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So we've got a few updates for you with regards to wherever we are with that ceasefire proposal. First, we wanted to bring you Jake Taper announcing on his program that Hamas had rejected the deal, which was not exactly exactly accurate and getting corrected in real time.
Let's take to listen to that.
Haamas has responded to the latest proposal for a hostage and ceasefire deal, and Hamas has rejected it. CNN political and foreign policy analyst Barack Ravide is breaking this. Did Hamas Barrock give any explanation for its rejection?
Hi, Jake, So, First, Hamas did not say that it rejected the deal. Hamas said that it gave a response to the Katarian Egyptian mediators that it gave several comments and remarks on parts of the Israeli proposal. Israel, the Israeli government, Israeli officials are the ones saying that after they received Hamas's response and analyzed.
It, they treated as a rejection. I think we still need to hear from the mediators and most importantly from the White House. That White House spokesman John Kirby said that the whites is still analyzing and studying the Hamas response. So Hamas is saying it just gave a few comments, Israeli saying Hamas rejected the deal. The White House still hasn't said anything of substance. I think we should wait and hear more what the White House says, what the Qataris say, and what.
The Egyptians say.
What I heard from US officials in the last few weeks is that because sinoar thinks that as the war goes on, Israel will be more under pressure in the US will put more pressure on Israel. This is why they try to mobilize the international community to support President Biden's speech, including the Security Council resolution that passed yesterday.
That the Biden administration thought that if Sinwar cares so much about the international pressure on Israel, maybe when he sees the Security Council resolution, he'll have second thoughts on where the international pressure is directed. Maybe he'll understand that he's also under pressure, and not only these ways.
So kind of a funny and subtly revealing moment there, because the actual story was israeally officials had said, and that was the Axios headline. Israeli officials had said, a monster rejection of the deal, and Taffer just takes.
Us a monster rejected the deal because he just takes.
Their hard work.
That the Israeli journalist who is an Israeli citizen and I believe he served in the idea previously, he said a whole dude, He's like.
That's just what the isral.
That's a perfect example, is that the Israeli media more skeptical of their own government or of their own coverage than the US media.
Yeah, well, how else can you that is it?
You used to look at that and put it in a time capsule, look at it from all the time for perfect moment.
But I mean I have to say, like I've read everything there is to read about their response and where we are, and it's honestly impossible to parse what is going on behind the scenes because it's very difficult to separate the spin from the reality of who is position. Where the best that I can come to, I want to show you some elements here that give you a sense of what we know, But I think we're still just at this fundamental impasse where Hamas wants to remain
in existence because they're self interested. They want the war to end and there to actually be a permanent ceasefire and some guarantee of that, and Israel, especially led by Bibana and Yahoo, does not want the war to end. And it seems to be that that's a pretty unbridgable divide, at least without us exerting much more pressure than they
have to date to make this thing happen. We did hear from Tony Blinkoln He described his characterization of what Hamas's response was here, saying that some of the changes were minor, others were unacceptable and unworkable.
As take a listen to his exact words.
Hamas has proposed numerous changes to the proposal that was on the table. We discussed those changes last night with Egyptian colleagues and today with the Prime Minister. Some of the changes are workable, some are not. A deal was on the table that was virtually identical to the proposal that Hamas puldfore on May the sixth, a deal that the entire world is behind, a deal Israel's accepted, and
Hamas could have answered with a single word yes. Instead, Amas waited nearly two weeks and then proposed more change, a number of which go beyond positions that had previously taken then accepted.
So listen, I'm not portraying Hamas. It's like a good actor in this, but it's worth being skeptical of the US's commentary here as well, because they clearly from the beginning they've framed this as this is the Israeli proposal and they totally support it. It's Hamasa's standing in the way when Israel, you know, the leaders of Israel Nanyahu in particular, were consistently saying, well, actually, we don't agree with what the US is put forward, and this isn't
exactly reflective of our proposal. So in any case, you can take that for what it's worth. We also have some harets reporting about according to Israeli officials what they are saying. Hamas's objections were here some of the provisions that are considered quote unquote unworkable. So they've demanded that the ceasefire agreements stipulate that Israel withdraw from all areas of the Gaza Strip in the first week of the deal's implementation, that if Israel does not do so, the
release of hostages will be halted. In a response given by Hamas and mediators on Wednesday, the group is seeking a complete cessation of fire from the Israeli army, the withdrawal of the idea from population centers on the first day of the ceasefire. On the third day, Hamas seeks and Israeli withdrawal from the sala Addin Road, which connects between both sides of the strip and the coastal Road.
