#Rape during civil conflict

[coochiequeens]

This is why incarcerated women everywhere need female only, not just women only prisoners but women only staff.

People gather for a funeral in the city of Goma, Congo.Michel Lunanga / AFP via Getty Images

Feb. 6, 2025, 1:30 PM EST By Astha Rajvanshi

At least 165 women were raped by male inmates after a mass breakout from a prison in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the United Nations said, citing officials in the central African nation.

After fighters from the M23 rebel group advanced toward the eastern city of Goma the U.N. said inmates at the Muzenze prison took advantage of the chaos and started to escape on Jan. 27.

In a video posted to X and verified by NBC News, hundreds of people can be seen escaping from the prison as plumes of black smoke billow nearby and what sounds like gunshots ring out.

“DRC officials report that at least 165 women were raped by male inmates during the mass prison break,” the United Nations said in a report four days later.

Vivian Van de Perre, the United Nations’ representative for the DRC, said in a briefing from Goma on Wednesday that the situation was “still highly volatile” in the city, which is home to around 2 million people.

Many residents were fleeing the city because “the conditions are really, really dire ... and we are actually afraid of health outbreaks in our camps, for the people that we are sheltering, but also for ourselves,” she said.

She added that the U.N. had been “unable to verify firsthand all the numbers and exactly what transpired” at the prison due to the situation in Goma.

Her comments came as farther south, Rwandan-backed M23 rebels moved into mining town of Nyabibwe, in an apparent violation of a unilateral ceasefire the group announced on Monday.

The capture of Nyabibwe takes the rebels a step closer to the provincial capital, Bukavu, some 40 miles south, a city the rebels said last week they had no intention of capturing.

Congo accuses Rwanda of using the M23 to pillage valuable mineral deposits. Rwanda says it is acting in self-defense and to protect ethnic Tutsis.

M23's capture of Goma last week displaced hundreds of thousands of people and fanned fears of a wider regional war.

On Friday, the U.N.'s Human Rights Office (OHCHR) warned that the escalation could lead to the increased use of sexual violence as a weapon of war by rival armed groups, which has long fueled the conflict in eastern Congo.

M23's capture of Goma last week displaced hundreds of thousands of people and fanned fears of a wider regional war.

On Friday, the U.N.'s Human Rights Office (OHCHR) warned that the escalation could lead to the increased use of sexual violence as a weapon of war by rival armed groups, which has long fueled the conflict in eastern Congo.

Reports that 52 women were raped by Congolese troops in South Kivu, including alleged reports of gang rape, were verified by the OHCHR on Friday.

The DRC's government launched an action plan to combat sexual violence by members of the military in 2014, but a report by the U.N. five years later found that perpetrators of sexual violence could still act with impunity.

Last year, Doctors Without Borders, the aid group also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres, reported that it had treated over 25,000 survivors of sexual violence across the DRC in 2023 — the highest number it had ever recorded in the country.

[thebrightestwitchofherage]

The UN's Official Mission report on Hamas' Sexual Violence in Israel was published

Please take your time to read this. Israeli \ Jewish victims deserve the same protection as any other women.

The brief version can be read here.

----

***I am not going to include any graphic detailing.

The pattern of Sexual Violence used by Hamas is very clear:

It was one of their key goals and tactics on October 7th.

You cannot say "Female Hostages are treated well. you're lying by saying they're raped" anymore!

Notice how they also said **Children**

Civilians were in fact burned inside their homes

This is also clearly a pattern used by Hamas, as this is just one of many examples they detail. -Hamas has also burned soldiers alive in their dorms and offices. That is also further detailed in the report.

This is not fake or propaganda

I can't believe I have to write this but this report is an official report (finally) made by the UN's Sexual Violence Office, as part of their yearly report.

They had a 2-week delegation that toured the actual Kibbutzim (turned crime scenes), interviewed eyewitnesses, spoke to families of victims, etc...

___

I do have to say I was mistaken in my earlier post, besides their conclusion, they have also written their recommendations:

...." V. Conclusions

Overall, based on the totality of information gathered from multiple and independent sources at the different locations, there are reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred at several locations across the Gaza periphery, including in the form of rape and gang rape, during the 7 October 2023 attacks. Credible circumstantial information, which may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence, including genital mutilation, sexualized torture, or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, was also gathered. 22

With regards to the hostages, the mission team found clear and convincing information that some hostages taken to Gaza have been subjected to various forms of conflict-related sexual violence and has reasonable grounds to believe that such violence may be ongoing.

The mission team was unable to establish the prevalence of sexual violence and concludes that the overall magnitude, scope, and specific attribution of these violations would require a fully-fledged investigation. A comprehensive investigation would enable the information base to be expanded in locations which the mission team was not able to visit and to build the required trust with survivors/victims of conflict-related sexual violence who may be reluctant to come forward at this point.

Regarding the occupied Palestinian Territory, while its scope did not extend to verification, the mission team received information from institutional and civil society sources as well as through direct interviews, about some forms of sexual violence against Palestinian men and women in detention settings, during house raids and at checkpoints. Though the mission team did not visit Gaza, the Office of the SRSG-SVC will continue to monitor the situation for any relevant allegations of CRSV in the context of the ongoing hostilities. The relevant UN entities present in the occupied Palestinian Territory will provide UN-verified information for reporting to the Security Council on allegations of CRSV, which will be complemented by the information obtained by the mission team.

VI. Recommendations

The mission team makes the following recommendations: a) Continue to encourage the Government of Israeli to grant, without further delay, access to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem and Israel, to carry-out fully-fledged investigations into all alleged violations that would deepen the preliminary findings contained in the present report. b) Urge Hamas and other armed groups to immediately and unconditionally release all individuals held in captivity and to ensure their protection including from sexual violence, in line with international law. c) Call on all relevant and competent bodies, national and international, to bring all perpetrators, regardless of rank or affiliation, to justice based on individual, superior and command responsibility, in accordance with due process of law and fair trial standards. d) Encourage the Government of Israel to consider signing a Framework of Cooperation with the Office of the SRSG-SVC to strengthen capacity on justice and accountability for CRSV crimes as well as security sector engagement, training, and oversight to prevent and address CRSV. 23 e) Strengthen the capacity of the United Nations to monitor and report on incidents, patterns and trends of CRSV in both Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territory through the establishment of the Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Arrangements on CRSV (MARA), convened by dedicated technical specialists, namely Women’s Protection Advisors (WPAs), deployed to the region to ensure prevention, protection and coordinated multi-sectoral assistance to survivors/victims. f) Encourage relevant actors to uphold information integrity and ethical, trauma-informed representations of conflict-related sexual violence, including by respecting and safeguarding the dignity and identity of survivors/victims and witnesses of sexual violence, as sensationalizing headlines, media pressure and scrutiny, exposure of identity, political instrumentalization and pressure, and/or fear of reprisal can result in the suppression, silencing and discrediting of survivors/victims and witnesses, further compound trauma and increase the risk of social stigmatization. g) Urge all parties to the conflict to adopt a humanitarian ceasefire, and to ensure that expertise on addressing conflict-related sexual violence informs the design and implementation of all ceasefire and political agreements and that the voices of women and affected communities are heard in all conflict resolution and peacebuilding processes....."

Israelis have been repeatedly saying all of this for months now, while you deny it. I've personally had people tell me it's all "fake propaganda". You should all be ashamed.

I am infuriated at the fact that for 5 months, our evidence and word isn't enough for Anti-Zionists. Here is some undeniable proof for you.

Believe Jewish Women.

[eretzyisrael]

Did the UN even speak to Dr. Elkayam-Levy? How could it possibly say that this report was "unfounded?"

Now compare the standards of evidence required by this UN team for Israeli evidence compared to Palestinian allegations of sexual violence by the IDF.

It says:

In other locations, such as kibbutz Kfar Azza, while circumstantial information may indicate some forms of sexual violence, the mission could not verify reported incidents of rape. 

Compare to:

The mission team also visited Ramallah in the occupied West Bank to hear the views and concerns of Palestinian officials and civil society representatives in response to allegations of conflict-related sexual violence received by the mandate in the aftermath of the 7 October attacks, allegedly implicating Israeli security forces and settlers. Interlocutors raised concerns about cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of Palestinians in detention, including various forms of sexual violence in the form of invasive body searches, threats of rape, and prolonged forced nudity, as well as sexual harassment and threats of rape, during house raids and at checkpoints. This information will complement information already verified by other UN entities on allegations of CRSV in Gaza and the occupied West Bank for potential inclusion in the annual Report of the Secretary-General on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence.

For Israel, they are quick to deny and reluctant to confirm. Extensive forensic evidence is required to verify the testimony of Jews who cannot be trusted on their own. 

For Palestinians, allegations with zero evidence are published in detail and considered important enough to be included in future reports. Not a shred of skepticism is seen with the Palestinian slanders. No hint of corroborating evidence is requested or even expected. 

[haggishlyhagging]

On the level of political theory, it is my contention that so long as "liberty" claims remain central to the political agenda of western liberalism, feminists and civil libertarians will remain locked in conflict. This contention has two aspects. First, I contend that not only do women presently have less "liberty" than do men in the liberal state, but that men have never been able to imagine "liberty" without assuming the oppression of women. If there were no women (socially or sexually), then men could not experience that state or condition they call liberty. Second, contemporary attempts to achieve the liberal ideal—the perfection of "liberty"—cannot be accomplished without the continued subjugation of women, and in particular, without such subjugating practices as rape, so-called surrogacy arrangements, pornography, and prostitution.

The concept of liberty was originally devised by men during the bourgeois revolution that began in Europe in the 1600s. The purpose of the bourgeois revolution was to promote wider distribution of political and economic power among male members of the state: in effect, "liberty" was a theory of affirmative action for nonaristocratic men (Kathleen Lahey, 1983). Early liberal theory is sometimes described as antipatriarchal, since it rejected feudal patriarchy as the organizing basis of the social order. However, this antipatriarchalism did not extend to the organization of the family or to the status of women, either within the family or within the larger social context (Zillah Eisenstein, 1981). Although newly formulated liberty claims legitimated egalitarianism among males, these liberty claims depended upon the continuing inequality of women to make liberty meaningful for men.

