Hamas attack on Israel

[Woodchopper]

The Hamas-run Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip says at least 500 people have been killed in an explosion that it says was caused by an Israeli airstrike.


If confirmed, the attack on the al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City it would be by far the deadliest Israeli airstrike in five wars fought since 2008.

The Israeli military says it is looking into the report.

[…]

Hundreds of people were seeking shelter at the al-Ahli Hospital at the time of the blast.


Photos sent to The Associated Press showed fire engulfing the hospital halls, shattered glass and body parts scattered across the area.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... story.html

[monkey]

The Hamas-run Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip says at least 500 people have been killed in an explosion that it says was caused by an Israeli airstrike.


If confirmed, the attack on the al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City it would be by far the deadliest Israeli airstrike in five wars fought since 2008.

The Israeli military says it is looking into the report.

[…]

Hundreds of people were seeking shelter at the al-Ahli Hospital at the time of the blast.


Photos sent to The Associated Press showed fire engulfing the hospital halls, shattered glass and body parts scattered across the area.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... story.html

It's probably best to note that the IDF say it was Hamas' fault, a failed rocket launch. via i24news - clicky

f.cking awful, either way.

[EACLucifer]

The Hamas-run Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip says at least 500 people have been killed in an explosion that it says was caused by an Israeli airstrike.


If confirmed, the attack on the al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City it would be by far the deadliest Israeli airstrike in five wars fought since 2008.

The Israeli military says it is looking into the report.

[…]

Hundreds of people were seeking shelter at the al-Ahli Hospital at the time of the blast.


Photos sent to The Associated Press showed fire engulfing the hospital halls, shattered glass and body parts scattered across the area.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... story.html

This happened moments after a heavy rocket barrage was launched from Gaza. I'm very ill right now and don't have the ability to do my usual roundup, but third party sources confirmed this barrage at the time, with alerts centred around the Tel Aviv area, which would by necessity mean the larger end of the rocket spectrum being used.

The IDF's assessment was that this was a short-falling rocket. A significant percentage of rockets fired from Gaza land in Gaza, but of course Hamas authorities aren't very open about this. In 2022, for example, 36 civilians were killed in Gaza, with 14 of them killed by short-falling rockets. About 20% of rockets fell short in that particular flare-up of violence. There's a number of reasons rocket launches can fail, and indeed we've seen it with things as advanced as a Patriot Battery's interceptor in Ukraine, but the principle reason for short-falling rockets in Gaza appears to be the use of improvised single use launchers for what are still very deadly rockets.

This is not to be read as me taking a definitive position, but it is important to note that the Hamas version of events is contested, and very plausibly contested.


ETA: Further to this, the IDF also denies operating in the area at the time of the explosion.

[EACLucifer]

And an OSINT take on the issue, complete with footage (note, the footage just shows an apparent rocket failure and a distant blast, but given people died due to the blast, could still be distressing), geolocation etc.

ETA: The key quote

The blast at the hospital happens less than 20 seconds after a large volley of rockets is launched at Israel with a trajectory over the hospital.

One of the rockets fails in the air. Initially described as an interception, it appears more likely to be a motor failure. Then, below this, the blasts on the hospital grounds.

ETA2: Sadly the narrative has already been set by all the irresponsible f.ckers who decided to reproduce the Hamas claim verbatim with at best just a tiny hint of a caveat that maybe Hamas aren't 100% reliable and no context re: the regularity of rocket shortfalls and so on.

[bob sterman]

ETA2: Sadly the narrative has already been set by all the irresponsible f.ckers who decided to reproduce the Hamas claim verbatim with at best just a tiny hint of a caveat that maybe Hamas aren't 100% reliable and no context re: the regularity of rocket shortfalls and so on.

The initial headlines (e.g. BBC) very shortly after this happened didn't even make it clear the claims were coming from Hamas. One just said "Reports: Israeli Strike on Gaza Hospital".

Given the stakes here - when it comes to rushing out these headlines - irresponsible is an understatement.