Sources in Hamas told Haratz that the amendments that were submitted are intended to ensure the withdrawal and ceasefire be established in the first phase, and that Israel will not be able to evade the implementation of all stages of the deal and return to fighting once all hostages are released. They also want China, Russia, and Turkey to be guaranteurs
of the deal, So again Sagur. To me, it seems to come down to this fundamental divide that Hamas wants the war to be over, a ceasefire to be permanent, and Israel wants to keep their options open to continue the shooting and the bombing once Phase one is up.
Yeah, I just think it's not. I don't at this point, I almost think it's impossible. Israel wants Hamas to commit to a sea spire, release the hostages, and then commit to not being in power after the war is over.
Is like, no, I'm not going to do.
No organization, And again I am not defending them, but what I am saying is that no organization except literally exhausting every single other option, is going to agree to effectively what is an unconditional surrender. There was a Wall Street Journal article that quoted a lot of leaked texts from Yahwa Sinwar, the head of Hamas, and the headline was basically like Sinwar willing to sacrifice like hundreds of thousands of Palestinians because he believes that he is winning
the war. And I was starting to think about it, I think he is a lot like any of these other like insurgent character leaders who is in like a nationalistic struggle against a stronger enemy. And again I'm not justifying purely analysis, but if you look at Ho Chi Minh and others, huge portions of the polit bureau during the NVA, we're like, yeah, we're going to lose a million Vietnamese at the end of the day, there's protests
that are happening in the US. We can outlast, you know, these Yankee imperialists, and.
We will win.
And they want us to surrender to them. They want us to literally give up our ability to govern what we see as our own country.
As long as we outlast them, we will win. And they were right.
And basically what he says in a lot of these text messages is yeah, it's sad, but a lot of people are going to continue to die. You can see that the West is beginning to rise up. There's a lot of outrage over the Israeli state. All I have to do is survive up until the point where their government breaks and international pressure comes. And the way that they are conducting themselves is giving their opponents all the ammunition that they need.
Well, he's like, I mean, in a very rational.
Way, he is exhibiting his own best self interests and he has hostages to negotiate with.
And I think I said this on our editorial call.
Everyone's like, well, they should just give up and release them, Like, yeah, look, I agree, it would be nice, But there's only really a few recorded instances in history where a group actually voluntarily surrenders and puts itself up for annihilation. The Japanese under World War two, and even then they had to agree that they were going to be able to keep their emperor after we nuked them and effectively annihilated the
vast majority of their populated cities. And Nazi Germany, where again we militarily occupied them and gave them no other choice after they fought to the death for every single scrap of their territory absent that it's not going to happen.
As we saw with the Nazis, we had.
Conquered the vast majority of Germany and they still wouldn't surrender. So you know, you can see you really only have one or two options here, like you can give up on this quote unquote unconditional.
Surrender or you can continue.
And he's going to keep pursuing the strategy which is in his own best interest.
Yeah, there was a revealing State Department exchange a few days back that really underscores the point you're making Soccer, which is like, listen, if you're going to have a negotiation, both sides have to feel like they're getting something out of it, and if you're on the Hama side, and again this is just you know, to analyze the way they're looking at things. It's like, oh, I'm just going to agree to you can go back to bombing, and also we're going to just self destruct and go away.
Why would we agree to that?
And that exact question, this is d four guys that I'm queuing up. That exact question was put to Matt Miller in a State Department briefing, and frankly, his answer was utterly preposterous.
Take a listen.
Hamas just a few weeks ago signed off on it, but first identical proposal.
But you just spoke to the points of why this would be wonderful for Israel. And you know, there's the way you've approached this so far, is that Hama the way a lot of people have approached that. Hamas doesn't care about the housing people. They only care about themselves, and so there are in a sense three parties to this Israel, the palsing people, non Hamas and Hamas. So but I think the answer to my question, which is what's in it for Hamas is essentially nothing for that.
