Israel-Palestine Mega Fact Check!

Some argue that it qualified as a genocide, and some argue that it doesn’t. The debate centers on whether Israel intended to commit a genocide, and whether that intent was carried out—as opposed to civilians being killed purely as collateral damage to the war on Hamas.

Regardless, like Norman Finkelstein I believe that Israel’s primary goal has not been to kill the maximum number of Palestinians, which would have led to a much higher death toll, since Israeli leaders know very well that this would lead to an unfathomable amount of political fallout.

Rather, the main goal appears to have been to destroy the maximum amount of civilian infrastructure—which some people call a domicide. Israel has justified this undertaking by attempting to link most of the civilian infrastructure to Hamas militants, whether this was accurate or not. Unlike destroying Hamas or retrieving the hostages, this is a goal which Israel has essentially achieved, including damaging or destroying roughly 92% of civilian homes. Was there a Hamas base, or weapons cache, or tunnel hatch in each and every one of these 300,000 housing units? Most schools, hospitals and universities have also been damaged or destroyed, along with over 80% of commercial buildings and 68% of the road network.

As Col. Yogev Bar-Sheshet announced a few weeks after the attack on Gaza began: “Whoever returns here, if they return here after, will find scorched earth. No houses, no agriculture, no nothing. They have no future.”