Support for this reading of early liberal theory is not difficult to find. The practices of the Marquis de Sade, which continue to define the essence of liberty for contemporary civil libertarians ranging from Susan Sontag to Larry Flynt, included rape, sexual torture, pornography, and prostitution. Sexual practices and preferences of libertarians aside, political economists such as John Locke conceptualized property and liberty in a way that assumed the continuing male appropriation of women's productive and reproductive energies, and treated as reductio ad absurdum any suggestion that women should be treated as equals or as self-determining persons in the emerging liberal state (Kathleen Lahey, 1983).

Indeed, if the ability to engage in economic and sexual exploitation is the essence of the liberal bourgeois revolution, then women can only now be said to be emerging from feudalism. And not surprisingly, our bourgeois revolution looks a lot like the last one. Women now can—and do—play the Marquis to our sisters, whether we are lesbian or heterosexual women, inflicting pain on others for our own (and allegedly for their) sexual gratification, all in the name of sexual freedom. Women now can—and do—purchase the reproductive capacities of other women, in the name of freedom of contract. Women now can— and do—defend our rights to serve (or even to become) pimps and johns, in the name of freedom of choice. Women now can—and do—define equality as men's rights to everything that women have—including pregnancy leave, child custody, and mother's allowances—at the same time that they define women's equality claims—such as the claim that pornography harms women—as infringements on the principle of freedom of speech or expression.

In our liberal moments, we women—along with all other civil libertarians—are busily engaged in justifying the continuing inequality of some women on the basis of sex; romanticizing emotional independence as the defining core of individualism; eroticizing instrumental rationality as the way to get off sexually; and identifying "the state," rather than male supremacy in its entirety, as the source of our oppression.

-Kathleen A. Lahey, “Women and Civil Liberties” in The Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Douglas Murray

Published: Feb 24, 2024

Like a number of ‘anti-colonialists’, William Dalrymple lives in colonial splendour on the outskirts of Delhi. The writer often opens the doors of his estate to slavering architectural magazines. A few years ago, one described his pool, pool house, vast family rooms, animals, cockatoo ‘and the usual entourage of servants that attends any successful man in India’s capital city’.

I only mention Dalrymple because he is one of a large number of people who have lost their senses by going rampaging online about the alleged genocide in Gaza. He recently tweeted at a young Jewish woman who said she was afraid to travel into London during the Palestinian protests: ‘Forget 30,000 dead in Gaza, tens of thousands more in prison without charge, five MILLION in stateless serfdom, forget 75 years of torture, rape, dispossession, humiliation and occupation, IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU.’ It is one thing when a street rabble loses their minds. But when people who had minds start to lose them, that is another thing altogether.

I find it curious. By every measure, what is happening in Gaza is not genocide. More than that – it’s not even regionally remarkable.

Hamas’s own figures – not to be relied upon – suggest that around 28,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October. Most of the international media likes to claim these people are all innocent civilians. In fact, many of the dead will have been killed by the quarter or so Hamas and Islamic Jihad rockets that fall short and land inside Gaza.

Then there are the more than 9,000 Hamas terrorists who have been killed by the Israel Defence Forces. As Lord Roberts of Belgravia recently pointed out, that means there is fewer than a two to one ratio of civilians to terrorists killed: ‘An astonishingly low ratio for modern urban warfare where the terrorists routinely use civilians as human shields.’ Most western armies would dream of such a low civilian casualty count. But because Israel is involved (‘Jews are news’) the libellous hyperbole is everywhere.

For almost 20 years since Israel withdrew from Gaza, we have heard the same allegations. Israel has been accused of committing genocide in Gaza during exchanges with Hamas in 2009, 2012 and 2014. As a claim it is demonstrably, obviously false. When Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, the population of the Strip was around 1.3 million. Today it is more than two million, with a male life expectancy higher than in parts of Scotland. During the same period, the Palestinian population in the West Bank grew by a million. Either the Israelis weren’t committing genocide, or they tried to commit genocide but are uniquely bad at it. Which is it? Well, when it comes to Israel it seems people don’t have to choose. Everything and anything can be true at once.

Here is a figure I’ve never seen anyone raise. It’s an ugly little bit of maths, but stay with me. If you wish, you might add together all the people killed in every conflict involving Israel since its foundation.

In 1948, after the UN announced the state, all of Israel’s Arab neighbours invaded to try to wipe it out. They failed. But the upper estimate of the casualties on all sides came to some 20,000 people. The upper estimates of the wars of 1967 and 1973, when Israel’s neighbours once again attempted to annihilate it, are very similar (some 20,000 and 15,000 respectively). Subsequent wars in Lebanon and Gaza add several thousands more to that figure. It means that up to the present war, some 60,000 people had died on every side in all wars involving Israel.

Over the past decade of civil war in Syria, Bashar al-Assad has managed to kill more than ten times that number. Although precise figures are hard to come by, Assad is reckoned to have murdered some 600,000 Arab Muslims in his country. Meaning that every six to 12 months he manages to kill the same number as died in every war involving Israel ever.

There are lots of reasons you might give to explain this: that people don’t care when Muslims kill Muslims; that people don’t care when Arabs kill Arabs; that they only care if Israel is involved. Allow me to give another example that is suggestive.

No one knows how many people have been killed in the war in Yemen in recent years. From 2015-2021 the UN estimated perhaps 377,000 – ten times the highest estimate of the recent death toll in Gaza. The only time I’ve heard people scream on British streets about Yemen has been after the Houthis started attacking British and American ships in the Red Sea and the deadbeat idiots on the streets of London started chanting: ‘Yemen, Yemen, make us proud, turn another ship around.’ Because like all leftists and Islamists there is no terrorist group these people can’t get a pash on, so long as that terrorist group is against us.

I often wonder why this obsession arises when the war involves Israel. Why don’t people trawl along our streets and scream by their thousands about Syria, Yemen, China’s Uighurs or a hundred other terrible things? There are only two possible conclusions.

The first is a journalistic one. Ever since Marie Colvin was killed it became plain that western journalists were a target in Syria. Not eager to be the target, most journalists hotfooted it out of the country. Some who didn’t fell into the hands of Isis. Israel-Gaza wars by contrast do not have the same dynamic and on a technical level the media can applaud itself for reporting from a warzone where they are not the target.

But I suspect it is a moral explanation which explains the situation so many people find themselves in. They simply enjoy being able to accuse the world’s only Jewish state of ‘genocide’ and ‘Nazi-like behaviour’. They enjoy the opportunity to wound Jews as deeply as possible. Many find it satisfies the intense fury they feel when Israel is winning.

Like being fanned on your veranda while lambasting the evils of Empire, it is a paradox, to be sure. But it is also a perversity. And it doesn’t come from nowhere.

==

"From the water to the water, Palestine is Arab."

This is the actual genocide.

[beardedmrbean]

In the early hours of October 7, 2023, the Idan family of Kibbutz Nahal Oz was shattered when Hamas terrorists infiltrated their home. As the family tried to take refuge in their safe room, the terrorists murdered their eldest daughter, Maayan, in front of her parents and siblings, and then abducted the father, Tzachi. The scene was broadcast live on social media, forcing the nation to witness their agonizing last moments. 

At the same time, in Kibbutz Holit, 16-year-old Rotem Matias lay hiding under his mother's lifeless body, texting his sisters the heartbreaking news: "Mom and Dad are dead. Sorry."

In Kfar Aza, Roee Idan was killed while holding his 3-year-old daughter, Abigail, as his older children watched in horror. Their mother, Smadar, was also shot before their eyes. Afterward, the children hid in a closet, trapped with their mother’s body, unsure of their younger sister's fate, who was later abducted into Gaza.

ISRAELI POLICE SAY EXTREME SEXUAL VIOLENCE, RAPE BY HAMAS TERRORISTS WAS SYSTEMATIC

These are just a few of the countless stories documented in a new report released on Tuesday, co-authored by Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy, founder of the Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes Against Women and Children, and Dr. Michal Gilad and Dr. Ilya Rudyak. The report introduces the term "kinocide" to describe the systematic targeting and destruction of family units during the attack- an unprecedented atrocity that goes beyond typical warfare.

"A crime without a name for victims without a voice," as Dr. Elkayam-Levy described it. "The perpetrators not only killed but deliberately sought to destroy the very foundation of human society: the family."

"The hardest crimes to witness were those involving families," Dr. Elkayam-Levy continued, "While the Hamas perpetrators celebrated their violence, chanting religious slogans and broadcasting their actions on social media, the terror was not confined to the immediate victims-it was amplified globally."

"The use of social media was crucial in spreading the terror, inspiring similar acts of violence elsewhere," Merav Israeli-Amarant, CEO of the Civil Commission, told Fox News Digital. She referred to this tactic as the "terror theater" a term coined by legal scholar Tehila Schwartz Altshuler, explaining how the broadcasts were designed to radicalize and incite other terrorists.

As Elkayam-Levy and her team dug deeper, they realized that similar tactics have been documented in conflicts across the globe, from Argentina and Iraq to Syria, Sierra Leone and Myanmar. "We’ve been in contact with survivors of kinocide, including Yazidis, who have shared their experiences. The pain is universal. This has happened before, but it never had a name," Dr. Elkayam-Levy said.

In collaboration with the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights, the commission worked to identify these patterns of abuse and ensure that kinocide is recognized as a distinct crime. The new report, released after a year of research, includes interviews with survivors, visits to the sites where the atrocities took place, and an extensive review of evidence. The goal is to bring kinocide into international legal discourse, advocating for its urgent need to be recognized as a distinct crime.

'I WILL BE HAUNTED FOREVER’: ISRAEL’S HORRIFIC VIDEO OF HAMAS ATROCITIES LEAVES VIEWERS SHOCKED AND SICKENED

Professor Irwin Cotler, former Minister of Justice of Canada and International Chair of the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights, stated, "Silence in the face of such evil is not neutrality; it is complicity. Worse still, there has been denial, justification, and even the glorification of these heinous acts, underscoring the moral and legal imperative to act decisively against such crimes. The dangers of antisemitism are not just the oldest and most lethal of hatreds- they are also a presage of global evil, as evidenced by the events of October 7."

"We need an international coalition to address this systematic targeting of families," Elkayam-Levy said. "But international law has failed the survivors of October 7. The current legal frameworks do not adequately protect families in these kinds of attacks."

The report, which has been endorsed by international law experts and human rights activists worldwide, highlights the urgent need for legal and social recognition of kinocide. However, despite the report’s widespread endorsement, Elkayam-Levy expressed her concern over the international community’s response. 