So again, right, So they claim to represent I'm not trying to be cute. They claim to represent the interests of the past.
I don't believe that.
And you've made it clear many many times that you don't think that they do care about.
I suppose this. I suppose that this proposal puts that question very square, didn't.
The last one and the one before that and the one before.
Given that this one is nearly identical to the one that Amas presented, I think so.
Madley, by the way, incredible, just always nails these guys dead to rights. But he's like, you're betting on Hamas to put like this the safety of the Palestinian people first. You're betting on like the goodwill of Hamas and for them to not be self interested whatsoever. In what other sense of this conflict do you hold that view?
Now? I would also add to that.
I mean, in addition to the idea that you're you're giving them nothing and expecting them to just you know, completely capitulate in total surrender. But also Hamas's provisions are designed to guarantee there is in fact a permanent ceasefire. And this is something that you can go and listen to Beabing and Yahoo and they're you know, you unrepresented. All these people in government themselves say they do not
accept that, they will not commit to that. So there also is just this even if you know you want to growl Hamas has only the good will of the palasing people in mind. Even through that frame, they wouldn't accept without some sort of conditions and guarantee that there
is a permanent ceasefire. There was an interesting exchange on Maddie Hawson's networks at Taiale with the nephew of a hostage explaining his view of Bibi's mentality and the way that he's been approaching these negotiations that I thought was worth hearing out as well as take a listen to.
That always he and the government always choose the wrong way, and always, ever since October eighth, everything they do is directed at not getting the hostages back. This is the plain truth. They had many opportunities to sign a deal they're always abotaging their own initiatives. When people from the professional you know, the negotiating team itself are crying out loud, this this thing can go on. We were sabotaging our own moves. And this is the reality for the past
nine months. This is why we didn't get any hostages back alive. And Nataia was the first to jump on the photo app and push inside, push himself inside the frame with his post, as he said, called the heroic military operation. The other that came back doing the hostage deal, it didn't get a visit. It's not such a good photo app apparently for his base to see people coming alive and well in a deal.
Yeah, and I think he puts that.
I mean, it's like that's the inescapable truth at this point, because there were have been deals, potential deals available all the way along. We know the bulk of the hostages that were released overwhelmingly came in the context of a deal. We also, this is something that's very present in Israeli politics. Sager is Biebe has refused to meet with the hostage
families in quite a long time. I mean, it's just completely shut them out, and in this way, he really is dramatically at odds with the Israeli domestic public, even a majority within his own you know, fairly hard right party Lacud party want to see a deal to bring the hostages home. And that is, you know, the opposite of his priority, because he just wants to be able to continue and continue and continue.
I just think his dance is going to continue.
And unless we can literally change irreconcilable differences, then nothing is going to happen. If the condition is that's well, that's the other thing. If the condition, and this is why things could change, if Benny Gance becomes the prime minister, if the condition becomes release of the hostages first, quote unquote, defeat of Hamas second, then we're in business. Right, Hamas may sign that deal. They'll be like, okay, fine, you
in the war. We're good to go. We're probably going to stay in power.
That's fine.
You're not existentially asking us to basically give up our arms. After that though, the military organization. I was just looking back at those text messages that I referenced. He Sinoar believes he is winning. He's like, yeah, it's sad, It's true. A lot of people have died, He said, I believe that the Israelis are right where we want them. This is something he said like multiple days ago. There is no way that they would voluntarily just give up military
resistance and then give up their hostages. I'm speaking purely from a cold calculation. That's why the North Vietnamese example is a good one. In the end of the day, they were correct about their ability to withstand. Yes, millions of people died, but they knew that that sacrifice in their communist worldview or whatever, was worth it, and ultimately they succeeded. So who's going to be the one who
has more to lose is the other question. Sinoar also references that with Netanyahu, he's like, even if he wins, he said, even Israeli victory could be a huge defeat because he knows what that would entail and what consequence is that he could invite on the Israeli military if that were to occur. So you can hate him if you want, But these people can both be ideological and deeply rational, and everything that they're doing is quite rational right now from their own self injured perspective.
