Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday gave one of his most direct condemnations of the civilian death toll in Gaza and said more needs to be done to “minimize harm to Palestinian civilians.”

Although Blinken commended Israel for its announcement of daily military pauses in areas of Northern Gaza and two evacuation corridors, he said that “there is more that can and should be done to minimize harm to Palestinian civilians.”

The top US diplomat has subtly shifted his messaging in the days since he departed the Middle East earlier this week to more directly voice condemnation of the civilian toll in Gaza and the US’ expectations for the Israeli government. However, he still has not condemned the Israeli government offensive and has continually voiced support for its right to defend itself.

  • mriormro@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    These statements are a bit wild to me.

    Whenever I hear this I always wonder what the “right” amount of Palestinians that should have been killed is.

    • ichbinjasokreativ@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      War is brutal. There is an acceptable amount of civilian casualties, and according to him, Israel has exceeded that number.

      • Sparlock@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Let’s tell a story… Imagine for a moment, if you will, the United States in the present day.
        Imagine a bill reaches the US House of Representatives called “America the nation state of white people”.
        In its basic principles it states “the right to exercise National self-determination in the United States is unique to white people”.
        Further down a clause for White Settlement “the state views the development of White Settlement as a national value and will act to encourage and promote its establishment and consolidation”.

        Outraged a coalition led by the Congressional Black Caucus initiates a challenge to the bill and proposes a bill of their own where it calls the United States “a country for all its citizens” but the speaker of the house unilaterally disqualifies the bill before it’s allowed to even be debated.

        The House General Counsel explains in a statement the bill includes several articles that are meant to “alter the character of the United States from the nation state of white people to a state in which there is equal status from the point of view of nationality for whites and people of color” the bill is dead.

        “America the nation state of white people” passes through both chambers of Congress unchallenged it’s then signed into law.

        US President Joe Biden would invoke the law in a tweet a year later saying “America is not a state of all its citizens according to the nation state law we passed America is the nation state of white people and not anyone else”

        As one Rights group put it “there is no Democratic constitution in the world that designates the Constitutional identity of the state on racial grounds as serving one ethnic group”.
        There is now, this disconcerting scenario is anything imaginary. It’s completely real and happened just a few years ago to little coverage and little condemnation in Israel.

  • Silverseren@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    If only the IDF had kept the civilian murders to a more reasonable number, it would have made the US look less bad.

  • ikidd@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Oh, have we gotten to the phase where the US tells Israel “We have to start making some statements to mollify the domestic uproar, but just ignore it, we’ll be sending you a few B in weapons next week.” ?

  • eestileib@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    Next we’ll be hearing about how it was just some “bad apples” in the IDF that did the genocide and after these two corporals get resigned to desk jobs everything will be ok.

    US Cops and IDF run from the same playbook.

    • DarkGamer@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      You’re not wrong.

      Military Industrial Problem: These bombs are killing too many civilians, it’s bad for PR.
      Military Industrial Solution: Here, let us sell you some GPS kits to make your bombs more accurate.

      • mlg@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Which Israel uses to accurately kill civilians.

        I mean not to sound pedantic, but it seems like such a waste even bothering with guided weapons with what they’re accomplishing. Bibi could literally save money and just uses regular old toss/dive bombing considering Gaza has zero air defense.

        It’s like how they used an aim-9x for the Chinese balloon. its so overkill.

        • DarkGamer@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          it seems like such a waste even bothering with guided weapons with what they’re accomplishing. Bibi could literally save money and just uses regular old toss/dive bombing considering Gaza has zero air defense.

          The reason they aren’t doing that is to reduce civilian casualties despite Hamas using human shields. If genocide were Israel’s goal I suspect they would be using such tactics, that they aren’t, that they are instead spending lots of money to increase accuracy and reduce collateral damage, is telling.

          • Mrkawfee@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            This human shields line. If it was true why don’t Hamas stick their hostages in every hospital?

      • Mrkawfee@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        That’s true. There are now half a million extremist settlers in the West Bank who were allowed to build homes there in violation of international law. The US did nothing even though this has made the idea of a Palestinian state effectively impossible. That was Netanyahu’s plan to create “facts on the ground”