Hamas, Hezbollah, Palestinians, Lebanese, … they’re practically the same thing. Better to be safe than sorry.
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As I said before, the first reports I saw said he had snuck over the border from Gaza, It didn’t say it was in Jericho, just that a Palestinian was killed. Given the terror attack earlier today, a Palestinian sneaking in from Gaza could reasonably be assumed to be working towards an attack.
Given the later reports, that he was in a Palestinian area (Jericho), I hereby retract my statement that he was likely working towards an attack.
You said it, not me.
As expected. They are starting to circle the economic drain as wars are very expensive to finance.
And the Brain Drain out of Israel is now accelerating.
Put religious extremists in charge…and this is pretty much always going to be the result.
Since Oct 7th, about 30,000 people have moved to Israel. So while some may be leaving, there are plenty more who are arriving.
Those that are leaving are the highly educated productive ones. The ones that have professional occupations and work in the tech industry.
These are precisely the people you don’t want to lose as a country. They are being replaced by less skilled people coming with a more religious skew to their worldview.
A death sentence for “democracy” in the long-run when the religious hardliners out number the rest.
So the view of the individual being quote in the guardian is correct. Israel is developing on the road to the Iranian model of population dynamics.
Good luck to them. Going to be interesting to watch them get a lot poorer as well.
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Israel apparently targeting hospitals in lebanon…
The hospitals were hiding Hezbollah fighters being treated for the pager attack?
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Hospitals and everyone inside were told to evacuate - cause, you know, everyone inside a hospital can always be easily evacuated without any difficulty - so if people still died that’s their own fault and they probably also support Hezbollah.
Get the details. Israel didn’t attack a hospital. They attacked an ambulance that was near the hospital, because Hezbollah was using ambulances to move their fighters around. Because the ambulance was close to the hospital, the hospital shut down.
Then Israel attacked a building next door to a hospital, as it was being used by Hezbollah. Before hitting it, they warned the hospital that they’d be attacking the building next door, and urged them to evacuate as a precaution.
No hospital was actually attacked.
Hospital staff in southern Lebanon told the BBC that health facilities treating wounded civilians had been hit with direct Israeli strikes. The BBC has approached the IDF for comment
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So, war crimes in response to war crimes?
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An ambulance being used to transport uninjured fighters isn’t protected.
It is a war crime to intentionally attack a marked ambulance. Period.
It is a war crime to abuse that protection by using a marked ambulance to transport uninjured troops. Period.
Thus we are left with the philosophical question – does the fact that “they” committed a war crime ever justify “us” committing war crimes in response?
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This is just not true. If an ambulance is used for military purposes it’s a valid military target.
I am definitely fuzzy on the “rules” as to what happens when the other side violates the rules or is not even the armed forces of a nation but rather an organized group of terrorists.
I also don’t have a photographic memory as to which conventions Israel is and is not a signatory. They ratified the Geneva Convention but they are not a member of the ICC despite helping draft some of the charter or something like that? I think there are other relevant rules that may or may not apply to Israel?
It would be super helpful (and lend to credibility) if citations were provided for these claims.
It is (or is not) allowed to attack a marked ambulance if you are super certain that it contains fighters… according to what set of rules? Better still provide the subsection / paragraph whatever so we can find this ourselves.
“Yes it’s allowed”
“No it’s not”
These are not compelling arguments at this point.
A compelling argument would look like “Section II, subsection B, paragraph 4 of the Geneva Convention, of which Israel is a signatory, says X. Therefore Israel IS (or IS NOT) committing a war crime by doing Y.”
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They are not protected if they are being misused.
Problem is you cannot be 100% sure they are being misused so you end up killing quite a few innocent people.
And yes, targeting an ambulance that you “suspect” is being misused and you end up being wrong = war crime.
I stand by my statement.
International law does recognize exceptions to the protections for ambulances, generally focused on when it is obvious that they’re being used outside the bounds of convention and they’re posing a clear, immediate threat.
That being said, I think an argument can be made that there may be a very small overlap between “valid military target” and “things that international law say should not be attacked”. I think there are a number of scenarios (usually hypothetical, but occasionally practical) where the morally/ethically correct action is illegal – do what you must, but accept the consequences for having done so.
I would argue that certain rules/laws apply regardless of whether the parties whose conduct is being evaluated are parties to any formal international agreements codifying those laws.
Of course, if those parties are not formally participating in the legal framework those agreements set up, it becomes problematic to enforce those rules/laws, adjudicate disputes, or seek justice.
Neither Israel nor Lebanon…nor the US…are signatories to the ICC. They are, however, parties to the Geneva conventions, which also provide protections for medical transportation.
The Geneva conventions do acknowledge that there is a loss of protection when medical transports are being used for non-medical purposes. However, I’m suggesting that such use of an ambulance is itself a crime, leading me back to my earlier statement.
EDIT: FWIW, the relevant language from the Rome Convention, Article 8, Section 2(b)(xxiv), in the enumeration of proscribed activities:
Note the lack of exception.
EDIT2: But we’ll have differences of opinion on the “in conformity with international law” clause. 
To provide clarity in this situation, I’ll link a few resources and my quick take (influenced by how I was trained in the 1990’s in this case). This will likely support what many other are saying.
Medical neutrality - Wikipedia
Customary IHL - Rule 28. Medical Units (icrc.org) (Poly provided a link to related Rule 29)
IF it can be demonstrated that a medical facility or transports marked for medical purposes (e.g. large red cross, large red caduceus, etc.) is being used–at the time of attack–for purposes other than providing care for (or transporting) wounded individuals, that facility/transport is not afforded protections.
In practice, this level of demonstration isn’t easy to provide (especially post-attack); and the default posture military personnel should take is to afford the transport/facility the protections.
But apart from having proof that facilities/transports are being used for “other than medical treatment/transportation of wounded”, these facilities and transports are afforded such protections–regardless if they’re civilian (which was explicitly added to the Geneva Conventions much later after its initial adoption) or military.
It should also be noted that these protections are to be afforded by signatory nations even if the opposition forces are not signatories of the articles/convention.
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