Yeah, and that's divorcing morality from the question it's not just Hamas leaders who feel that Israel is losing and Israel is failing in their objectives. I mean, you can read analysis to that effect in many mainstream Israeli really press newspapers. They're saying, listen, they haven't destroyed the tunnels, they haven't destroyed Hamas. They've only gotten a relatively small lesson of a majority of their fighters have been killed.
There're thousands of new recruits signing up. You've created a hotbed for future terrorism because of all the death and destruction that you've sown. And listen, the reality is before October seven, again, this is divorcing morality. This is not sanctioning anything any of the horrors that were committed on October seven against civilians. Before October seven, the Palestine question was basically dead. Even someone like this is something you know,
Professor Norman Finkelstein talks about here. He is someone who's devoted his entire adult life and career to studying this, and he himself had given up because it felt like no one cared to me. There was no possibly at the Abraham according these normalization deals that were occurring, and Palestine was playing no part in it. The idea was just to pretend this didn't exist. And we are now in a very different landscape and Israel is increasingly a pariah country. Are going to get to this new UN
report that accuses them of extermination. They're facing genocide charges at the ICJ, bib Net and Yahoo and Yoav Glant, the Defense Minister, are facing icc war crime prosecution. This didn't make it into our show, but we were looking at was an intel that pulled out of a huge fifteen billion dollar deal in Israel. Their economy is really suffering.
You know, the Western pross is one thing, but if you go around the world at the way that they're viewing Israel, the way they're viewing this conflict, this has been devastating to Israel. It's also been devastating by the way to the US and whatever prestige we had remaining in the world as well. So when you look at all those pieces, I think you have to agree with the assessment that this has not gone well for Israel.
And it's not a surprise because Bbnight, now, who doesn't care first and foremost about Israel, Israeli security, certainly doesn't care about the hostages.
He cares about himself.
He wants to stay in power, and he wants to stay on in prison too, because don't forget, he's facing corruption charges. So you know, the US tried to give an alternative version of victory to the Israelis. Biden tried to frame. You know what they've done already is hey, you've degraded their capacity so they can no longer conduct
another operation like October seventh. Call that a victory and move on is basically what Biden was proposing to the Israelis, and without any sort of actual muscle being applied on the US side, i'd any sort of pressure or leverage. There may be some actors in the Israeli government that would accept that, but beating that Yahoo is not one of them, and that is incredibly clear and has been
incredibly clear, by the way, for a long time. So that's where we are the best I can tell, with the cease fire deals, anything else you wanted to see there before I move on. There's a UN commission that's been looking into atrocities committed by both Hamas and Israel on October seventh and through the end of last year. So they just put out a report that is quite
detailed and accuses Israel and Hamas. By the way, but Israel, you know, that's the government that we're funding, so we take particular interest in of some outrageous war crimes and even crimes against humanity. Let's put the New York Times right up on the screen. We give you some of the headlines here. So the headline is UN report accuses both Israel and Palestinian groups of war crimes. A commission produced the UN's most detailed examination yet of the October
seventh attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza. Read you a little bit of this in that report, released on Wednesday. The three person commission does not itself carry any penalties, but lays on a legal analysis of actions in the Gaza conflict that is likely to be weighed by the International Court of Justice in an other international criminal proceedings. Israel to not cooperate with the investigation surprise surprize, and
protested the panel's assessment of its behavior. Some of the details here in terms of the Israeli side, they say, during their months long campaign in Gaza to aust Hamas, they have committed war crimes like the use of starvation as a weapon.
Of war through a total siege of Gaza.
The report also said Israel's use of heavy weapons in densely populated areas amounted to a direct attack on the civilian population and had the essential elements of a crime against humanity, disregarding the necessity of distinguishing between combatants and civilians, causing disproportionate high number of civilian casualties, particularly among women and children. The conflict has killed or named tens of thousands of Palestinian children, a scale and a rate of
casualties that were unparalleled across conflicts in recent decades. Other crimes against humanity committed by Israel include extermination, murder, gender persecution, in targeting Palestinian men and boys for a simple transfer of the population, torture, and in human and cruel treatment.
