"Disproportionate" reponse? Really?

[tund3]

Now, I've seen a lot of people mention Israel's "disproportionate" attack?

The question a lot of you here are raising is whether or not the "targeting" (another argument for another day) of civilians in Gaza is a proportionate or just response on the part of Israel.
The problem with ?proportionality? arguments is that ?proportionality? exists in the eye of the beholder. Hamas has fired off over 1,200 rockets at Israel in the last year. What?s the ?proportionate? response? For Israel to lob exactly the same number of rockets back at Gaza? For Israel to target the Gazans with a steady drip, drip, drip of rockets over the course of 12 months?
If, on the other hand, ?proportionality? is measured by the number of fatalities -- and Israel must abide by that standard -- then it can apparently do nothing in response. Well, not nothing: its children can cower in bomb shelters in perpetuity. The other problem with ?proportionality? arguments is that they play into the hands of terrorists who twist them around for their own strategic advantage. Once Hamas establishes that rocket attacks will go unanswered so long as the rockets are fired from heavily-settled areas (because an Israeli response would cause a disproportionate number of deaths), then Hamas is empowered by that fact: it can fire rockets at civilians with impunity.

Well, let's talk about proportion for a minute
WHEN HAMAS OR HIZBALLAH OR FATAH NEGOTIATED PRISONER EXCHANGES WITH ISRAEL THE RATIO OF ARAB-TO-ISRAELI PERSONS HAS ALWAYS BEEN IN ABOUT A 250-500-TO-ONE RATIO

(2004): In exchange for the bodies of three Israeli soldiers, missing since October 2000, and one Israeli businessman, abducted in October 2000 under questionable circumstances, Israel released more than 430 Arab prisoners on January 29, 2004.

(2003)Hamas militants involved in seizing an Israeli soldier who they have held captive for 10 months said over the weekend that they had sent Israeli officials, through Egyptian mediators, a list of Palestinian prisoners they would demand released in exchange. The list of approximately 450 names, according to the Israeli media, included Marwan Barghouti, a grassroots Fatah leader and former head of the Tanzim, a militant group. Barghouti was sentenced in 2002 to five life sentences for his role in the death of four Israelis and a foreigner.

* THIS PROVES THAT ARABS FEEL THAT ONE ISRAELI SOLDIER - OR SOLDIERS CORPSE - WAS WORTH 250-500 LIVING ARABS.
* BASED ON THIS REALITY, ISRAEL'S COUNTER-STRIKE AGAINST HAMAS CANNOT POSSIBLY BE CONSIDERED DISPROPORTIONATE - IN ANY NUMERICAL SENSE.
IN FACT, BASED ON THESE "PROPORTIONS", THE COUNTER-STRIKE IS VERY RESTRAINED.

The notion that Israel ought to be faulted for responding ?disproportionately,? presumes that there ought to have been some other, ?proportionate? response. What exactly would that response be?

Send rinky-dink missiles back towards Gaza? Then what? Wait for Hamas to escelate, and escelate ?proportionately??

When, in the history of mankind, has a sovereign nation ever defended itself under such a principle? Should the U.S. have met Iraq?s invasion of Kuwait with a ?proportionately? weak army?
What would it even have meant to confront Nazi Germany ?proportionately?? The bizarenesss of the questions belie the inanity of the proposal itself.

Yes, indeed, let's wait for more Israeli deaths before we act "proportionately." This is the language of the new morality: "No eye for an eye. No eye for less than an eye. No eye for more than an eye." And certainly, "NEVER, an eye before any eye at all."

Hamas has steadily increased the range of its rockets. While the shelling of southern Israel seems tolerable to you, the country cannot simply wait until its largest city and its principal international airport are within striking distance irrespective of how lethal the projectiles are.

Hamas wanted war, and they got it. Why all the outraged screeching? They worked very, very hard for this.


Note: I'm just playing devils advocate to provoke a debate. I try to stay objective to both sides.

Copied and pasted from a response I posted to a thread in a different forum so I do apologize about the random question marks in the text

[Wussy]

Well if you want devils advocate. Israel should attack more. I doubt they'll launched 1200 missiles. Sure they are more powerful and better aimed. But its about being proportionate in the attacks.

And also the targets are leaning too far on the military side. They should be shooting at civilians like hamas does.