As someone who faced the denial of prominent figures in the international human rights community in response to her last report on sexual violence on Oct. 7, she said, "We live in dark times when international law is weaponized against us (Israelis) in terrifying ways. As an international human rights scholar, I never imagined that we would live in a time when such abuse is directed at us. It really scares me."

[anarchotahdigism]

"

Content warning: contains accounts of war crimes, including rape.

In the previous issue of Anarchosyndicalisme, the CNT-AIT echoed the call for solidarity from anarchists in Sudan.

Since a terrible war broke out on 15 April 2023 between two military factions – the Rapid Support Forces (or Janjaweed militias) against the official army – civilians have been living in a climate of “pure terror” because of a “ruthless and senseless conflict”, denounced by the UN with general indifference. At least 15,000 people have died, and more than 26,000 have been injured, but these figures are certainly underestimates.

There are 11 million internally displaced people, 1.8 million people in exile, and 18 million people at acute risk of starvation. 8 million workers have lost their jobs and their income. 70% of areas no longer have water or electricity, 75% of hospitals have been destroyed, 19 million students have stopped studying, 600 industrial plants have been destroyed and looted, as have 110 banks, 65% of agriculture has been destroyed, 80% of inputs (fertilisers, pesticides, agricultural machinery and harvesters) in the Geziera irrigated area – the largest in the world – have been looted and destroyed, etc.

The media and activist silence surrounding Sudan is allowing soldiers on both sides to commit genocide with impunity. The conflict between the two clans has many components: ethnic, with its trail of reciprocal genocides (according to the UN); “imperialist”, because each of the two opposing groups is supported by various foreign powers that covet Sudan for its natural resources and its strategic location. But above all, it is a “counter-revolutionary” war. By putting the country to fire and blood, it has crushed the hopes of the civil and democratic revolution. And drove many of the revolution’s activists into exile. By completely destabilising the country, this war has enabled the leaders of the former regime to remain in power without being tried for the crimes they committed over decades (during the military dictatorship and then the coup d’état).

Following the appeal for solidarity, we received more than 1,200 euros (including 200 euros from the companions of the Kurdish-language anarchist forum, KAF), which we were able to pass on to our Sudanese companions. This solidarity enabled them to organise humanitarian distributions of blankets, hygiene products (sanitary pads, soap, toothpaste) and infant milk. A reception area for children was organised, with drawing materials and elementary classes, giving the children a chance to escape the madness of war.

But today, the situation is becoming impossible. The violence of the military groups is unleashed. The Janjaweed militias are behaving like barbarians towards civilians. They murdered our companion Sarah after raping her. For their part, the soldiers are arresting and torturing revolutionaries, accusing them of being allied with the Janjaweed. Our companions urgently need to seek shelter in neighbouring countries. We are relaying their desperate appeal to the international anarchist movement.

If you would like to make a contribution, please send cheques made payable to CNT AIT to CNT-AIT 7 rue St Rémésy 31000 TOULOUSE, or via PayPal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/cntait1 "

[leftistfeminista]

Testimonies, read out by a judge, detailed how soldiers deployed to fight Maoist rebels used their position to systematically intimidate, persecute and rape women and girls as young as 14.

As a teenager, María was repeatedly raped by different soldiers over several years and had two pregnancies as a result.

“We were young girls,” she said. “And they sent the army to all the rural zones, to various departments, where they carried out abuses. Abuse, rape, torture, killings. I’m a witness of that.”

Prosecutors began looking into the teenagers’ accusations in 2004 after a special commission investigating the armed conflict published a report detailing among other abuses suffered by civilians in Manta that “sexual violence was a persistent and daily practice” for which “the members of the Army stationed in the local military bases were mainly responsible.”

Angulo on Wednesday said the rapes sometimes occurred when the teenagers were entering their homes after being threatened with rifles, or after being detained and accused without evidence of being part of the Shining Path. One victim reported having a scar on her hip left by a soldier using a knife to cut her underwear.

[anyab]

Via NasAlSudan

Swipe through to learn about the ethnic cleansing, historical context, current events, and key factors contributing to the Genocide in Darfur. For actionable ways to make a difference, please it is @darfurwomenaction.

December 18 2023

Transcript:

Darfur A region in western Sudan, consisting of 5 states and home to around 80 tribes of diverse ethnic makeup, consisting of African and Arab descent. Has a history of enduring social, political, and economic marginalization under past governments. Has been enduring a 20-year conflict known as the Darfur War (2003 - Present).

Transcript:

What is happening today?

Using the cover of the war in Sudan and the SAF's preoccupation in the capital of 7 Khartoum, RSF forces almost immediately launched a genocidal assault in El-Geniena, the capital of West Darfur, against members of the Masalit tribe.

The brutal massacres and horrific reports of sexual assault and enslavement have prompted more than 500,000 to flee via the Western border to Chad since the conflict's start eight months ago.

Since June, RSF assaults in the Darfur region have led them to capture 4/5 states, with the group now controlling West, Central, South, and East Darfur. North Darfur and its capital of El-Fashir remain under the relative protection of the SAF and its allied groups.

In July, following international condemnation, the International Criminal Court (ICC) reported that it is opening investigations into the RSF on the allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Key Alliances

Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF)

Justice and Equality Movement (Gibril Ibrahim)

Sudan Liberation Army (Minni Minawi)

GSLF (Salah Al-Wali)

Sudan Liberation Army (Mustafa Tambour)

Rapid Support Forces (RSF)

Bani Halba

Tarjam

Habaniya

Fallata

Taaysha

Misseriya

Rizeigat

Transcript:

Darfur: The war in numbers

Humanitarian crisis:

*56 cases of reported rape including minors, male children, and one resulting in death. Sexual violence cases are significantly underreported due to limited capacity, infrastructure, support measures, and willingness to come forward.

At least 29 cities, towns and villages fully or partially destroyed across Darfur.

At least 5 million children are facing extreme deprivation of their rights and protection risks.

Mass abductions and enslavement have been reported, with women forced into sexual acts for basic needs and both genders traded by captors.

1.2 million children under five in the Darfur states are suffering from acute malnutrition. 218,000 of them facing severe acute malnutrition

Over 3,130 allegations of severe child rights violations Since mid-April

Transcript:

Building historical context

The colonial era (1899 - 1956)

During the period of Anglo-Egyptian colonization, a policy of identity fragmentation was pursued that played on the division of Arab and Muslim versus African and Christian

The hierarchical identity separation was a form of erasure and marginalization of many, including ethnically African Muslims, as most of the population of Darfur is

Furthermore, building on the identity fragmentation policy, land allocation under the British was to ethnic groups rather than on an individual basis

The African tribes of the Fur and Masalit were allocated the largest swaths of land, especially in comparison to Arab tribes like the Rizeigat

This led to a domination of African tribes in Darfur post-independence and continued land and resource-based conflict between the Arab and African tribes in the region

The second Sudanese civil war (1983-2005)

Due to systemic marginalization and the violation of the Addis Ababa Peace Agreement that had ended the first Sudanese Civil War, rebel groups in the South led primarily by the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) rose against the central government in Khartoum in 1983

An estimated 2 million people were killed and 4 million displaced.

Unable to fend off SPLA alone, the central government armed members of the Arab tribes of Darfur (collectively known as the Baggara tribes) to help fight the war, particularly against displaced southerners who had fled towards Darfur and the Nuba Mountains regions of Sudan

The Baggara tribes now held a weapons advantage over African tribes

Transcript:

Bashir era escalation (1994-1999) Under the government of deposed dictator Omar al-Bashir, a rigorous strategy of Arabization was pursued across Sudan

In 1994, Bashir divided the region of Darfur into 3 states: North, West and South Darfur

Altered the boundaries to make the ethnically African Fur tribe a minority in each state

In 1995, Bashir appointed 8 Arab emirs in West Darfur, which was dominated by the African Masalit, which led to the the outbreak of the Arab-Masalit War (1995-1999)

This was Darfur's second war, with the first being the Arab-Fur War (1987-1989) following the migration of Arab tribes to the southern Fur dominated region due to drought and famine

The rise of militias (1995 - 2003)

Stemming from the Baggara tribes armed by the government in the 80s, the Arab tribes banded together during the Arab-Masalit war to form a new militia, the Janjaweed

In response, the early 2000s witnessed the formation of many ethnically African militias (Fur, Masalit, Zaghawa) to challenge the central government, including:

Darfur Liberation Front (DLF) - 2001

Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) - 2003

Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) - 2003

Transcript:

Declaration of the Darfur war(2003)

In March of 2003, a government helicopter was shot down by SLM/A, marking the start of the Darfur War

Rebel attacks were highly coordinated and army resources were depleted from the fight in the South against SPLA

By May of 2003, the central government realized that it had lost the first 32 of 34 battles

Prompted the Bashir government in June of 2003 to escalate the war through the arming of the Janjaweed to fight as a proxy for the central government

Genocide in Darfur (2003 - 2005)

The Darfur genocide marks the systematic killing of ethnically African Darfuri people at the hands of the Bashir government and Janjaweed, constituting the first genocide of the 21st century.

Typified by systematic targeted assaults, mass displacement, sexual violence, and intentional obstruction of aid, all contributing factors leading to its classification as genocide.

Targeted the Fur, Masalit, and Zaghawa ethnic groups, of which, over 300,000 people were killed and millions displaced, with 400,000 refugees forced to seek shelter in camps in neighboring Chad.

Ethnic divisions served as fuel for the conflict, exemplified by the derogatory term "abd" (slave) used against the ethnically African Darfuri population.

In 2009, al-Bashir became the first sitting head of state indicted by the ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity, and was later on charged with genocide

Transcript:

FAQ - From the Janjaweed to the RSF

Question 01 What happened to the Janjaweed?

The paramilitary group was formalized by al-Bashir in 2013 as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and legally incorporated into the security sector in 2017

Question 02: Who makes up the RSF today?

Today, the RSF is primarily comprised of members of western Arab tribes from across the Sahel including the: Rizeigat, Taaysha, Beni Halba, Habbaniya, Salamat, Messeria, Tarjam, and Beni Hussein

Due to the lucrative pay and benefits offered by the RSF, members of these tribes from Chad, Niger, Mali have all joined the ranks of the RSF in this war

Question 03 What about the rebels?

