Tuesday, August 26, 2014

#GenocideinGaza

(Ed notes: I drafted this on the train in to work this morning and had pretty much a day of end-to-end meeting hell. Although I now know that a [coughs] "long-term" ceasefire has now been agreed, I don't think it changes the sentiment of what I had written.)

The population of Gaza is some 1.8 million people, crammed in to an area of 139 square miles. Not quite Macau, or even Hong Kong (which I had thought was the most crowded 'country') but certainly quite cramped.

Over the last seven weeks, the planes, tanks, attack helicopters and infantry of the Israeli Defence Forces have, according to Hamas figures, killed some 2200 of them. Roughly 0.1%.

In contrast, the Rwandan genocide, conducted with machetes and fire, saw the slaughter of some 70%* of the Tutsi population.

What can we judge from this?

Either that there was (Ed note: I originally wrote 'is') no attempt to commit genocide in Gaza or that the IDF are simply not very good at it. In fact, very bad at it.

* 'Fact' from Wikipedia. YMMV.
 
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