No, by all definitions of war crimes, what Israel is doing is a war crime. They are indiscriminately killing civilians, especially children, in an effort to get to Hamas, using the "human shields" narrative, which is nonsense. If a Hamas guy is in a hospital getting his wounds tended to, and Israel bombs the hospital killing 500 civilians and the Hamas guy, it is a war crime. Those civilians are not human shields, they are civilians getting medical help. They did this a couple of days ago when they bombed the refugee camp.
Hamas is a terrorist group and should have been eliminated in the last 4 weeks of military action, which I initially supported as well. But that hasn't happened, so it is time to try a different method, because almost half the dead, are children.
This is not about what Hamas wants, but it is about the civilians killed that the majority of right wingers do not care about because they are brown and Muslim. Its racism, not anti-terrorism.
Also, if there is anything we have learned from the 20+ year, war on terror, it is that in the Muslim world, terrorist groups cannot be eliminated via military action. The US went to war with Al-Qaeda and killed their leader. What happened? Al-Qaeda still exists and we got ISIS which was an offshoot of Al-Qaeda, in Iraq. The US eliminated the Taliban government in Afghanistan. Who is ruling Afghanistan now?
So in sum, the military action against Hamas, is only creating a humanitarian crisis, and is not successful and will not be successful in eliminating Hamas. Hence my change in position as well. I think it is time to stop the aerial bombing, and instead use targeted assassinations of Hamas leaders through covert or special operations which Israel is well known for (similar to how Bin Laden and al-Baghdadi were dealt with). And in the mean time, work with the PA/PLO to find lasting diplomatic solutions, which would involve giving land to the Palestinians that the Israelis have stolen over the years.
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