Reporting is more balanced this morning - but BBC are quite good at understatement at times too...

"Hamas said the Israeli military was responsible for the strike. Israel in turn has blamed the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an armed group based in Gaza"

"Armed group"???? Not even a "militant" armed group?

[Woodchopper]

On the hospital, picture from this morning appears to show that there isn’t an impact crater where the explosion took place. Doesn’t look like a bomb hit it.
https://x.com/qudsn/status/171452189672 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

But we should wait for more information and analysis.

[EACLucifer]

ETA2: Sadly the narrative has already been set by all the irresponsible f.ckers who decided to reproduce the Hamas claim verbatim with at best just a tiny hint of a caveat that maybe Hamas aren't 100% reliable and no context re: the regularity of rocket shortfalls and so on.

The initial headlines (e.g. BBC) very shortly after this happened didn't even make it clear the claims were coming from Hamas. One just said "Reports: Israeli Strike on Gaza Hospital".

Given the stakes here - when it comes to rushing out these headlines - irresponsible is an understatement.

Reporting is more balanced this morning - but BBC are quite good at understatement at times too...

"Hamas said the Israeli military was responsible for the strike. Israel in turn has blamed the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an armed group based in Gaza"

"Armed group"???? Not even a "militant" armed group?

Repeating the claimed casualty figure was also deeply irresponsible as there just wasn't any way for anyone to know at that point.

With dawn, we see the hospital still standing, and a number of burned out cars in the car park. It seems fairly clear some people were killed by the impact, but I'll say now there's no f.cking way it was a J-DAM.

[jimbob]

Long OSint thread by @GeoConfirmed

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1714 ... 51272.html

Where they show their working

[bob sterman]

Repeating the claimed casualty figure was also deeply irresponsible as there just wasn't any way for anyone to know at that point.

With dawn, we see the hospital still standing, and a number of burned out cars in the car park. It seems fairly clear some people were killed by the impact, but I'll say now there's no f.cking way it was a J-DAM.

The casualty figure may be high as there may have been a large number of people sheltering in the courtyard.

But as you point out - that photo does not suggest high explosives. Combustion of something (e.g. failed rocket) - but that tin roof on the right would not be standing if it was an Israeli airstrike.

[EACLucifer]

Repeating the claimed casualty figure was also deeply irresponsible as there just wasn't any way for anyone to know at that point.

With dawn, we see the hospital still standing, and a number of burned out cars in the car park. It seems fairly clear some people were killed by the impact, but I'll say now there's no f.cking way it was a J-DAM.

The casualty figure may be high as there may have been a large number of people sheltering in the courtyard

Yes, and while I profoundly hope it was not, it could be high. The point I was aiming to make, though, was that Hamas's figure was being reported almost immediately, when experience from Ukraine and indeed from Israel shows that mass casualty events when first responders can't immediately get in don't see accurate death tolls initially reported. Indeed you can see a horrified post from me earlier on this thread when the death toll of Hamas's attack on Israel was reported at two hundred, when in reality it was a lot, lot worse.

And this is the sort of thing where bad reporting can and does get people killed. We've already had a French Jew murdered by an Islamist and a little Palestinian-American boy murdered by a (Catholic) right wing nutjob in so-called-response to this war, and last night mobs set on embassies across the Middle East. While western media can't control for what Arabic, Farsi and Turkish media report, they can avoid fuelling the fire in their own countries, or lending false credibility to reports in Arabic, Farsi or Turkish media by appearing to report the same thing. Much of the western press acted as stenographers for Hamas last night. On the day of the Hamas attack, the BBC held off for hours on reporting civilian casualties save for one caused by rocket fire, even as video circulated freely of the murders of civilians, yet they reported Hamas's claims with no more than a caveat that won't mean much to most readers.