I'm going to get into some of the specific details here, which were the subject in particular a lot of commentary and discussion online, but just to zoom out for a second of the import of this, because you guys might be, oh, you another UN report, who really cares? Which in one sense, okay,
fair enough. In another way that you have yet another report accusing Israel of such grain crimes against humanity, and that this is likely to weigh heavily in a future International Court of Justice ruling with regards to genocide, and also potentially the ICC may take a look at this also in terms of crimes prosecution against bb Net, Yahoo, Yoev Goalan and potentially others in the future. By the way, that's what gives this some weight and makes it really significant.
It also carried a lot of out mainstream press was forced to cover this and talk in detail about this, and it's yet another instance of Israel's increasing pariah status internationally.
Yeah.
Well, and there's also a lot of other stuff, Crystal, if we want to get into about the Hannibal directive, which they found, which is very interesting.
Yeah, so could we put the Hannibal directive piece of this up on the screen? So the Hannibal directive the basic idea, and this has been documented in the past that the Israeli military will kill their own in the process of attempting to get the bad guys orwort hostage taking in particular, and there's already been credible reporting in places like The New York Times that there had been some instances of the Hannibal directive being operative during the
response to October seventh. Well, noteworthy in this report you have this paragraph that says, quote, the Commission also verified information indicating that in at least two other cases, the Israelis had likely applied the Hannibal directive, resulting in the killing of up to fourteen Israeli civilians. One woman was killed by ISF helicopter fire while being abducted from near
Oz to Gaza by militants. In another case, the Commission found that Israeli tank fire killed some or all of the thirteen civilian hostages held in a house that's in that Kibbutz inn Beery. That was the instance that I think has been most documented and basically admitted to by the Israelis who were involved in that operation and witnesses survivors had also testified to that as well. But still noteworthy to see this confirmed in this report.
Oh, absolutely, I mean this is not only has it been I mean this has been something that's been danced around previously, but it's important also just underscore remember there were some revisions about the death toll on October seventh, and it does still remain questions about specifically the Nova Music Festival up to have a confirmation or at least supposed confirmation here by the United Nations not nothing.
Yes, And they looked into the Nova Music Festival piece as well, and they weren't able to come to a conclusion there over whether the Hannibal directive was also operative at the Nova Music Festival, so they left that question open at this time. Another area that they dealt with was an incredibly politically sensitive issue, which is rape and
gender based violence committed by Hamas on October seventh. And I wanted to put this is going to be a little bit lengthy, guys, but I just want to make sure you have all of the information that was in the report so that you can know fully what this commission found. Let's go and put the first piece up on the screen. The TLDR here is that the commission found quote indications that members of the military wing of HAMAS and other Palestinian armed groups committed gender based violence
in several locations on October seventh. These they say, were not isolated in but perpetrated in similar ways in several locations by multiple Palaestinating perpetrators. The acts that were documented reflected, they say, clear abuse of power by male perpetrators. Disregard for special considerations and protection of women's integrity. So that's gender based violence.
Let's go to the next paragraph in the report.
They indicate that Hamas rejected those accusations. However, they get into some of the specifics of the evidence that they found of sexual violence and gender based violence perpetrated against women in and around the Nova Festival site, as well as at a military out post and several.
Of the kibbutz.
They say they collected and preserved digital evidence, including images of victims' bodies displaying indications of sexual violence of pattern corroborated by independent testimonies from witnesses. Reliable witness accounts obtained describe bodies that have been undressed in some instances with
exposed genitals. They receive reports and verified digital evidence concerned the restraining of women, including hands and sometimes feet of women being bound, often behind the victims backs, prior to their abduction or killing. Additionally, the commission made assessments based on the position of the body, for example, images displaying leg spread or bent over, and signs of struggle or violence on the body such as stab wounds, burns, lacerations,
and abrasions. So let's go on to the next piece. They say, however, that they looked at testimonies obtained by journalists and Israeli police concerning rape, specifically so as distinct from general gender based violence or general sexual violence, but they were not able to independently verify those rape allegations due to lack of access to victims, witnesses and crime
seats and obstruction of investigation by Israeli authorities. Commission was unable to review the unedited version of such testimonies for the same reasons. The Commission was also unable to verify reports of sexualized torture and genital mutilation. Additionally, the Commission found some specific allegations to be false, inaccurate, or contradictory with other evidence or statements and discounted these from its assessment.