That's playing devils advocate.

(In seriousness I think the proportion thing is crap. The degree of attacks should be based on the goals of the missions not the capabilities of the enemy. That goes for either side and any war.)

[Rambo26]

Proportionality makes no sense. Should the U.S. have just bombed a Japanese harbour in WW2?

If possible, free nations should take out the source of aggresion!

[Chowboy]

Proportionality is a euphemism for, "stop, you're kicking my ass."

I'm sure the US had proportionality foremost on thier mind when they kicked Saddam out of Kuwait.

I'm also sure proportionality was the center point of the Islamic battle plan when they went about creating the caliphate.

Proportionality is simply, a red herring to garner support in the ongoing Pally Passion Play

[blancmange]

(figures rough)


total rockets fired = 6000

explosive power of Qassam missile = 10kg TNT



6000*10 = 60 Kiloton explosion



(BTW hiroshima nuke was 15kiloton)





So randomly lob a 60 KT fussion-fission nuke (very little fallout) into Gaza Perhaps lower it to 50 Kiloton to make up for the bit of radiation left



perfectly fair and perfectly proportional

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

(figures rough)


total rockets fired = 6000

explosive power of Qassam missile = 10kg TNT



6000*10 = 60 Kiloton explosion



(BTW hiroshima nuke was 15kiloton)





So randomly lob a 60 KT fussion-fission nuke (very little fallout) into Gaza Perhaps lower it to 50 Kiloton to make up for the bit of radiation left



perfectly fair and perfectly proportional

Have you not taken calculus?

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by mehdi84

Have you not taken calculus?

Tell me what im missing?

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

Tell me what im missing?

dx/dt

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by mehdi84

dx/dt

what?? how would the difference over time change anything?

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

what?? how would the difference over time change anything?

/facepalm

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by mehdi84

/facepalm

lol you quite clearly tried to sound clever there but have no idea wtf youre talking about.. And lets make the difference in time 6 years then, isnt your stupid argument meaningless when its the same energy release over those periods?




edit: In before you try and prove your point with the formula for the volume of a cylinder

[ll ReNeGaDe ll]

The "disproportionate" argument is the dumbest I've ever seen.

If 2 people break into your house and one rapes your wife and the other kills your child. And you kill one of them. Do you then have to rape the other guy?

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

lol you quite clearly tried to sound clever there but have no idea wtf youre talking about.. And lets make the difference in time 6 years then, isnt your stupid argument meaningless when its the same energy release over those periods?




edit: In before you try and prove your point with the formula for the volume of a cylinder

clearly

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by mehdi84

clearly

Your silence and inability to respond with a cohesive explanation for your ridiculous proposition speaks volumes... I know what you were going for though






better luck next time

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

Your silence and inability to respond with a cohesive explanation for your ridiculous proposition speaks volumes... I know what you were going for though






better luck next time

undoubtedly

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by mehdi84

undoubtedly

Glad we are in agreement!

[mehdi84]

Originally Posted by blancmange

Glad we are in agreement!

brb working on my hydrogen sulfide bomb in the bathroom

edit: Just so I don't get /fbi'ed... hydrogen sulfide is the primary gas you excrete when you drop a deuce.

[leafs43]

Back before the politically correct era, if you lose a conflict you had no right to complain about getting your ass kicked, especially if you had been talking sh!t all the way up until said conflict.


When they say the good old days were better, this would be one of the things that was plain better.

[Wussy]

Originally Posted by leafs43

Back before the politically correct era, if you lose a conflict you had no right to complain about getting your ass kicked, especially if you had been talking sh!t all the way up until said conflict.


When they say the good old days were better, this would be one of the things that was plain better.

QFT

[asiya-sparkles]

Originally Posted by leafs43

Back before the politically correct era, if you lose a conflict you had no right to complain about getting your ass kicked, especially if you had been talking sh!t all the way up until said conflict.


When they say the good old days were better, this would be one of the things that was plain better.

No talking anything except justice, rights & honour. Israeli politics clearly are bereft of such things.

Civillians have never been a legitimate target in war. Yet, here you guys are justifying the deliberate slaughter of innocents. I don't see this as any less wrong than the German nazi holocaust.

[leafs43]

Originally Posted by asiya-sparkles

No talking anything except justice, rights & honour. Israeli politics clearly are bereft of such things.

