The ex-speaker’s “delusional” attack insults millions of voters—and reveals the scorching ignorance of top Democrats about the depth of opposition to Israel’s war.
Make no mistake, this is directly connected to what he would like to see. Same thing with Ukraine. It’s about Putin’s message. I think some of these—some of these protesters are spontaneous and organic and sincere. Some, I think, are connected to Russia.
And I say that having looked at this for a long time now, as you know.
She’s completely right. Some of the opposition is astroturfed. It’s part of Hamas’s strategy of “lawfare.”
It would be a betrayal of national security for the DOJ or FBI not to investigate the source of a lot of this messaging.
“I don’t think they’re plants,” said Pelosi. “I think some financing should be investigated. And I want to ask the FBI to investigate that.”
Since the dead kids don’t seem to be an issue, maybe these moderates would do it to deny the Russians their issue. Democratic moderates will fall all over themselves to coopt rightwing issues to deny them the ideological ground, maybe they can be convinced to actually adopt something good for once.
Well, that’s the point isn’t it? If there’s a legitimate military target and a reasonable warning tailored to minimize civilian casualties, that is not a war crime, let alone a genocide. It’s standard operating procedure, and morally and legally valid.
People seem to be completely unaware that before Israel bombs a building, it calls cell phones in the area and warns people to leave. One thing Hamas likes to do is tell people that those warning calls are a hoax, so that more civilians stay in the building to be killed. Nothing makes Hamas happier than more inncoent Palestinians killed with Israeli weapons.
People also seem to believe that every time a building is destroyed, there are never any Hamas members or weapons or tunnels. The extent of the tunnel systems in the Gaza Strip are well documented and if you threw a dart at a map of the strip, you’re pretty much going to hit a tunnel. I’m exaggerating, but not by much.
Again, if they are striking valid targets and warning the people to leave the area, it sucks and it’s horrible and of course it makes Democrats very uncomfortable because we are caring and empathetic people, but it’s not objectionable from an international law standard. Humanitarian corridors are open, supplies are flowing, and the daily death tolls have been decreasing for weeks. I agree with Pelosi that it’s delusional to call that genocide.
If it comes out that Israel does not really have valid military targets, or made no contemporaneous attempts to warn people in the target area, and that’s part of a policy or the result of training, as opposed to isolated war crimes, I agree it would be a genocide all day long. So far though, the evidence is overwhelming that that’s not what’s happening. Add to that the evidence that Israel is actively prosecuting people for war crimes and incitement to genocide.
This is what I mean. Even in the evac zone, the IDF calls and texts people before bombing.
Yes, people were told to leave the north and head south. Nobody said “everywhere south is safe.”
People keep making this point to me and it would be a good point if it was as black and white as coverage keeps implying. My observations have been as follows:
These stories are exaggerated by media outlets that do not publish sufficient detail to identify the date and location of the bombing. This makes it impossible to know if you have just read 10 articles about 10 bombings or 10 articles about one bombing. It also makes it impossible to look up and see if one can find evidence of the warnings that were given or the IDF explanation for the bombing.
Many of the articles that do contain enough information to identify the date and location but does not include idf’s explanation or any information related to any warnings. This gives the false idea that Israel is just bombing people. Indiscriminately, and it just isn’t true. Because literally every single time I have been able to identify the date and location from any reports of civilians being killed in bombings, I’ve been able to find for everyone some explanation from the IDF and some eyewitness account including videos or screenshots of the warnings that people have received.
Here’s a good example. It is unique only because everyone evacuated, despite Hamas’s attempts to mislead people into staying in the buildings:
Israel is actually sending more food and supplies into Gaza right now than anyone, and it’s ridiculous to say that they are intentionally starving people when they are the ones bringing in the food.
500 trucks used to go in on a daily basis. “Aid” (provided by a number of agencies and counties and not Israel) that had to be painfully inspected by Israel has been far below that. In other words, Israel actually withheld aid from Gazans, despite “allowing it in”.
Nothing makes Hamas happier than more innocent Palestinians killed with Israeli weapons.
Then stop doing it.
Israel is running into Gaza like a Fuze player on hostage gameplay, and wondering why the hostages keep getting in the way of the bombs. Either it is stupidity or maliciousness.
When it should be treating this like a gang or mafia that has infiltrated the population of Gaza and using them as unwilling participants.
People also seem to believe that every time a building is destroyed, there are never any Hamas members or weapons or tunnels.
