case of Russia, lack of war criminal prosecution could be held up as a reason for non-renormalization.  In short Russia would be put into a global penalty box.

Israel could wind up in a similar box if things got much worse.  It is the diplomatic and potential economic damage that is the primary stick here.  In a few years if pressure got bad enough Israel would likely offer up some scapegoats to give the international community a pound of flesh to try and tie this off.  But I think we are going to see stuff like military cooperation between the West and Israel take a hit - with the possible exception of the US, but big Red White and Blue is going to have its hands full so might not be in a position for a lot of loving either.

Professionally the IDF will be living with this for quite awhile.  It will cause strains and likely pushback.  No nation is an island in this world, not even the US.  There are too many linkages upon which our lifestyles and security rest.  Messing with them too much is never a sound strategy.

[OBJ]

@The-Capt, I have a tremendous amount of respect for you, both from what you have said of your personal experience of war here and the opinions you have expressed here.

However, we differ in our view of just how strong the rule of law and world order are around the globe in the present day. I do not think the IDF is concerned they will be prosecuted by the Israeli judicial system for their conduct of the war against Hamas. I believe a perception within the IDF that conduct commensurate with what we have seen since 7 Oct was criminal would have led to different behavior from the start.

For what it is worth the IDF says:

Additionally, as a democratic country committed to the rule of law, Israel subjects the IDF’s military justice system to civilian oversight.

https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/military-advocate-general-s-corps/the-idf-military-justice-system/#:~:text=Additionally%2C as a democratic country,justice system to civilian oversight.

 

The IDF has lived with near continuous conflict with Arab neighbors since 1948. All of that history and experience undoubtedly shaped the IDF we are seeing today. To my knowledge, and I have looked, there are no IDF generals, retired or otherwise, speaking out, publicly or privately, against the way Israel is conducting the war against Hamas.