So this is consistent with the Times of London piece that I did a monologue on earlier this week, which is effectively in terms of rape and specifically there's another piece that speaks to this rape being used systematically as a weapon of war, with top down instructions from military commanders to use rape as a weapon of war. There is no evidence at this point, no testimony, no forensic evidence to back up those claims.
We have one more.
Piece that speaks to this specifically, they say that the Commission identified patterns indicative of sexual violence in several locations. The attack on October seventh, they say enabled perpetrators to commit sexual and gender based violence, and this violence was not isolated. But they say they did not find credible evidence that militants received orders to commit sexual violence, and
so it was unable to make conclusions on this issue. However, they inflammatory language disbelief observed with both parties resilencing and
discrediting survivors, further exacerbating trauma and stigmatization. So I know this was a lot to go through, true, but I just wanted to give all the details of what the Commission report found, what they documented, what they claimed, and you know, it gives a little bit of a fuller picture of what we know at this point of what happened October seventh, which is they found indications of gender
based violence, of sexual violence. They did not they were able to falsify some of the journalist tellings, some of the news accounts.
Of specific rapes.
They were not able to find evidence of specific rapes. Israeli government continues not to cooperate, and they found no indications that this was used systematically as a weapon of war with top down instructions, which again is consistent with prior reporting.
Take I boy, you will call it tedious if you want. Go ask any normy Israel supporter out there, and they're going to bring up rape in the babies every single time.
So if you think this stuff doesn't.
Matter, it's kind of like going back in two thousand and five and be like, does it really matter that we didn't find WMD in Iraq? And it's like, no, Yeah, it actually really does matter because the indittional justifications for the eventual fallout they matter a lot. And that one of the very effective tactics that the Bush administration war supporters and all those people did is they moved past all of their lies and started architecting new ones instead
of actually reconciling what really happened. We didn't get a full accounting until what twenty ten basically of like what really went down in those initial years, and by that time the damage was done. Yeah, I say, don't ever forget. It's kind of like nine to eleven. Do the details of nine to eleven still matter? In some sense? No. In others, we just learned two weeks ago that the Saudi government had even more to do with you know, funding me hijackers than we knew at the time, and
it was totally covered up. I would say it does matter. It matters both the historical record and for future US policy.
Well, and it also matters because Israeli government really used this as a center of their push to justify barbarism, not just them, oh.
Absolute, I mean Joe Biden.
I I showed the clip of him lying about always saw the photographs. No, you didn't, because those photographs didn't exist. So that's why your word tedious is correct. I also find it somewhat tedious, but I want to make sure that we're really clear about what we know actually happen on that day, what evidence supports, what it doesn't support.
There was one last piece that I wanted to put up here because this looked both at you know, Israeli actions and Palestinian actions, crimes committed against Israelis and against Palestinians. There was quite a significant section about gender based and sexual violence committed against Palestinians.
We can put this up on the screen. This was a portion of it.
They say that the frequency, prevalence, and severity of sexual and gender based crimes perpetrated against Palestinians since October seventh across the OPT indicate that specific forms of this type of violence are part of Israeli operating procedures. Palestinian men and boys experienced specific persecutory acts intended to punish them
in retaliation for the crimes committed on October seven. The way in which these acts were committed, including their filming and photo graphic and conjunction with similar cases documented in several locations, leads the Commission to conclude that forced public stripping and nudity and other related types of abuse were
either ordered, ordered or co condoned by Israeli authorities. So they're suggesting that there may have been operating orders to humiliate Palaestini men and boys in particular and perpetrate sexual violence gender based violence against Palestinie men and boys in a systematic way post October seventh, to quote unquote get revenge for the crimes that were committed on that day.
And there's quite a bit of detail in the report about some of the acts that have been reported, which again consistent with prior reporting we had report from previous UN reports. We also just had New York Times documenting torture and abuse against Palestinian prisoners who have been taken by the Israelis, including multiple reports of hot electric rod being used to sodomize multiple Palestinian men.
So you know this report provides additional detail theres.
Yeah, well, said Crystal, what are you taking to look at well?