People don’t understand shit. Me included. In fact, me the example. However, people can empathize with human suffering.
People have eyes and can think, maybe Israel should stop bombing indiscriminately. Maybe Israel, should tone it down a bit?
It doesn’t inspire any confidence you either don’t know what you are talking about, or don’t know that Israel has a completely different philosophy from what you are arguing.
I mean, but you’re lying about indiscriminate bombing. The evidence is absolutely overwhelming that Israel is effectively warning people and striking valid military.
Sometimes Hamas packs their whole family into the room above the tunnel shafts and forces them to stay to die proudly as martyrs.
God how ridiculous are the things you believe to keep yourself from seeing Israel is butchering mostly civilians. Why would Israel know the room is full of civilians before bombing? Imagine, you’re whatever heinous evil you see Hamas as, and you’re trying to avoid being bombed in your secret tunnel. Why would you pack a room full of civilians right above your location? Are you doing it in secret so IDF doesnt see where you are, if so that doesnt give you any protection because they wouldnt know about the civilians to be deterred from bombing anyway. Or in broad daylight to make sure they know civilians and you are there, in this war where the presence of civilians has not stopped them from leveling neighborhoods at all.
This is not the uplifting story you seem to think it is. Someone rung this poor random guy and made him evacuate his entire community under extreme time pressure, only to destroy all the infrastructure so they can never return.
Three buildings were destroyed. As Mahmoud watched the destruction, the man on the phone said three more buildings would be bombed and then the residents would be allowed to return.
But a change of orders came suddenly.
They would bomb the full row of apartment blocks on the eastern side of the street, Mahmoud recalls being told.
This was more than 20 tower blocks, and hundreds of homes.
"There were people we hadn’t evacuated yet because there was no warning about those buildings. I told him, ‘At least give us until morning, in night time, where will the people go?’
“The answer was, ‘The orders have been received, and we will bomb all towers within two hours.’”
Mahmoud screamed at people to clear the area, running from block to block.
Residents describe chaotic scenes of adults shouting and children weeping. Some parents and children lost one another in the melee.
Despite the panic, Mahmoud stayed on the phone the whole time, trying his best to delay the bombing.
The voice on the other end of the phone continued, without emotion.
"He even told me, ‘Take your time. I won’t bomb unless you give me permission.’
"I said 'No, it’s not my permission. I don’t want you to bomb anything. If you want me to evacuate, I will evacuate for the safety of the people, but if you want to bomb, don’t tell me you need my permission.
And towards the end:
Mahmoud and the man who called himself Daoud kept speaking until the streets went quiet. Then the calls abruptly stopped without any further instructions for the people of al-Zahra.
“They didn’t tell us to go back to our homes, or to evacuate or leave the area. So people waited until noon, and then they started to move,” Mahmoud says.
In the hours and days that followed, the community of al-Zahra, like many in Gaza, disbanded.
“Even for the people whose homes were still standing, there are no services left… the sewage systems are damaged, there is no bakery, there is no supermarket, there is no water, no electricity,” Mahmoud says.
They didn’t care about this man. They took everything he had apart from his actual life and he had done nothing wrong. You think it is a story of IDF benevolence but it is literally a war crime.
Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives;
The dentist office is not a military objective just because there’s a tunnel 20m below it.
More importantly, there are 26 THOUSAND dead Palestinians, mainly innocent civilians. If they are not intentionally targeting them they are the most careless and/or incompetent army in the world.
It’s just not true, at least not any more than a handful of isolated war crimes. It’s shitty but that’s the reality of it.
Oh well that’s ok then, just a “handful” of “isolated” war crimes 🤣
She’s directly linking any protestation of the war with Putin. She’s essentially saying if you protest for cessation of hostility in Gaza you’re a tool of Putin.
It’s incredibly disingenuous and will definitely hurt their numbers. And in a race that’s going to be as close as this is, it could easily lead to a red Presidency.
I think you’re buying into her attempt to soften the blow.
She starts off the statement by immediately linking protests with Putin, then follows it up by putting up a front as though she’s in some way neutral.
John Stewart did a pretty good show about this sort of thing about a decade ago about Glenn Beck. “She’s only asking questions! How do we know these protestors aren’t all Russian agents, after all?”
I think it’s also plausible that Russia would astroturf to help Trump get back in office. By turning people against the Democrats and toward a third party to split the vote.
Then again, Russia is all about weaponizing the cracks in the target society. Adding to the discord over this situation by astroturfing both sides is right out of their playbook.