[Woodchopper]

Long OSint thread by @GeoConfirmed

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1714 ... 51272.html

Where they show their working

See also this thread: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1714 ... 34678.html

[Woodchopper]

Long OSint thread by @GeoConfirmed

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1714 ... 51272.html

Where they show their working

See also this thread: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1714 ... 34678.html

And this one by Eliot Higgins
https://x.com/EliotHiggins/status/17145 ... 15554?s=20

Much more to be found out. But at this stage the damage appears to be more consistent with a falling rocket, or a rocket that split into parts, than a bomb dropped by an aircraft.

[Woodchopper]

Repeating the claimed casualty figure was also deeply irresponsible as there just wasn't any way for anyone to know at that point.

With dawn, we see the hospital still standing, and a number of burned out cars in the car park. It seems fairly clear some people were killed by the impact, but I'll say now there's no f.cking way it was a J-DAM.

The casualty figure may be high as there may have been a large number of people sheltering in the courtyard

Yes, and while I profoundly hope it was not, it could be high. The point I was aiming to make, though, was that Hamas's figure was being reported almost immediately, when experience from Ukraine and indeed from Israel shows that mass casualty events when first responders can't immediately get in don't see accurate death tolls initially reported. Indeed you can see a horrified post from me earlier on this thread when the death toll of Hamas's attack on Israel was reported at two hundred, when in reality it was a lot, lot worse.

Yes, triage and counting the bodies would take some time.

It would be good if someone could put together a timeline with which we could compare the timing of the explosion and the statements, and exactly what was originally stated.

[IvanV]

A demonstration of why it is useful to have a good reputation for being open and truthful about potentially embarrassing events.

[Woodchopper]

Good John Burn Murdoch thread on the problems with journalism (here and elsewhere).
https://x.com/jburnmurdoch/status/17146 ... 18265?s=20

tl;dr Major news organizations are still based around receiving information from human sources and aren't equipped to do their own data analysis (of OSINT in this case), or if they have the capacity don't take it seriously enough.

[bob sterman]

It would be good if someone could put together a timeline with which we could compare the timing of the explosion and the statements, and exactly what was originally stated.

The explosion was apparently at about 19:00 local time. So 17:00 in UK.

At 18:25 BBC website had....

Hundreds killed in Gaza hospital strike - reports

We are seeing unconfirmed reports from Hamas that Israeli warplanes have struck the Baptist Hospital in central Gaza.

A health spokesman is quoted estimating that hundreds of people were killed.

More on this story as we get it.

At 18:50 BBC website had...

About 500 killed in hospital airstrike, say Palestinian officials

The number of people killed has reached 500 following the alleged air strike on a hospital - according to the Gaza health ministry spokesman.

Meanwhile, an Israeli army spokesperson says the cause of the incident is not known and the army is looking into the details.

The BBC is working to verify details of the incident.

[monkey]

I just watched this report from Channel 4 on the hospital (There are blurred images of dead bodies in it, some bloodstains on a wall, and video of the explosion, 5 mins long) - clicky

In it they say that the Hamas people on the recording are saying the missile came from a cemetery across the road from the hospital, but the video of the explosion and the IDF suggest that it came from much further away.

Has this been addressed by anyone?

[IvanV]

I think many people in the Middle East have decided for themselves what happened at the hospital according to their loyalties. Hamas can get away with blaming this on Israel, to the people predisposed to believe that, precisely because Israel takes so little care to avoid casualties to Palestinian civilians. As Israel sows, so it reaps. And there are Israelis who justify the death of Palestinian civilians by saying that all Gazans are responsible for Hamas's attack.

As the Economist leader this week writes, "The tragedy of Ahli Arab validates the cynical calculation that Palestinian casualties help Hamas by undermining support for Israel."

Another sentence worth quoting: "Egypt is more resolved than ever to keep temporary refugees out of the Sinai, partly for fear of being seen to abet Israel in what Palestinians worry is a plan to empty Gaza permanently."

Meanwhile, Israeli settlers in the West Bank are carrying out atrocities against the local Palestinian population. And Israel's land invasion of Gaza has been delayed by concern for Hizbullah's activities along the northern border.