Earlier this week, Israel injured and killed roughly one thousand palest Indians in an effort to rescue four Israeli hostages who had been taken by Hamas on October seventh. In spite of the horrific death toll two hundred seventy four souls approximately, this massacre was almost uniformly celebrated by American political elites and mainstream news figures, who heralded the brave
heroes conducting this daring mission. But a few voices did recoil at the mass civilian death and clear war crimes, which displayed a monstrous disregard for human life and the crowd over at Morning Joe, while they just couldn't let
that slide. But the fact that there wasn't absolute universal celebration of this latest Israeli slaughter really got to contributor Donny Deutsche in particular, who popped off in a little monologue designed to explain why, actually, if you think about it, killing and injuring hundreds of civilians, including children and grandma's was perfectly fine.
Good even take a listen.
We have to start to really talk honestly about the definition of civilian casualties. Four hostages rescued and two hundred and seventy Palestinian civilians killed. We need to start to look at that word civilians. When the hostages are being held by a Palestinian journalist, a civilian, and a Palestinian doctor a civilian. These are not civilians. These are Hamas ambassadors.
And yes there are innocent civilians. But I think back to also the hundreds and thousands of rabid Gazans as they dragged a corpse through Gaza, cheering, hysterical, with glee and joy, and it's just once again, the media coverage is And these were four hostages that were taken on a day that twelve hundred Israelis were slaughtered, main decapitated, killed in the most gruesome way.
And I don't know.
If Americans had four hostages that were taken and we had a rescue mission, and yes, there were two hundred and seventy casualties, and many of those Palestine casualties are deep, deep, deep sympathizers of Hamas. Would the coverage be the same way anybody be criticizing the rescue mission or would it.
Be truly one of heroism?
But I do think we have to start to really be talk honestly, honestly about the definition of civilian casualties.
Now, Donnie was so proud of this little moment. He posted on Twitter proclaiming, let's have an honest conversation about quote civilian casualties. So all right, Donnie, let's go ahead and do that. So off the bat, let's talk about this hypothetical American hostage mission that successfully rescued four of our citizens. You claim there would be no criticism of
such a toll, and maybe, But I don't agree. Because although political and media elites, the Morning Joe types turned the other cheek when it came to war crimes of the War on Terror era, many Americans did not. There was a robust opposition to the civilian death toll, from drones strikes to CIA black sites, and torture and Gitmo and Abu grab.
But let's pause it.
You're correct that the American public would accept the death of two hundred and seventy four people in exchange for four hostages. That still doesn't make it right. Furthermore, there are American hostages being held Gaza. In fact, Hamas claims that one of them was killed as part of this glorious rescue mission. Obviously, we shouldn't take AMAS claims without evidence at face value, any more than we should take
IDF claims at face value. We can say, however, with absolute certainty, that every hostage, American and otherwise has been in grave peril due to Israeli bombing campaigns, including this one. You don't have to take my word for it. One of the just rescued hostages told Harets quote, our greatest fear was the IDF's plans and the concern that they would bomb the building we were in. Now the US
is not attempted a rescue mission for our five hostages. Instead, we're actually considering negotiating with Hamas to bring them home, which makes all the sense in the world. Since the overwhelming majority of hostages who had been freed came home. In the context of seatsfire negotiations, many more have been killed by bombing than saved. Finally, we might take a look at some past hostage rescue missions for a little comparison of what level of quote unquote collateral damage has
been typical and accepted by the supposedly civilized world. And freedmen healthily compiled a list of some recent hostage rescue missions. And would you look at that Mayre Scalabama. That was the US Navy zero civilians killed, Somalia, US Navy zero civilians killed, Nigeria, US Navy zero civilians killed.
Then we get to the Israeli operations and the number.
Of civilians killed skyrockets sixty six in Operation Golden Hand. And of course this latest operation we now know took more than two hundred civilians. So no, while we are a no beacon of virtue and participated directly in this specific monstrosity, we have not operated this way, and our
citizens have not all just accepted brazen war crimes. But let's dig a level deeper here, shall we, Because while Donnie Moo's the words that, of course there are some innocent civilians, his commentary strongly suggests that actually there really aren't, even though the population is half literal children in Gaza. He asks us to think of the hundreds or thousands of quote rabid Gazins, cheering and hysterical with glee and joy, who he says, celebrated a dead Israeli in the streets.