(Ed) And I’m guessing Israel is doing some of its own astroturfing. And probably same for Hamas and sympathetic entities.
She’s completely right. Some of the opposition is astroturfed. It’s part of Hamas’s strategy of “lawfare.”
It would be a betrayal of national security for the DOJ or FBI not to investigate the source of a lot of this messaging.
Yup.
Idk. Seems pretty natural to look a genocide and say that sucks. Maybe we should do something about it.
Since the dead kids don’t seem to be an issue, maybe these moderates would do it to deny the Russians their issue. Democratic moderates will fall all over themselves to coopt rightwing issues to deny them the ideological ground, maybe they can be convinced to actually adopt something good for once.
Well, that’s the point isn’t it? If there’s a legitimate military target and a reasonable warning tailored to minimize civilian casualties, that is not a war crime, let alone a genocide. It’s standard operating procedure, and morally and legally valid.
People seem to be completely unaware that before Israel bombs a building, it calls cell phones in the area and warns people to leave. One thing Hamas likes to do is tell people that those warning calls are a hoax, so that more civilians stay in the building to be killed. Nothing makes Hamas happier than more inncoent Palestinians killed with Israeli weapons.
People also seem to believe that every time a building is destroyed, there are never any Hamas members or weapons or tunnels. The extent of the tunnel systems in the Gaza Strip are well documented and if you threw a dart at a map of the strip, you’re pretty much going to hit a tunnel. I’m exaggerating, but not by much.
Again, if they are striking valid targets and warning the people to leave the area, it sucks and it’s horrible and of course it makes Democrats very uncomfortable because we are caring and empathetic people, but it’s not objectionable from an international law standard. Humanitarian corridors are open, supplies are flowing, and the daily death tolls have been decreasing for weeks. I agree with Pelosi that it’s delusional to call that genocide.
If it comes out that Israel does not really have valid military targets, or made no contemporaneous attempts to warn people in the target area, and that’s part of a policy or the result of training, as opposed to isolated war crimes, I agree it would be a genocide all day long. So far though, the evidence is overwhelming that that’s not what’s happening. Add to that the evidence that Israel is actively prosecuting people for war crimes and incitement to genocide.
And what about when Israel tells Palestinians to head to an evac zone, and then bombs that evac zone?
This is what I mean. Even in the evac zone, the IDF calls and texts people before bombing.
Yes, people were told to leave the north and head south. Nobody said “everywhere south is safe.”
People keep making this point to me and it would be a good point if it was as black and white as coverage keeps implying. My observations have been as follows:
These stories are exaggerated by media outlets that do not publish sufficient detail to identify the date and location of the bombing. This makes it impossible to know if you have just read 10 articles about 10 bombings or 10 articles about one bombing. It also makes it impossible to look up and see if one can find evidence of the warnings that were given or the IDF explanation for the bombing.
Many of the articles that do contain enough information to identify the date and location but does not include idf’s explanation or any information related to any warnings. This gives the false idea that Israel is just bombing people. Indiscriminately, and it just isn’t true. Because literally every single time I have been able to identify the date and location from any reports of civilians being killed in bombings, I’ve been able to find for everyone some explanation from the IDF and some eyewitness account including videos or screenshots of the warnings that people have received.
Here’s a good example. It is unique only because everyone evacuated, despite Hamas’s attempts to mislead people into staying in the buildings:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67327079.amp
The IDF caller at one point even said “we will not bomb until you say it is safe to do so,” and they did not. That doesn’t sound very genocidal to me.
Intentionally starving, targeting journalists, and killing 1% of the population is not legitimate.
Having government ministers on tv talking about displacing the whole population is genocidal language.
Bibi using biblical references to people genocided at gods command to describe current day Palestinians also points to genocidal intentions.
But you are blind to it.
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500 trucks used to go in on a daily basis. “Aid” (provided by a number of agencies and counties and not Israel) that had to be painfully inspected by Israel has been far below that. In other words, Israel actually withheld aid from Gazans, despite “allowing it in”.
Here is a good article that describes how less than 200 trucks were allowed in every day despite a daily basic need of 500. On one day in January, only 30 crossed in.
It’s Israel doing genocide and trying to get away with dirty lawyer tactics.
(not interested in a discussion with you, just adding this fact based piece of evidence here, because people deserve to know that that is inaccurate)
If Israel shut off the electricity into Gaza, how do they charge their cell phones?