Though groups like JEM and SLA fought in the Darfur War against the central government and the Janjaweed, today they have allied with the SAF to fight the RSF in its campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Masalit

Transcript:

How the system works

Systems of oppression

Resource Competition Climate change coupled with competition for scarce resources exacerbated intercommunal conflict. Darfur's arid environment heightened competition for scarce resources, such as water and arable land, exacerbating tensions between herding Arab groups and farming African tribes.

Historical Grievances Historical disparities in land distribution, dating back to colonial times, created resentment between Arab and African communities. The distribution favored African tribes, fostering a sense of marginalization among the Arab tribes.

Government Policies The Sudanese government, historically dominated by Arab elites, pursued exclusionary policies that favored Arabization and Islamization. This contributed to the marginalization of non-Arab ethnic groups, particularly in Darfur.

Armed Conflict The Second Sudanese Civil War (1983- 2005) set the stage for Darfur's conflict. As the government armed Arab militias, known as the Janjaweed, during the civil war, these militias continued their operations in Darfur post-war, targeting non-Arab communities.

Ethnic and Racial Divisions The conflict took on ethnic and racial dimensions, with the government's targeting of African tribes and creating the Janjaweed against the ethnically African Darfuri population. This fueled animosity and contributed to the genocide.

Resource Competition The Janjaweed and Sudanese government engaged in systematic violence, including targeted assaults, mass displacement, sexual violence, and obstructing aid. These tactics aimed to weaken and destabilize the targeted communities, constituting genocidal acts.

[jewishbarbies]

You should watch Israelism. And “Tantura : The Untold story of the 1948 massacre,” its on YouTube. Tantura literally traumatized me. It’s a documentary where journalists interviewed soldiers who “served” in the village of Tantura. They recall the mass rapes, torture and massacres committed against Palestinians there. How they burned them for fun. How they were jealous of them because they lived in beautiful houses. Beautiful clothes. All that with big smiles…

To think human beings, blessed with thought and free will would consciously make the decision to be this evil. How sadistic, How messed up do you have to be to still support those gen0cidal maniacs ? Truly disgusting. The fact that the Brits helped those Europeans Jews do their massacres just proves how much Israel is essentially a colonial project.

Israelism is also a documentary who uniquely explores how Jewish attitudes towards Israel are changing dramatically, with massive consequences for the region and for Judaism itself. It was directed by two first-time Jewish filmmakers who share a similar story to the film’s protagonists, it was produced by Peabody-winner & 6-time Emmy-nominee Daniel J. Chalfen (Loudmouth, Boycott) along with activist and filmmaker Nadia Saah (Mo, Omar, 5 Broken Cameras), executive produced by two-time Emmy-winner Brian A. Kates (Marvelous Ms. Maisel, Succession, The Plot Against America).

Synopsis: “When two young American Jews raised to unconditionally love Israel witness the brutal way Israel treats Palestinians, their lives take sharp left turns.

They join a movement of young American Jews battling the old guard to redefine Judaism’s relationship with Israel, revealing a deepening generational divide over modern Jewish identity.”

I know a Palestinian girl whose grandmother was a Jewish Palestinian killed during the Nakba. Europeans considered her "too Arab," especially since she was married to a Palestinian Muslim. Interfaith marriages were common in Palestine back then and still are among Christian and Muslim Palestinians. It's a tragic reality that the racism against Arab Jews is often overlooked by many Zionist Jews today.

Recently, I read an article by an Iraqi-American Jew about how Palestinian Jews were pressured by Europeans to be "more civilized like them”. That just shows the colonial mindset that they had (and still have).

Finally, I’d like to call your hypocrisy on saying that Palestine never existed. Just because they were colonized doesn’t mean they never existed. It’s like saying “Algeria never existed before the French came and colonized them”, same goes to Morroco, Tunisia, Libya ect.

It’s their land whether y’all like it or not, they welcomed you even though they had nothing to do with the Holocaust. What did they got in return ? Ethnic cleansing, Gen0cide and oppression. Denying their right of return is just the cherry on top of the cake.

Israel is a prime example of why reparations are a terrible idea. All it does is spark new conflicts from old sins. And even then, you can give reparations without creating a colonial apartheid state. Reparations would have been rebuilding Jewish neighborhoods and providing social programs for their residents instead of shipping them off to be someone else's problem.

The fact that Palestinians have to pay for the European crimes is disgusting.

Shame on the US and European countries for denying Palestine right to establish sovereign nation. And shame on you for supporting that colonial and genocidal state.

[mariacallous]

On March 11, Pramila Patten, the United Nations’ special representative of the secretary-general on sexual violence in conflict, presented a report to the U.N. Security Council on her fact-finding mission to Israel and the Palestinian territories regarding the events of Oct. 7, 2023. Her mission, she stated, “threw light on the indiscriminate and coordinated attacks by Hamas and other armed groups against multiple military and civilian targets, aimed to kill, to inflict suffering and abduct the maximum number possible of men, women, and children—soldiers and civilians alike—in the minimum possible amount of time.”

According to the report, Patten and her team “conducted interviews according to UN standards and methodology, with a total of 34 interviewees, including with survivors and witnesses of the 7 October attacks, released hostages, first responders, health and service providers and others.” Further interviews were conducted with the families of hostages still held in captivity. Patten’s team also met with civil society organizations, went to a military base where bodies of those killed during the attack were brought for identification and release to families, and examined four locations in the Gaza periphery where attacks took place.

Based on this, Patten said in her remarks to the Security Council that her team had found “clear and convincing information” of “a catalogue of the most extreme and inhumane forms of killing, torture and other horrors” and other violations that had occurred, including “sexual violence, abduction of hostages and corpses, the public display of captives, both dead and alive, the mutilation of corpses, including decapitation and desecration of bodies as well as the looting and destruction of civilian property.”

Patten’s report joins an earlier statement made by U.N. human rights experts Alice Edwards and Morris Tidball-Binz that was also sent to the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, calling for full accountability for the multitude of alleged crimes committed against civilians in Israel during the Oct. 7 attacks. It also corroborates other reports, most recently by the Association for Rape Crisis Centers in Israel as well as by the New York Times, Washington Post, Human Rights Watch, BBC, and others, regarding allegations of rape and ongoing sexual abuse of the hostages held in Gaza.

In late March, the New York Times published the first survivor testimony of an alleged sexual assault experienced by an Israeli hostage in Gaza. Amit Soussana, a 40-year-old Israeli lawyer held hostage in Gaza, recalled being chained to a bed and fondled by a guard who constantly inquired about the timing of her period. Two weeks after her abduction, she told the Times, she was beaten and groped while naked and held at gunpoint, and the guard, “with the gun pointed at me, forced me to commit a sexual act on him.”

The Israeli government and some Israeli officials, including IDF officers and members of the community volunteer organization ZAKA (the Hebrew acronym for Disaster Victim Identification, Extraction, and Rescue), have also issued statements and made allegations of sexual abuse by Hamas. However, some of that information has been proved to be false, including reports of alleged atrocities that actually never happened. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated and recirculated these tales and the veracity of an earlier New York Times report based on an Israeli soldier’s allegations has since been called into question by the paper’s own reporters.

However, the fact that the Israeli government has disseminated some disinformation about the events of Oct. 7 or misused the suffering of the victims and the hostages for its own purposes does not render all allegations made by Israeli victims and by other sources false.

Many of the acts described in reports by the U.N., rights groups, and media outlets may constitute war crimes, as defined in the 1949 Geneva Conventions and subsequent protocols, and crimes against humanity, as defined by the 1998 Rome Statute. In addition, international law forbids the taking of hostages during an armed conflict, as defined by the International Committee of the Red Cross. A war crime is a war crime, and both sides should be held accountable for the crimes and human rights violations they have committed.

More than six months after Oct. 7, some media organizations and international groups remain unconvinced that any sexual violence actually occurred that day. Others issue general statements without specific reference to Hamas and Israel, or provide a reluctant acknowledgement that minimizes the scope and severity of the sexual abuse; others ignore or give only passing reference to the plight of the estimated 134 hostages still held in Gaza, at least 19 of whom are women and children, or issue general statements without specific references to Israel and Hamas.

The Intercept published a scathing critique of the earlier New York Times report, noting that “[r]ape is not uncommon in war.” The Intercept article presented the reporting of the Times article as flawed, noting that “at every turn, when the New York Times reporters ran into obstacles confirming tips, they turned to anonymous Israeli officials or witnesses who’d already been interviewed repeatedly in the press. Months after setting off on their assignment, the reporters found themselves exactly where they had begun, relying overwhelmingly on the word of Israeli officials, soldiers, and Zaka workers to substantiate their claim that more than 30 bodies of women and girls were discovered with signs of sexual abuse.” The Intercept implied that the rapes and abuse perpetrated against Israelis were not a systematic or deliberate act of war.

Elsewhere, Guardian columnist Owen Jones claimed on his YouTube channel that the video he watched, put together by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) from Hamas’s own bodycam footage as well as dashboard and mobile phone footage, provided “no evidence” of war crimes.

More recently, articles in both the Grayzone and Mondoweiss analyze Patten’s report and claim, in the words of the latter, that she actually provided “no evidence of systematic rape.” The Grayzone also published a transcript of a discussion between Max Blumenthal and Chris Hedges in which they agree that Israel created a “shock-and-awe campaign of misinformation” in order to create “political space for its brutal assault on Gaza.” Other essays in the Middle East Eye and Zeteo focus primarily on the plight of women in Gaza, glossing over or failing to mention the plight of the Israeli women held hostage. Responses by certain women’s institutions at the United Nations and other feminist groups have also been muted.

On its website, U.N. Women refers to itself as “the global champion for gender equality,” but it has done little to seek justice for murdered Israeli women or resolve the plight of the hostages. In late November, U.N. Women Executive Director Sima Bahous did indeed brief U.N. Security Council members of the “dire situation of women in Gaza and the hostages.” And on Jan. 19, Bahous issued a statement saying, “I call again for accountability for all those affected by the 7 October attacks.” Bahous also condemned “the unparalleled destruction rained on the people of Gaza” along with a call for the release of the hostages.

But the response of U.N. Women as an organization has been less forthcoming. In late November, U.N. Women posted a condemnation of the “brutal attacks by Hamas on Israel on 7 October,” then replaced it with a statement that dropped the condemnation of the attacks and mention of Hamas, while calling for the release of the hostages. That latter statement was later deleted. Since then, its statements have condemned the deaths of Palestinian women in Gaza without any mention of the Israeli victims or the hostages remaining in Gaza, despite the testimony by released hostage Soussana in the New York Times and Israeli media.