The Economist has some positive suggestions for de-escalation. But if they happen it would be hat-eating time. If things like that happened, we'd never be here in the first place.

It doesn't look like the anyone with any influence in the region thinks this ends, in the long run, except through the utter defeat of the other side.

[Bewildered]

I’m finding this thread strange. The attacks in Israel were awful and sad, so is the response.

You lot are right the bbc etc should really not quote numbers of deaths if it’s clear any numbers could not yet have been gathered. I don’t really know what is standard practise in these things etc but it sounds bad. However I’m finding both the general tone in here weirdly selective / one-sided compared to what I am hearing from main stream centrist sources and that this discussion and outrage at the bbc irresponsibility sits poorly with the fact that in this thread we had someone posting unverified stories about babies being beheaded and no one raised any objection to the sharing of that kind of lurid / emotive detail (as I recall the fact that it was unverified was raised but no one really challenged it being shared).

Beyond that I see complaints certain people don’t condemn hamas* but little sympathy for the Palestinians or comments suggesting Israel should show constraint from many people. Mostly just Ivan’s posts showing sympathy in that direction. I mean on a forum you are entitled to just focus on one aspect without it meaning you disregard or don’t care about others, but I think it’s a bit odd to be so one-sided while criticising the lack of empathy from others.

Just for contrast I have found the Rory Stewart / Alistair Campbell e.g. https://youtu.be/xAs5EOBUDcs?si=hiRyvutBPh28i0ov completely different. I think they are clearly centrists (albeit one Tory and one labour) and hardly Corbyn-like leftists, but to me the picture I get from them is worlds apart from what I get reading this thread.

*for the record, though it seems quite pompous for me to say so (as if me saying it carries any significance or matters for anything), I do condemn what Hamas did, it was awful and I am very sorry for the victims, their friends and their families.

[tenchboy]

I’m finding this thread strange. The attacks in Israel were awful and sad, so is the response.

You lot are right the bbc etc should really not quote numbers of deaths if it’s clear any numbers could not yet have been gathered. I don’t really know what is standard practise in these things etc but it sounds bad. However I’m finding both the general tone in here weirdly selective / one-sided compared to what I am hearing from main stream centrist sources and that this discussion and outrage at the bbc irresponsibility sits poorly with the fact that in this thread we had someone posting unverified stories about babies being beheaded and no one raised any objection to the sharing of that kind of lurid / emotive detail (as I recall the fact that it was unverified was raised but no one really challenged it being shared).

Beyond that I see complaints certain people don’t condemn hamas* but little sympathy for the Palestinians or comments suggesting Israel should show constraint from many people. Mostly just Ivan’s posts showing sympathy in that direction. I mean on a forum you are entitled to just focus on one aspect without it meaning you disregard or don’t care about others, but I think it’s a bit odd to be so one-sided while criticising the lack of empathy from others.

Just for contrast I have found the Rory Stewart / Alistair Campbell e.g. https://youtu.be/xAs5EOBUDcs?si=hiRyvutBPh28i0ov completely different. I think they are clearly centrists (albeit one Tory and one labour) and hardly Corbyn-like leftists, but to me the picture I get from them is worlds apart from what I get reading this thread.

*for the record, though it seems quite pompous for me to say so (as if me saying it carries any significance or matters for anything), I do condemn what Hamas did, it was awful and I am very sorry for the victims, their friends and their families.

A number of us raised objections/commented upon a certain style of posting in the early days of the Ukraine War thread. We were screamed at, told to f.ck off and most memorably, to "come back when we were mature enough to understand what wars were about" (or similar).
So, for myself, I now don't bother; I leave those who care to, to get on with it: it's just their way of doing things.

[EACLucifer]

I’m finding this thread strange. The attacks in Israel were awful and sad, so is the response.

You lot are right the bbc etc should really not quote numbers of deaths if it’s clear any numbers could not yet have been gathered. I don’t really know what is standard practise in these things etc but it sounds bad.