Then stop doing it.
Israel is running into Gaza like a Fuze player on hostage gameplay, and wondering why the hostages keep getting in the way of the bombs. Either it is stupidity or maliciousness.
When it should be treating this like a gang or mafia that has infiltrated the population of Gaza and using them as unwilling participants.
People don’t understand shit. Me included. In fact, me the example. However, people can empathize with human suffering.
People have eyes and can think, maybe Israel should stop bombing indiscriminately. Maybe Israel, should tone it down a bit?
Then Israel says stuff like “Yo dudes, we are going to wipe out Gaza and every civilian, man, woman, baby, child, dogs, cats, sheep, salt the earth.”
It doesn’t inspire any confidence you either don’t know what you are talking about, or don’t know that Israel has a completely different philosophy from what you are arguing.
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Don’t argue with me,argue with math.
Half of Gaza is gone
Israel dropped almost as many bombs in a week then the US did in a year in Afghanistan.
Israel almost dropped more bombs in a week, then the US did in a year. Do you know what a high bar that is? For a place like Gaza?
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You’ve been warned about denying genocide before. 30 day ban.
have you seen the civilian casualty numbers?
If that’s minimized I would hate to see their idea of maximized.
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God how ridiculous are the things you believe to keep yourself from seeing Israel is butchering mostly civilians. Why would Israel know the room is full of civilians before bombing? Imagine, you’re whatever heinous evil you see Hamas as, and you’re trying to avoid being bombed in your secret tunnel. Why would you pack a room full of civilians right above your location? Are you doing it in secret so IDF doesnt see where you are, if so that doesnt give you any protection because they wouldnt know about the civilians to be deterred from bombing anyway. Or in broad daylight to make sure they know civilians and you are there, in this war where the presence of civilians has not stopped them from leveling neighborhoods at all.
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by anyone other than the people doing the civilian slaughter?
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This is not the uplifting story you seem to think it is. Someone rung this poor random guy and made him evacuate his entire community under extreme time pressure, only to destroy all the infrastructure so they can never return.
And towards the end:
They didn’t care about this man. They took everything he had apart from his actual life and he had done nothing wrong. You think it is a story of IDF benevolence but it is literally a war crime.
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They destroyed the whole civilian area. You know that intentionally destroying civilian infrastructure is a war crime right?
Source
The dentist office is not a military objective just because there’s a tunnel 20m below it.
More importantly, there are 26 THOUSAND dead Palestinians, mainly innocent civilians. If they are not intentionally targeting them they are the most careless and/or incompetent army in the world.
Oh well that’s ok then, just a “handful” of “isolated” war crimes 🤣
Israel is an incompetent state
You’ve been warned about genocide denial previously. 30 day ban.
>if they are striking valid targets
what is a valid military target in a ghetto?
>People seem to be completely unaware that before Israel bombs a building, it calls cell phones in the area in warns people to leave.
they cut power and telecoms already…cellphones are dead.
She’s directly linking any protestation of the war with Putin. She’s essentially saying if you protest for cessation of hostility in Gaza you’re a tool of Putin.
It’s incredibly disingenuous and will definitely hurt their numbers. And in a race that’s going to be as close as this is, it could easily lead to a red Presidency.
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I think you’re buying into her attempt to soften the blow.
She starts off the statement by immediately linking protests with Putin, then follows it up by putting up a front as though she’s in some way neutral.
John Stewart did a pretty good show about this sort of thing about a decade ago about Glenn Beck. “She’s only asking questions! How do we know these protestors aren’t all Russian agents, after all?”
It’s hilarious to me how Nancy Grace used to be the caricature for this shit and now Democrats employ the same tactics with zero sense of hypocrisy.
So do I. I want to know who’s paying Pelosi.
She doesn’t need to get paid, she has that sweet Congress gig with all the legal insider trading.
Russia would also fund pro-Israeli activists to help promote a rift.
We need to investigate every pro-Israeli supporter for their ties to Moscow.
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It benefits Russias political agenda by creating division between pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel people.
And being against genocide does not need amplification, it should be the default side if anything.
I think it’s also plausible that Russia would astroturf to help Trump get back in office. By turning people against the Democrats and toward a third party to split the vote.
Then again, Russia is all about weaponizing the cracks in the target society. Adding to the discord over this situation by astroturfing both sides is right out of their playbook.
(Ed) And I’m guessing Israel is doing some of its own astroturfing. And probably same for Hamas and sympathetic entities.