Foreign officials and some advocacy organizations have been similarly equivocal. Interviewed on CNN in January, U.S. House Rep. Pramila Jayapal stated that while rape was “horrific,” it “happens in war situations. Terrorist organizations like Hamas obviously are using these as tools. However, I think we have to be balanced about bringing in the outrages against Palestinians.” (She later issued a statement unequivocally condemning “Hamas’ use of rape and sexual violence as an act of war.”)

In late March, a group of feminists wrote an open letter addressing the Israeli and U.S. governments, claiming that the Israeli government has “chosen to weaponize the issue of sexual violence for political outcome” to shield the IDF’s operations in Gaza amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

In the eyes of many Israeli women, these institutions and organizations have failed to advocate for Israeli victims of sexual violence and for the safety of the remaining hostages—an abdication of their responsibility to protect the lives of all women everywhere. Their inability to simultaneously condemn the gender-based crimes committed by Hamas and the rampant death and destruction caused by Israel in Gaza raises disturbing questions about their understanding of, and commitment to, their mission—and their future relevance.

The downplaying of sexual violence by Hamas is all the more perplexing given the amount of disturbing material already in the public domain. Some of what is known about the gender-based crimes on Oct. 7 comes from testimonies of survivors, the desperate text messages that the victims sent to their families, and recovered cellphones and cameras. And some was provided by journalists or by the attackers themselves, some of whom broadcast their gruesome acts to entire world in real time.

These images include the picture of Naama Levy, bloodied and bruised, as she was loaded onto a Hamas vehicle; the image of terrified Noa Argamani as she was kidnapped to be brought to Gaza; and the photo of Shani Louk, whose mostly naked, splayed body was driven around Gaza on the back of a pickup truck. It is unknown if Louk was dead or alive in the photo; she was reported dead nearly a month later when IDF troops operating in Gaza identified parts of her body. That photo was the first featured in the winning gallery of the team category of Pictures of the Year competition run by the Missouri School of Journalism.

“This has been one of the most documented atrocities in history,” said Ruth Halperin-Kaddari of Bar Ilan University, an expert in international women’s law who served three terms on the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women. The denial of the crimes against women constitutes, she said, “a betrayal of everything that these feminist organizations claim to stand for.”

There are several explanations for why previously respected women’s rights organizations might refuse to publicly admit that Hamas is capable of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, or gloss over these crimes.

Some observers, such the ad hoc group Me Too Unless You’re a Jew, insist that antisemitism is at the heart of the anti-Israel bias. Some academics, such as prominent Israeli sociologist Eva Illouz of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and historian Aviad Kleinberg of Tel Aviv University, argue that academics and human rights organizations—including the U.N.—have been and part of a far broader alliance between religious Islam and what Illouz refers to as the “‘post-colonial’ left” that has divided the world into victims and perpetrators, leading to a simplistic and distorted view of morality, according to which Palestinians can do no wrong—a view that Hamas has aggressively promoted.

One source—who previously held a high-ranking position at U.N. Women and is still employed by the United Nations, and therefore spoke to Foreign Policy on the condition of anonymity—pointed to bureaucratic and logistical issues as the cause of this disparity, rather than antisemitism or politicization. This source noted that unlike the West Bank and Gaza, Israel, the United States, and other developed Western countries are not considered “program areas for U.N. Women. … As a result, the U.N., a cumbersome, bureaucratic organization bound by all sorts of regulations and limitations, finds it difficult to even to really consider that Israel, or even any Israeli, might ever be a victim of the Palestinians.”

Furthermore, the source noted, Israel has often positioned itself as distant or even aloof from the U.N. and other international organizations. Indeed, Israel has long denigrated the U.N. and maintained that it is inherently hostile to Israel; as early as 1955, then-Prime Minister David Ben Gurion derisively used a made-up Hebrew rhyme, “Um-Shmum” to deny that the U.N. has any importance.

“This plays into an already-existing bias against Israel as an occupying country, and as a result, Israel may receive less understanding, compassion, or even attention from the U.N. and its affiliates,” the U.N. source said.

Based on her familiarity with the United Nations, Halperin-Kaddari—the international women’s law expert—also pointed to procedures and other limitations as a difficulty. But she noted that in comparison with other situations, such as the sexual violence in Foca, Bosnia, in 1992—during which large numbers of Muslims and Croats were tortured, disappeared, raped, or executed, and women were transferred to so-called rape camps—the responses of by U.N. Women and similar organizations has been “appalling slow and terribly inadequate.”

Daphna Hacker, a professor at Tel Aviv University’s faculties of law and gender studies and Israel’s current member of the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, acknowledged that the evidence from Oct. 7 may not meet the “usual criterion” of U.N. and other international investigations.

“The intensity and manner in which these crimes were perpetrated is unprecedented,” Hacker said. “Hamas murdered or kidnapped most of their victims; the hostages have not been released and, as feminist researchers, we know that if there are surviving eyewitnesses or survivors, they may not come forward for many years, if ever. But the testimony that we do have is horrific.”

Tal Hochman, the director-general of the Israel Women’s Network, Israel’s foremost feminist advocacy organization, also acknowledged that there are numerous difficulties surrounding the evidence. She said that ZAKA, the nongovernmental rescue and recovery organization tasked by the government to recover the bodies after the Oct. 7 attacks, did not prioritize forensic examinations.

“ZAKA gave priority to identifying the bodies and bringing them to rapid burial, which is a holy commandment in Judaism,” Hochman said. “We do not have all of the evidence that we could have had, but I also understand the families’ pain and need for burial and closure.”

In the days following the attack, Hochman added, she volunteered at the Shura military base, the forensic collection center and morgue to which bodies from the Oct. 7 attack were brought. “We did not have enough refrigerators to perform complete forensic examinations of all of the bodies,” she said.

“To honor these women, the U.N. and other organizations cannot hide behind protocols and logistics,” Hacker said. “The organizations must adapt to the reality that the victims suffered, and the hostages continue to suffer, in order to bring them the justice they deserve.”

Orit Sulitzeanu, the director of the Association for Rape Crisis Centers in Israel—which published the first comprehensive report regarding the attacks­—noted that the report produced by her organization “meets the highest standards of reporting. It is offensive that are findings are dismissed because of misuse by some Israeli individuals or officials. We are a nongovernmental agency—our report should be judged on its merits as an investigative report.”

Furthermore, she commented on the recent U.N. report: “What about the report by Patten? It is ludicrous to dismiss her report as if she were part of Israeli hasbara.”

Weaponizing the abuse of women and conflict-related sexual crimes to promote other agendas—whether the Israeli government’s or its opponents’—is a deliberate victimization of women and a betrayal of all women, everywhere.

Accusations of sexual-based war crimes must be investigated, no matter who the victim and the alleged perpetrator are. Sexual violence is abhorrent, no matter on which side of the border between Israel and Gaza the victims are and no matter if the victims are Israeli or Palestinian. Justifying or excusing the crimes of Oct. 7 as if they were acts of liberation and resistance implies that Israeli women are in some way complicit in their victimization, or perhaps deserved their fate, because they are citizens of an occupying power.

A position paper published in early December by a coalition of six Arab women’s organizations in Israel takes a more morally upstanding position. The coalition members clearly state that they do not question the reports of sexual assaults against Israeli women and “call upon the women [and] feminist activists … to boldly condemn all violations, including killings, demolitions, and displacements occurring in the relentless war against the Palestinian people, particularly affecting women and children in Gaza. … Our feminist values dictate that we cannot accept any excuses for violating human rights.”

In some future, we in this region will struggle to rebuild and create new societies predicated on freedom, security, and opportunity for all. To do so, we must learn to hold multiple, even contradictory, truths—and to feel pain for ourselves and our enemies simultaneously.

That means recognizing the anguish of the many thousands of women and children in Gaza who have been traumatized by the appalling deprivation, chaos, violence, and death at the hands of the IDF and the Israeli government and—at the same time—demanding justice for all of Hamas’s victims.

Justice is meant to be universal and indivisible. By minimizing the dehumanization of Israeli women and the hostages still in Gaza, many publications and organizations have undermined this crucial, seemingly self-evident axiom. And by denying the universalism of war crimes and crimes against humanity, they have abdicated their basic responsibility.

Instead of assuming positions of moral selectivity, U.N. institutions and all organizations and publications dedicated to human rights can and must apply their prestige, influence, and extensive funding to advocate for all women, investigate all credible allegations, bring all perpetrators to justice before an international court, and provide support for all victims.

[horizon-verizon]

Any thoughts in particular about Alyssa V and her motherhood and political decisions? I think she, Rhaena and Visenya are really fascinating characters in this era of the Targ. Her husband dead, her son was usurped and murdered, her daughter, her granddaughter, her other son, and she and her two youngest children are hostages. Finally she got the allies they didn't have but that came at a high price. They win by her decisions and However, be sidelined and lose her political and personal agency.

So I talk about Rhaena, her relationship with Alyssa and Rhaena's perspective of her relationship with Alyssa both in TikTok (devoteeofwhimsy) and HERE on Tumblr. But I haven't really talked about Alyssa and her perspective in great detail. And this post won't either, bc I'm a bit too tired as of yet.

In short, I feel for her and wish I can be black and white about her for Rhaena's sake...but again, she went through it, had to consider her children's lives often above her own even when (one, guess who) they didn't consider her issues when it was needed. So basically, I just agree with you.

It is fascinating to compare & juxtapose Rhaena v Visenya; Visenya, in supporting Maegor to usurp Rhaena's brother Aegon, had perpetuated and enacted much of the catastrophe Rhaena suffered. Visenya was also the one to suggest a marriage b/t her and Maegor so the dynasty itself doesn't split (thus we may think Rhaena would be safer) and have less chance of a later civil conflict but also to have Maegor that much closer to the throne. On the other hand, Aenys refused to name Rhaena, his eldest child, his heir to keep the peace with the Faith and greater Andal patriarchy in the mind to stabilize and ensure the Targ monarchy/Westerosi unity.

And Rhaena---understandably--does not push for her own advance bc of these considerations, knowing her family wouldn't really go for it, and she herself felt she wouldn't be a good fit, practically, to be a Queen regnant/leader. So she supports her brother's claim over her own (before and when she's 18, she was very young)...she later sees how all this victimizes her and her kids so she becomes more determined to ensure her own safety & those she feels she can save through the Queen Dowager title AND that royal claim of the throne. Yet this woman also says to Jaehaerys, point blank, that she is the "Visenya" to Alysanne's "Rhaenys", after Elissa steals the dragon eggs.