These actions, he suggest, mean that Palestinians aren't really innocent civilians in the way that you or I are well Star two.
Can play at that game. What have we here?
Just Israeli Finance Minister Bezalielsmotrich suggesting that Palestinian corpses be paraded through the streets on carts, as they did in Biblical times sounds kind of akin to the actions Donnie klaim stripes Palestinians of their civilian status. Now Smotrich is a politician representing a large constituency. Should all those who celebrate these ideas be deemed combatants? Maybe just those who vote directly for Smotrich. Maybe the entire society that could
produce such a monstrous death cult? What do you think, Donnie? And that brings me to my real point here. Donnie thinks he's such a special big boy for coming up with this brilliant logic, but it's not new or special. It is a logic of exterminationists and terrorists throughout history, boring and stale, as it is monstrous and disgusting. There are no innocent, no uninvolved civilians, because the entire society is dangerous, complicit, from the bay in the cradle to
the Grandpa with this cane. If they are our enemies, they are by definition not innocent, not uninvolved, not civilians. That's the thinking, and it's the logic. For example of Osama bin Laden, who blamed all Americans for the crimes of American political leaders. We voted for them, after all, didn't we our tax dollars sustain their torture camps, buy the bombs, build the drones. Donnie doined to suggest all Palestinians are complicit because, in his words.
They are deep, deep deep.
Sympathizers of Hamas well. Bin Laden considered us deep deep deep sympathizers of Bush and Cheney. With I have to say more legitimacy because Hamas is authoritarian. Majority Palestinians were not even alive the last time elections were held. We at least theoretically have a democracy here. In fact, al Qaeda and bin Laden had quite a lot to say about their definitions of civilians that Donnie would seemingly readily agree with if it was applied to Palestinians and al Qaeda.
Theologian wrote, for example, that anyone who was useful to the unbelievers was fair game. Quote our conclusion. But God knows better than anyone is as follows, those who can be useful to the unbelievers or to others must be killed, whether they are old people, priests, or invalids. You can hear echoes of this sentiment when Deutsch references the doctor a journalist who were supposedly holding hostages, a claim made
by the IDF, by the way, and lacking evidence. Bin Lan himself directly echoes one of Donnie's arguments with evocative language. Donnie Deutsch brings up the horrors of October seventh to say, in essence, they did it to us first. Well, here's Osama bin Laden.
Quote.
Is very strange for Americans and other educated people to talk about the killing.
Of innocent civilians.
I mean, who said that our children and civilians are not innocence and that the shedding of their blood is permissible. Whenever we killed their civilians. The whole world yells at us from east to west, and America starts putting pressure on its allies and puppets who said that our blood
isn't blood and that their blood is blood. In other words, just like Donnie's logic, Hey, they did it first, pseudo intellectual sophistry when coming from Osama bin Laden or Donnie Deutsch alike logic of a sociopathic kindergartener, which is what
this all boils down to. Really tribal in, group out, group evil cloaked in a whole bunch of bullshit, which is why you'll be unsurprised to learn it is also the language of some of the other great terrorists of our time, the current Israeli regime, which tweeted this out from their official government account, quote, we need to talk about the elephant in the room. Many gas and civilians participating in killing, raping, and kidnapping Israeli's on October seventh.
It is also reported that gaz And civilians were paid by Hamas to hold hostages captive in their homes. Hamas is intentionally involving the civilian population of Gaza in its war crimes. You can see they're on the picture, they say, quote, there are no innocent civilians there. They just come right on and say it. But of course this is nothing new the words of Israeli President Hertzog earlier in this conflict. He said, quote, it is an entire nation out there
that is responsible. It's not true, this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved, It's absolutely not true. They could have risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime which took.
Over or Gaza in a coup deta.
Those words, by the way, were cited as evidence of genocide in South Africa's ICJ case against Israel. So congrats Donnie for proudly broadcasting yourself discovering the logic of war criminals and terrorists. Tune into the Next Morning Joe, where they discuss how sodomizing Palestinian hostages with metal rods is actually really morally complicated if you think about it hard enough, just astonishing.
I mean the key and if you want to hear my reaction to Crystal's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot com.