Civillians have never been a legitimate target in war. Yet, here you guys are justifying the deliberate slaughter of innocents. I don't see this as any less wrong than the German nazi holocaust.

In WW2, 60% of the allies loses had been civilian causalities, not military. Now take that and compare that to 40% of Gaza citizens when fighting in an urban environment.


Civilians die in war.

They have always died in war.


Gaza is not special. Stop pretending it is.

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by asiya-sparkles

No talking anything except justice, rights & honour. Israeli politics clearly are bereft of such things.

Civillians have never been a legitimate target in war. Yet, here you guys are justifying the deliberate slaughter of innocents. I don't see this as any less wrong than the German nazi holocaust.

If civilians were a legitimate target for the IDF there would be none left by now you brainwashed hippy parrot fuk... They have literally killed 0.0004% of the population... Is that a good score for one of the most advanced armies in the world? Dont you think it would be SLIGHTLY higher after 3 weeks of bombing people who are basically sitting ducks?

[tund3]

Originally Posted by asiya-sparkles

No talking anything except justice, rights & honour. Israeli politics clearly are bereft of such things.

Civillians have never been a legitimate target in war. Yet, here you guys are justifying the deliberate slaughter of innocents. I don't see this as any less wrong than the German nazi holocaust.

Deliberately slaughter of innocents?
Innocents which are being used by Hamas militants as human shields. If Israel don't respond, then as I mentioned in my post, Hamas is empowered by that fact that it can fire rockets at civilians with impunity i.e. knowing fully well Israel won't respond because of the danger of harming civilians among with Hamas choose to hide.

Blame Hamas for hiding among them, not Israel for finally deciding they weren't gonna take anymore **** from pests like them.

[Thy_Kingdom]

I've always found that funny, as if anything related to violence is supposed to be 'proportionate', especially in a theatre of war.

[photomasterx]

Originally Posted by blancmange

(figures rough)


total rockets fired = 6000

explosive power of Qassam missile = 10kg TNT



6000*10 = 60 Kiloton explosion



(BTW hiroshima nuke was 15kiloton)





So randomly lob a 60 KT fussion-fission nuke (very little fallout) into Gaza Perhaps lower it to 50 Kiloton to make up for the bit of radiation left



perfectly fair and perfectly proportional

6,000 x 10 = 60,000 kg.

1 kiloton = 1,000 metric tons

So i'm assuming that would be something like 60,000 kg = 0.06 KT

So isn't that 0.06 kiloton
.

[leafs43]

Originally Posted by Thy_Kingdom

I've always found that funny, as if anything related to violence is supposed to be 'proportionate', especially in a theatre of war.

To be honest I am starting to think many of the pro-Hamas posters here think war is a game of Pong, where all parties have the exact same advantage and disadvantage.


Of course, what can you expect?


These are the same people that quote the Koran almost exclusively to give them the right to do whatever the f*ck they want as long as it is allowed by their magic book from a man with a flying horse.

[blancmange]

Originally Posted by photomasterx

6,000 x 10 = 60,000 kg.

1 kiloton = 1,000 metric tons

So i'm assuming that would be something like 60,000 kg = 0.06 KT

So isn't that 0.06 kiloton
.

ah damn, youre right *blush*

[hockeyplaya13]

I hate people that say Israel is being to harsh. I assume that equates to "unproportionate." I mean they've been the target of a couple thousand missiles over the past few years. And now they finally snapped, and people are whining, as if they don't have the right to defend themselves. Hamas has been poking a big angry bear with a stick for a long time. That bear politely dealt with it for awhile, which is more than most countries would do, and now they've had enough. And I hate hearing people complain about "civilian deaths," like when Israel bombed a school. Well Hamas has been using largely civilian institutions such as schools to store their weapons and to launch missiles from, knowing full well that Israel wouldn't want to cause civilian casualties. But Hamas was/is willing to endanger their civilians lives, and we say nothing. Hamas knowingly put their civilians at risk, and nothing has been said about that. Israel doesn't care anymore. They are pissed off, and rightfully so, and I think they should be left unhindered to show Hamas that they mean business. If it isn't our place to get involved when Hamas is bombing Israel, then why is it our place to stop Israel from retaliating?