She resented Alyssa for not putting as much effort into saving her or at least Aerea when she first runs away with Alysanne & Jaehaerys or try to bring up an army for her/Aerea and save their other brother Viserys from Maegor's torture. Is this unfair bc Alyssa had to save the kids she had access to, yes...but:

we have to remember that Rhaena had been very likely raped by Maegor after she became his "Black Bride" and multiple times after and idk if people know but this plus that systematic misogyny understanding can tend make people angry and emotionally isolated or more self-concerned....bc they are pushed into the survival corner

Alyssa did not just marry Rogar for the political benefits *EDIT 12/20/24* as in her way to getting the arms/soldiers necessary to protect Jaehaerys/have a buffer against Maegor during his reign bc the Baratehons was a grand house/ to use said troops for he & Jaehaerys' rebellion against Maegor...her way of access to even more other houses she and Rogar would convince to be with Jaehaerys both bc Rogar, as a man and with his perosnality, gives credit her. BUT after the wedding she would have also likely wanted to develop a true relationship with him as many people involved in arranged marriages do; with all this in mind, he became her kinda blindspot after he helped her and her kids that she didn't -- guarded herself the ambitiousness that he had (no matter how many times Gyldayn tries to make him seem "not that bad", remember this is written by a man from an anti-Targ, anti-female ruler institution and Rogar's problem was that he didn't have as much influence and power as his wife[when he certainly still had power, he just wanted more] so ofc Gyladyn would try to reduce Rogar's actions and his accountability to "he just wanted to help the realm") bc she felt he could ensure emotional security for herself and "love" along with that political security that she needed for her children/Jaehaerys *END OF EDIT* ...Rhaena probably resented that they (Alyssa and Jaehaerys) both valued his words and support over her own precisely because he, not her, provided much of that military force *EDIT 12/20/24* and how Alysanne herself became a protected, insulated party, not that she hated Laysanne but she resented that Jaehaerys Alyssa (more him but Alyssa did have to do with it when she enlisted handmaids for Alysanne in reflection of how Rhaena's companions put a "bad light" on her with the suspicions of her sexuality) *END OF EDIT*

Which is why I think she was slowly realizing her own wrongs towards Alyssa when we see she tried to rush to her bedside and talk to her before she died of childbirth, too late.

Anyway, this was about Alyssa. She and Aenys, the text states, seemed to be a good match because both reportedly searched for not just casual love but the approval/validation of their leadership through the traditional Andal eye; in search of using said approval to ensure their political short term survival, which feeds into their needs for personal validation, and back again in a feedback loop. However, for Alyssa, as a woman, yeah much of her power and agency comes from how much/many men around her allows her to practice use and through them. We see this in how Rogar tried to insult and dismiss her at that final council when he demanded they all replace Jaehaerys with Aerea or Rhaella, and it is only by the Kingsguard and every other man at that table defending her (for Jaehaerys) that Rogar's rebuffed:

("A Surfeit of Rulers"):

A lifetime of not having your own little net of supporters, guards, etc. entirely of your own instead of being your father or husband or child's AND witnessing men will defend your interests when it still ends up for the interests or elevation of another man will of course engender women with such blind spots that I truly believe every Targ woman had in same way or another, in different ways, that also came along with their genuine love for their male relatives. And she didn't even have a dragon (social prestige and way of intimidation) or grow up with one to at least have that Andal-less mental connection and psychological escapism that that we see helps Targ women put thing into perspective and/or take more courage...we see how it helped Dany's sense of self; how it helped this Rhaena; how to spiritually and physically enabled Nettles' both near-death but also deification/escape from violence, etc. Dany & Nettles is a special example are special examples because they always had that je-nais-se-quois spark, but their dragon connections and constant affirming of boundaries and bonds the right way also worked to strengthen them. Dragons didn't totally protect some of these women from their material dangers or their family's sidelining...but it did provide them something that was "just theirs", some personal means of mental, emotional, physical bubble that was theirs...not their children, not their husband, not their parents...just theirs alone. Something that materializes the strength they wanted and saw they could have. Alyssa didn't have that *EDIT 12/20/24* but at the same time, she showed the strength she was socialized to have towards saving her kids lives and Jaehaerys thanks her by leaving her with a seemingly abusive man to die eventually in childbirth...ironic in multiple ways. *END OF EDIT*.

Alyssa was stuck between a rock and hard place with little wiggle room. At the same time she, as the mother and the only one who could access some form of protection against Rogar through said Kingsguard, wasn't suspicious enough as Rhaena was when Rogar was not on to this who went out to help out Aegon when he went to confront Maegor....despite this being the same dude who the text says wanted to come 1v1 against Maegor and "never got the chance to":

("The Year of the Three Brides"):

("A Surfeit of Rulers"):

Alyssa, like Rhaena, Visenya, was fallible and a victim. Who maybe some, certain HotD fans, will probably try to pose as this Virgin Mary/Eve/Madonna figure against Rhaena's Jezebel/Lillith/Slut if HBO ever adapts this period of time and even removes Alyssa's own thirst for revenge...which they probably would with the wrong producer-writer. Even though Rhaena was more than likely sexually and romantically attracted to only women. Because Alyssa is much less assertive, vocal, or willing to confront grown men with what she really feels than other women around her, *EDIT 11/5/24* OR AT LEAST enough for Rhaena *END OF EDIT*.

Even though there's this gem of a "tease" Alyssa made to Maegor when Rhaena bonded with a dragon before he could, this also could have been her feeling safe to do so (she certainly was no shrinking violet):

("Sons of the Dragon"):

Watch these tradcaths try to say Rhaena "chose" to love women over men bc she's wants to "flaunt" her disobedience and freedom in her poor mother's face. Watch.

[putrefawn]

What is happening in Sudan: A Timeline

2018 - In December 2018, the economic decline in Sudan, along with escalating costs of bread and fuel, the unavailability of money in banks and ATMs, served as significant catalysts prompting Sudanese people to protest all over the country against the regime of Omar Al-Bashir. (known as Kezan). Omar Al-Bashir's 30-year dictatorship was marked by a reign of oppression and atrocities. His administration perpetrated heinous acts, including the Darfur genocide and the civil war in South Sudan. In these conflicts, they deployed militiamen (Janjaweed, RSF now) who engaged in a range of crimes, from ethnic cleansing to acts of rape and looting, leaving a devastating impact on these regions and others.

2019 - After four months of protests, in April 2019, a coup led by the military against Omar Al-Bashir was declared. Al-Bashir was arrested, and a TWO YEAR Transitional Military Council (TMC) was announced until a new CIVILIAN administration is established. Even after overthrowing the regime of Omar Al-Bashir, the Sudanese people didn't trust the military due to the presence of Kezan among them. So the people decided to conduct a sit-in at the army headquarters in Khartoum, the capital and kept protesting in other states for a civilian-led government. The sit-in continued for 2 months. In June 2019, during the last ten nights of Ramadan, the TMC and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) initiated a lethal assault on civilians, resulting in death of over a 100+ people, 600+ injured 40 bodies found at the shore of the Nile River and countless cases of rape and sexual assault. That attack is now known as the massacre of the army headquarters (مجزرة القياده العامة). During that period, the TMC and RSF imposed a media blackout in Khartoum by shutting down the internet to commit their crimes in the dark. In the face of adversity and in honor of the fallen martyrs of the massacre, the resilience of the Sudanese people intensified, triggering marches that drew millions and widespread acts of civil disobedience. World wide marches for Sudan were also organized by the Sudanese diaspora. Since 2019, persistent protests have called for a civilian-led government free from Kezan and RSF influence. Unfortunately, despite the efforts of numerous organizations advocating for this change, it has not been done. For five years, the call for freedom continued, during this time, clashes and atrocities by the RSF and TMC persisted. Incidents of killing civilians, looting houses, rape, sexual assault, and various other crimes throughout Sudan.

2023 - The conflicts in Sudan began on April 15th, escalated into a full-scale war between the Sudanese Army Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), persisting for the past 7 months. These clashes emerged after months of escalating tension between the two leaders locked in a power struggle. The ongoing fighting has disrupted the envisaged transition to complete civilian rule. Established in 2013 by the former dictator Omar al-Bashir, the RSF originated from the notorious Janjaweed militia. This is the same group that carried out war crimes in the Darfur region (Darfur genocide) and is responsible for the killing of civilian protesters during the 2019 Revolution. They are armed and funded by the UAE, possibly with other foreign interventions exacerbating the war.

All underlined text have links!

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

Naturally, the subservient Palestinians would be their useful stooges to undertake the overthrow of both regimes. Yasser Arafat and his duplicitous cohorts were overjoyed at their backer’s belief in their military capabilities and were only too willing firstly to overthrow their Jordanian brothers who had not only housed them but contributed financially and politically supported them since their creation in the 1960’s. Egypt would soon follow.

September 1970, known as Black September was the chosen date for the Palestinians to achieve their treacherous agenda which they naively considered to be an easy task. The Jordanians however were sensible enough to call on the assistance of their ally Pakistan and an ambitious Pakistani army officer, Brigadier Muhammad Zia-al-Haq who with elite Pakistani troops and the 2nd Division of the Jordanian army annihilated Arafat’s militias resulting in tens of thousands of deaths and the expulsion of thousands of Yasser Arafat’s followers and their families to Lebanon.

To this day those Palestinians and their heirs were stripped and still barred from obtaining Jordanian citizenship. Treachery has a price. The exact death toll has never been quantified as media support for the Palestinians disallowed coverage let alone expose a humiliating defeat at the hands of Jordan (and Pakistan) their former supporter. Research suggests that up to 25,000 of Arafat’s army were killed and over 100,000 ‘ethnically cleansed’ to Lebanon.

As a comparison the 75-year conflict with Israel has resulted in half that number of deaths.

The Lebanese did not want but had no option than to accept the defeated Arab Palestinian presence in their country and did their best to accommodate.

Typically, as is befitting of the Palestinians, Lebanese goodwill was met with treachery. On January 20th 1976, during the very start of what was going to be a fifteen-year civil war, the Palestinians siding with Islamists, attacked a sleepy Maronite Christian town, Damour, on the main highway south of Beirut.