They pushed Hamas's narrative almost entirely uncritically until the narrative was established. It's not just the numbers - the claim was that the hospital was levelled. It wasn't. NYT and AP used photos from different incidents to illustrate it, hell, AP used a photo of grieving relatives that ought to have been obviously unconnected as some of those mourning where wearing kippot. Since then we've had synagogues burned, mobs in the streets going after embassies. Overnight, I discovered a rabbi was stabbed, which may or may not be connected.

The single thing that most commonly caused pogroms was false claims about Jewish malfeasance. I saw was, but I think it is quite optimistic trying to confine that to the past tense.

Despite the evidence being entirely incompatible with Hamas's version of events, they were *much* more critical of the Israeli pushback, even though since then multiple nations investigations, along with OSINT, the AFP's visual verification team etc have all confirmed it was a rocket launched from Gaza, meant to kill Israeli civilians, that instead killed Palestinian ones, though thankfully likely less than a tenth as many as Hamas claimed.

BBC Hamas Stenographers 1.jpg (175.89 KiB) Viewed 26459 times

BBC Hamas Stenographers 2.jpg (197.78 KiB) Viewed 26459 times

Of course it took a little time for the truth to emerge, and in the meantime, the Hamas narrative, unencumbered by any need to conform to reality, spread like wildfire. If it was the first time the BBC had pulled sh.t like this - always assuming the Jewish source is untrustworthy compared to everything else - it might be something, but I have very distinct memories of them hearing a bit of Hebrew during a recording of an antisemitic attack on some f.cking schoolchildren and deciding it was really an anti-Muslim slur, while the attacker's motive got the "allegedly" treatment. Quite why they thought someone would throw a random anti-Muslim slur in English into the middle of a Hebrew sentence, when the words, when parsed as Hebrew, were a necessary part of the sentence I don't know.

Not just the BBC, of course. Papers like the NYT were just as complicit. Coincidentally - or perhaps not coincidenallly - they've just re-hired Soliman Hijjy, who is a big fan of Adolf Hitler.

However I’m finding both the general tone in here weirdly selective / one-sided compared to what I am hearing from main stream centrist sources and that this discussion and outrage at the bbc irresponsibility sits poorly with the fact that in this thread we had someone posting unverified stories about babies being beheaded and no one raised any objection to the sharing of that kind of lurid / emotive detail (as I recall the fact that it was unverified was raised but no one really challenged it being shared).

Well we did discuss the degree to which it was verified. And more and more witnesses confirmed it. Despite this, the same far left f.cking vermin that lauded the attack as it happened still denied it, to the point photographs had to be released - not that many of them didn't fall for a 4-Chan level photoshop job to try and pretend that they weren't seeing the charred corpse of a child.

Evidence. Be warned, there are photographs on there where your mental health will be better if you don't see them.
Spoiler:

Yes, kids were decapitated, even infants. Women and girls raped until their pelvises broke. Family members tied together and burned alive - we know they were alive because of the soot in the respiratory system. Eyes were gouged out. Genitals cut off, as well as fingers and toes - including from children. A pregnant woman had had her stomach cut open, her unborn baby removed and stabbed.

[MOD edit: I've placed a harrowing description behind the spoiler]

[Grumble]

The problem is how can you remove Hamas while doing all the things that create an environment where Hamas can flourish? The injustice of collective punishment is clear, and Israel cutting off power by action or blockade to a civilian population is certainly that.

[IvanV]

The problem is how can you remove Hamas while doing all the things that create an environment where Hamas can flourish? The injustice of collective punishment is clear, and Israel cutting off power by action or blockade to a civilian population is certainly that.

There is little realistic prospect of a polity like Palestine, being the West Bank and Gaza, if self-ruled, having anything other than an ruthless authoritarian rule that prioritises the benefit of those in charge over the greater population, any time soon. Such as just about every Arab state has, as well as major states such as China, Russia and Iran, and practically all of the less developed world with only minor exceptions. And indeed the entire world until quite recent times. That is how nearly all of the polities in the world have been ruled through nearly all of time since polities larger than about a village came into existence. Because stable democracy is very difficult to create.

