Reply #37: They cover Israels responses to terrorism

[FarrenH]

including a prohibition on collective punishment, which is what you are endorsing. It doesn't matter what tactics the opposition is using, the conventions are unambiguous about these provisions. The tactics of the enemy make no difference.

Furthermore, the assertion that breaking the conventions Israel itself ratified (via collective punishment and disproportionate use of force) is the only rational response to the tactics of Hamas, is not an assertion either the drafters of the Geneva Convention or its signers agree with.

Neither is it an assertion that most reasonable people would accept. The UK, Sri Lanka and others have managed to not violate the conventions in a similar manner in decades long battles with opponents who used guerrilla tactics among a civilian population. We have historical evidence that disproportionate force and collective punishment are NOT required to end or even contain a guerrilla force. The absolute necessity of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity to secure Israel's civilian population is just baldly stated as a fact all the time by Israel's apologists when it simply is not. Its a bullshit claim.