Armed Palestinian militants committed barbarity after barbarity, atrocity after atrocity on old men, women and children. They made mothers watch the slaughter of their children before the mothers themselves were raped and beheaded. Young men were lined up against a wall and sprayed with machine guns whilst their parents were made to watch.

The Palestinian Charter of 1968 not only commands Jew extermination but also subservience to Islam or death of all other races and religions. They certainly attempted to achieve their latter objective at Damour.

That’s how the Palestinians repaid Lebanese generosity when they were forced out of Jordan. Yet again mainstream media chose to ignore this episode given the bad light that would have been shone on Israel’s enemy. Again, the number of deaths and casualties is unknown but even the most pro-Palestinian journalists such as the late Robert Fisk, who were later allowed access to the village estimated the numbers between 300 and 500 deaths. Others suggested 1000 plus. To this very day the Lebanese naturally detest the Palestinians and impose a a system of apartheid against them. And who can blame them.

[nicklloydnow]

“At this moment in history, there are people and cultures that harbor very different attitudes about violence and the value of human life. There are people and cultures that rejoice, positively rejoice—dancing in the streets rejoicing—over the massacre of innocent civilians; conversely there are people and cultures that seek to avoid killing innocent civilians, and deeply regret it when they do—and they occasionally prosecute and imprison their own soldiers when they violate this modern norm of combat.

There are people and cultures who revel in the anguish of hostages and prisoners of war—who will parade them before cheering mobs, and often allow them to be assaulted, or raped, or even murdered. They will desecrate their bodies in public, and all of this carnage is a cause for jubilation. Conversely, there are people and cultures who find such barbarism revolting—and, again, would be inclined to prosecute anyone on their own side who took part in it.

In short, there are people and cultures who revel in war crimes—and who do not hide these crimes or their celebration of them but, rather, proudly broadcast their savagery for all the world to see. Conversely, there are people and cultures who have given us the concept of a war crime as a sacred prohibition—and as a safeguard in the ongoing project of maintaining the moral progress of civilization.

(…)

Consider just one of these norms: Whenever an armed conflict breaks out, some groups will use human shields, and others will be deterred, to one degree or another, by their use. To be clear, I’m not talking about the taking of hostages from the opposing side for the purpose of using them as human shields. That is appalling, and it is now happening in Gaza, but it is separate crime. I’m talking about something far more inscrutable—it’s astounding, really, that it happens at all—I’m talking about people who will strategically put their own noncombatants, their own women and children, into the line of fire so that they can inflict further violence upon their enemies, knowing that their enemies have a more civilized moral code that will render them reluctant to shoot back, for fear of killing or maiming innocent noncombatants. If anywhere in this universe cynicism and nihilism can be found together in their most perfect forms, it is here.

Jihadists use their own people as human shields routinely. Hamas fires rockets from hospitals and mosques and schools and other sites calculated to create carnage if the Israelis return fire. There were cases in the war in Iraq where jihadists literally rested the barrels of their guns on the shoulders of children. They blew up crowds of their own children in order to kill US soldiers who were passing out candy to them. Conversely, the Israeli army routinely warns people to evacuate buildings before it bombs them.

Of course, during times of war, it common to dehumanize one’s enemy, to describe them as barbarous and evil. And it is natural for ethical and educated people to distrust such politically-charged language. But pay attention: I’m describing concrete behaviors—behaviors that occur on only one side of this conflict.

Just consider how absurd it would be to reverse the logic of human shields in this case: Imagine the Israelis using their own women and children as human shields against Hamas. Recognize how unthinkable this would be, not just for the Israelis to treat their own civilians in this way, but for them to expect that their enemies could be deterred by such a tactic, given who their enemies actually are.

(…)

Do you see what this asymmetry means? Can you see how deep it runs? Do you see what it tells you about the ethical difference between these two cultures?

There are not many bright lines that divide good and evil in our world, but this is one of them.

(…)

Simply counting the number of dead bodies is not a way of judging the moral balance here. Intentions matter. It matters what kind of world people are attempting to build. If Israel wanted to perpetrate a genocide of the Palestinians, it could do that easily, tomorrow. But that isn’t what it wants. And the truth is the Jews of Israel would live in peace with their neighbors if their neighbors weren’t in thrall to genocidal fanatics.

In the West, we have advanced to a point where the killing of noncombatants, however unavoidable it becomes once wars start, is inadvertent and unwanted and regrettable and even scandalous. Yes, there are still war crimes. And I won’t be surprised if some Israelis commit war crimes in Gaza now. But, if they do, these will be exceptions that prove the rule—which is that Israel remains a lonely outpost of civilized ethics in the absolute moral wasteland that is the Middle East.”

“Foucault wrote about how “epistemes” define the thinking for entire epochs of human thought. We are cursed to live through a “paradigm shift” where the idea of civilization, progress, culture and morality are under assault.

An “episteme” or “regime of truth” is an underlying idea that people hold that is so deeply rooted in culture that it is unconscious. Epistemes, metaphorically, are the intellectual water we swim (or think) in. Just as a fish cannot discover water, a human cannot easily distinguish the epistemes their thought is grounded in, or oriented around.

One such broadly acknowledged episteme is “progress.” For centuries. people believed that rational thought and human endeavor generally improve things over time. This episteme is thought to have developed during the early Enlightenment, when rationality started producing remarkable improvements to human life. “Progress” was so undeniable, that it soaked into our thinking at a profound (literally foundational) level, to become and episteme.

(…)

The identity-based view has really taken off. Marxism has been such a miserable failure everywhere it was embraced that it lost credibility. But an appeal to identity is an appeal to tribalism — and it turns out tribalism is baked into humans at a deep, biological level, so is more palatable even if it has not yielded very good results either.

So neo-Marxists today claim that identity differences are the main obstacle to humanistic flourishing, rather than wealth or class, and view the world through the lens of which identity groups are involved, and which is more powerful vs less powerful.

About three months ago, on October 7th, Hamas perpetrated a massive, brutal terror attack in Israel. Since then, there has been a fundamental disconnect in how people interpret the situation. The older, mainstream view is that terrorism is always wrong, but the “Oppression-oriented New Left” view is that whichever identity group is stronger within a power dynamic is always wrong.

(…)

Our system of international laws and norms has evolved to make war somewhat less terrible. While it may seem that war itself is fundamentally “uncivilized,” war with some restraints is actually as high a level of civilization as we have been able to achieve so far.

The different views on the Hamas war align with the ideological split between people who support civilization/progress and those who focus on dismantling systems of oppression.

To the oppression group, Hamas is weaker, more brown, Muslim, and “colonized.” (Colonization is a huge marker for oppression within the oppression-oriented group.)

(Most of that is not true, but that does not matter much. E.g. most Israelis are brown descendents of Arab Jews expelled in the mid 20th century from other countries in the Middle East. Israelis are also descended from a combination of indigenous, immigrant and refugee communities.)

To the civilization/progress group, not legitimizing terrorism, rape and kidnaping is critical, because it represents a hard-won international norm of how conflicts — even violent conflicts — are resolved.

(…)

Personally, I favor civilization over terrorism. I favor the idea progress over a false narrative that nothing ever improves and society must be rebuilt from the roots up on a foundation of tribalism. That idea has had only divisive and dysfunctional impact so far.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: David French

Published: Oct 12, 2023

The instant I understood the scale of Hamas’s attack on Israel, I understood the probable response. As I read reports of Hamas terrorists murdering entire families, raping Israeli women beside the bodies of their dead friends and dragging Israeli hostages into Gaza, it was apparent that Hamas had chosen to behave like ISIS, and if it behaved like ISIS, then the Israel Defense Forces were justified in treating Hamas in Gaza the same way the United States and its allies treated ISIS in Iraq.

The comparison is not lost on Israel. After the attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, “Hamas is ISIS. And just as the forces of civilization united to defeat ISIS, the forces of civilization must support Israel in defeating Hamas.”

This means Israel’s goal is not to punish Hamas but to defeat it — to remove it from power in Gaza the way the Iraqi military, the United States and their allies removed ISIS from Mosul, Falluja, Ramadi and every other city ISIS controlled in Iraq. That can’t be accomplished by air power alone. If removing Hamas from power is the goal, then that almost certainly means soldiers and tanks fighting in Gazan cities, block by block, house to house in an area of roughly two million people.

The purpose of this newsletter is to give you a primer on both the military difficulty of the task and the humanitarian constraints on it, along with the limitations that are unique to Israel. It, like every other advanced democracy, is bound by the law of armed conflict. This means Israel may not treat Gaza the way, say, the Soviet Army treated Berlin in 1945. Even in its rage and pain, Israel may not level cities without regard for innocent life.

There is a model for Israeli victory in Gaza, but that model also illustrates the magnitude of the challenge. In the fall of 2016, around 100,000 Iraqi security forces and their allies massed outside Mosul and faced a daunting task: to remove the Islamic State from a vast, densely populated city when that army was deeply embedded in the city and had been able to prepare elaborate defenses.

Compounding the problem were that the civilian population, unlike during other recent urban battles in Iraq, largely remained in the city and that ISIS had no desire to facilitate a civilian evacuation. When the United States entered Falluja in 2004 during its war against Al Qaeda in Iraq, a vast majority of civilians had already fled. When soldiers and Marines engaged insurgents in street battles there, there were far fewer civilians in the zone of combat.

Mosul, by contrast, was largely fought in and around the civilian population and was at the time quite possibly the largest and deadliest urban battle since the end of World War II. Iraqi soldiers — supported by American air power — assaulted a city of more than one million people. The resulting battle took nine months to complete; killed thousands of ISIS fighters, by most estimates; cost the Iraqi security forces thousands of casualties; and, despite considerable efforts to protect noncombatants, killed up to 11,000 civilians. But Iraq won, ISIS lost, and ISIS no longer controls Mosul.

How does this fight compare with a battle in the heart of Gaza? The Israel Defense Forces will be better trained and more prepared than the Iraqi security forces — with a greater capacity to protect noncombatants — but if Israeli military history informs the present situation, the Israel Defense Forces will not have the luxury of time. It will almost certainly have to execute its major combat operations in much less than the nine months it took to defeat ISIS in Mosul.

To help me more fully understand the nature of the battle in Gaza, I called John Spencer, the chairman of urban warfare studies at West Point’s Modern Warfare Institute. The conversation made one thing very clear to me and resonated with my training and experience as a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom: Israel’s military mission is inseparable from its legal obligations. When a nation abides by the law of war, which Israel requires its soldiers to do, it fundamentally changes the way it fights and the experiences of its soldiers on the ground.