It is very difficult to create the circumstances where the broader population has greater influence on how they are ruled, and restrain authoritarianism. There is a strong tendency to authoritarianism in any rule. We currently see this going on in places like China, Russia, Turkey, India, Bangladesh, Venezuela, and many other middle and lower income countries. Stable democracy tends only to come into being and persistence through long historical trend, with powerful and persistent counterbalancing institutions against the leading government, which places like Palestine just don't have. The classic text on this, as I keep on recommending, is Why Nations Fail by Acemoglu and Robinson.

It is a factor that makes the situation so intractable and so devastatingly likely to perpetuate tragedy for a long time. It is why I have long said, the ideal is a two state solution, but it probably can't be made to work, because the Palestinian state would rapidly become a failed state under the power of the most ruthless. And they would be doing just what we see Hamas now doing.

Things were on the whole more pacific when Egypt controlled Gaza and Jordan the West Bank. But even they couldn't keep the terrorist atrocities below a level which provoked Israel into response. Which is why they don't want to take back the responsibility for them, as that creates problems for them. Realistically, West Bank and Gaza need to be part of a larger polity or polities if they are to be more feasible and stable. Since Egypt and Jordan don't want that responsibility, people talk of coalitions of responsibility for them from the wider Arab community, but in practice no one in that community wants any part of that, or any large enough part for there to be enough when put together. Of course the very greatest outcome to achieve that would be a one-state solution where everyone got along nicely with each other. But few people think that is realistic.

Which is why so many people in the region think this goes on until one side or the other is utterly defeated, and, by implication, just goes away. And that would indeed be an end of it, as we have recently just seen in Nagorno Karabakh. It is why the Turks and the Greeks ended their war with population swaps. It is why the Czechoslovaks pushed the German population out of their lands after the 2WW as otherwise the Sudetenland would be a continuing sore. It is why most of the population of Abkhazia, ie the non-Abkhaz, where formerly Abkhaz were only in a minority, have left. Why the formerly large Jewish populations of places like Iraq and Uzbekistan have mostly left. Why the German minorities in many East European and Central Asian countries have left since 1990. Etc. It is not the kind of end any civilised person should wish for. But the practical dynamics of intercommunal relations make it very difficult to navigate to a more civilised end. Hence my continuing despair.

[Woodchopper]

From a transcript of an interview with Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, 22 October

Gaza is an unprecedented humanitarian crisis, which is unfolding under our watch. We have 1 million people who have moved from their home. The- Gaza City has been entirely (unintelligible)- have been flattened down. Hospitals have been hit. People near our settlements have been hit. More than 30 installation of the UN have been also hit. Thousands of people have been killed there. And as you indicated, we have 29 staff also killed among our workers. They're all teacher, doctor, gynecologists, types of social workers. And certainly we might have more people to come. What we know- so is that Gaza is under total siege. Until yesterday, absolutely nothing enter into Gaza.

[…]

What we need is a significant scaling up of a supply line into Gaza. And it needs to be sustained and it needs to be uninterrupted. Before October 7, we had up to 500 trucks entering into Gaza. And this was under a blockade, at the time already 80% of the population was dependent of international assistance.

[…]

Today I issued a statement, an alarm, because in three-four days, we will have no fuel anymore in Gaza. And what does it mean? No fuel, no water, no bakery, no running a hospital. But beyond that. That means also there will be no humanitarian operation. We need fuel to move the trucks to reach the people in need.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/philippe-l ... 023-10-22/

[Woodchopper]

Looks like the almost all of the Gaza town of Beit Hanoun has been levelled by bombing:

Drone footage: https://x.com/nournaim88/status/1715823 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Satellite: https://x.com/osinttechnical/status/171 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

This level of destruction doesn’t appear to be consistent with strikes against military targets. If so then it’s a war crime.