For example, a nation that disregards the law of war often approaches urban combat by destroying as much of the city as it can to weaken defenses before the attack and then, when it enters the city, it presumes structures are full of enemies and destroys buildings at will.

When a nation complies with the law of war, the presumptions switch. Civilian structures are presumed to be benign unless solid intelligence or hostile action demonstrates otherwise. As a practical matter, this means that air power alone is insufficient for the job. As Spencer told me, aircraft “can’t see through steel-reinforced concrete,” so tanks and troops have to enter a city to truly clear it.

But when they do, the defender gets an initial advantage. As Spencer said, the “attacker has to walk down the street and take a punch to the face.” Then it can respond. Israel understands that reality and adjusts its tactics accordingly, often leading with armored vehicles that can take the punch without incurring casualties.

Don’t think for a moment, however, that use of precision weapons means that cities can endure invasions without suffering terrifying damage. Before and after aerial views of Mosul reveal incredible devastation. Iraqi forces were generally less trained than the Israel Defense Forces, but that doesn’t account for the full extent of the destruction. Much of the damage was the result of the large-scale use of America’s most precise weapons. Spencer told me that the U.S. dangerously depleted its stocks of its extremely precise Hellfire missiles during the battle.

Spencer called the widespread destruction inflicted by precise weapons the “precision paradox.” I’ve also heard it described as spiderwebbing. Imagine if you have 10 ISIS fighters in one building. Iraqi forces call in an airstrike, and U.S. forces hit the building with a missile or bomb, but it doesn’t kill every fighter in the building. The remaining fighters scatter to two or three nearby buildings, which are then precisely targeted by additional munitions. The result is a form of slow-motion demolition, in which each strike might be quite precise but the cumulative effect can eventually make the city look as if it had been carpet-bombed.

We’re already seeing the phenomenon in Gaza. We are witnessing nothing like the immediate mass destruction of an indiscriminate attack, but large numbers of precision attacks can still inflict extreme (and deadly) damage.

If civilians aren’t evacuated from the combat zone, the intensity of combat makes significant civilian casualties inevitable, even if Israel fully complies with the law of war. I also spoke this week to James Verini, a contributing writer to The Times Magazine, who wrote “They Will Have to Die Now: Mosul and the Fall of the Caliphate,” perhaps the definitive on-the-ground account of the fight for Mosul, and two things he said stood out in the conversation.

First, because precision weapons sometimes miss and intelligence often fails, airstrikes inevitably inflict serious collateral damage, including civilian casualties. Second, as the fight drags on and ramps up in intensity, concern for civilian lives often diminishes. That was the pattern for the less-disciplined Iraqi security forces, but we can’t for a moment presume that Israeli soldiers are superhuman. Most of them are draftees and reservists. They’re subject to the same fears and temptations under extreme stress and anger as any other soldier in any other army.

Then there’s the factor of time. Spencer observed that Israel always fights against the backdrop of a ticking clock. The United States is an independent economic and military superpower. We possess the world’s most powerful military and the world’s most potent economy. We have the luxury of fighting on timetables we set. If we want to slow down and take nine months to clear a city, we can take nine months to clear a city.

Israel possesses a powerful military and a strong economy, but it is still ultimately a dependent power. It cannot ignore international (and especially U.S.) pressure. In addition, calling hundreds of thousands of reservists out of the work force weakens the economy. In every major conflict since its war for independence, Israel has had to race to accomplish its military objectives before international pressure forced a cease-fire. The sheer scale of Hamas’s atrocities may increase the patience of the international community for an Israeli offensive, but that patience has never been unlimited.

Put all this together, and you can immediately perceive Israel’s asymmetric challenge. Hamas scorns the law of war. The reports of its intentional mass killing, mutilation, rape and civilian hostage taking are evidence enough of that fact. Israel legally and morally obligates the Israel Defense Forces to comply with the law. As a result, civilians become one of Hamas’s principal military assets. The presence of civilians gives Hamas the ability to punch first in any given street fight. The presence of civilians raises the bar for approving airstrikes or any other use of long-range weapons. And when civilians die, Hamas uses their deaths to inflame the international community and to help run out the clock on international patience for Israeli military operations.

Even worse, Hamas is helped by an enormous amount of public ignorance combined with outright misinformation. The average journalist — much less the average citizen — doesn’t know much, if anything, about the laws of war. Let’s take, for example, two key legal concepts that will be relevant every single day of the fighting in Gaza: proportionality and distinction.

As the war continues and as the destruction mounts, you will hear a number of voices condemn Israel for a disproportionate response, but many of these critics fundamentally misunderstand what proportionality means in the law of war. The U.S. Army’s “Law of Land Warfare” field manual — which is deeply grounded in the international law of armed conflict and governed our urban operations in Iraq and Afghanistan — defines the legal obligation of proportionality as requiring “commanders to refrain from attacks in which the expected loss or injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects incidental to such attacks would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage expected to be gained.” It also requires that commanders “take feasible precautions to reduce the risk of harm to civilians, other protected persons and civilian objects.”

Proportionality does not require the Israel Defense Forces to respond with the same degree of force or take the same proportion of casualties as Hamas. In addition, as the manual states, “the proportionality standard does not require that no incidental harm results from attacks.” If you’re a soldier on patrol and someone fires at you with a rifle, you don’t have to respond with a rifle. You can use a tank round or a missile in response, unless you have reason to believe the tank round or missile will cause extraordinary collateral damage. But if you’re taking fire from a single house, proportionality prohibits you from destroying the entire block. Throughout the war on terrorism, American forces used powerful, longer-range weapons to attack individual targets. That does not violate the laws of war.

In reality, inflicting disproportionate casualties can be one of the goals of a fighting force. Ukraine appears to have inflicted substantially greater casualties on Russia than the Russian Army has inflicted on Ukraine. That doesn’t mean Ukraine’s response was disproportionate under the law of armed conflict. In every fight, the goal is to inflict as many losses as possible on your opponent while taking as few losses as possible.

There is a similar public ignorance problem with the concept of distinction, which “The Law of Land Warfare” defines as requiring combatants to distinguish “between combatants and military objectives on the one hand and civilians and civilian objects on the other in offense and defense.” Distinction requires soldiers to separate themselves from civilians by wearing uniforms, for example, or by fighting from marked military vehicles. It prohibits militaries from fighting from places like hospitals, schools and mosques.

Hamas disregards the principle of distinction. Its fighters take aim from civilian buildings while wearing civilian clothes and using civilian vehicles. This presents an attacking military with serious targeting problems. It is easy to identify, say, an armored personnel carrier as a military vehicle. But what if there are four Toyota Tacomas in the street and only one is full of Hamas fighters?

But here’s the key point: When Hamas abandons the principle of distinction, then Hamas is responsible for the civilian damage that results. If Hamas fights from a hospital — or stores munitions in a hospital — damage to that hospital is Hamas’s responsibility. If Hamas fighters shoot at Israel Defense Forces from a home that contains a Palestinian family, then Hamas is responsible for the civilian casualties if that family is harmed in the resulting exchange of fire.

There is also the unique military legal doctrine of siege warfare. On Monday, Israel announced a “complete siege” and said that “no electricity, no food, no water, no fuel” would be allowed inside the Gaza Strip. A siege is an ancient form of warfare, and the modern legal obligations of a besieging party are a matter of dispute, but again, “The Law of Land Warfare” is instructive. It explicitly declares it “lawful” to cut off “reinforcements, supplies and communications,” but it also states that the belligerents should “make reasonable, good-faith efforts to conclude local agreements for the removal of wounded, sick, infirm and aged persons, children and maternity cases from the besieged or encircled area.”

Given these realities, you can see the dynamic that will unfold. Bound by the laws of war, Israel has every incentive to decrease civilian casualties. The Israel Defense Forces are already providing detailed evacuation instructions for civilians to remove them from the zones of expected conflict. Netanyahu has urged residents to leave Gaza. Disregarding the law of war, Hamas has concrete tactical and strategic reasons to keep civilians in harm’s way and capitalize on their deaths.

To accurately describe that dynamic is not to pre-emptively excuse every single civilian death at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces. We are already seeing reports of significant civilian casualties from Israeli airstrikes, and it will be necessary to investigate them to ensure that the Israeli military followed proper protocols when approving those strikes. The siege will become legally and morally untenable if civilians cannot leave the besieged areas and if they’re blocked from receiving life-sustaining supplies. Egypt has responsibilities as well. If it continues to block entry into Sinai from Gaza, it will be contributing to the humanitarian crisis.

During the war on terrorism, the Army and Marines often embedded JAG officers (lawyers specifically trained in the law of armed conflict) with combat arms units to try to ensure compliance with the laws of war under circumstances every bit as difficult as the ones the Israel Defense Forces face in Gaza. The Israel Defense Forces also rely heavily on their lawyers. When I served in Iraq with the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment, that was my job. Yet our military still made mistakes. Some American soldiers (not in my unit) committed war crimes, in spite of comprehensive training and numerous constraints placed on the use of force.

Every violation of the law should carry a consequence, but the law of war does not prevent Israel from destroying a terrorist army embedded in a civilian population. It can be done. It has been done. And as Israel embarks on perhaps its most difficult military operation since its war for independence, public clarity about the law of war will be indispensable for depriving Hamas of one of its chief propaganda weapons, and continued enforcement of the law of war can prevent atrocities that could fuel this conflict for generations to come.

[ Via: https://archive.md/IHYo8 ]

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Did you know that Israel and Palestine were already in a cease-fire when Hamas launched their terrorist attack? So, the current admonishment to Israel to stand down and accept a cease-fire is absurd on its face.

It's the same pattern that always happens. Hamas commits some atrocious act, Israel retaliates, Hamas cries foul, the west panders to them and convinces Israel to accept another cease-fire. Things go dormant for a bit, giving Hamas another opportunity to regroup and reorganize, then the cycle starts again. Israel always has to turn the other cheek, and Hamas always avoids all consequences.

The west needs to let Israel obliterate Hamas once and for all, to kill everybody involved in Hamas, and destroy or confiscate all their resources. Otherwise, nothing will ever change; Palestine will never be free of its terrorist rulers, and Israel and Palestine will never be able to find a sincere coexistence.