More Conversations with Adversaries (Part I)
What can we say when "everyone knows" that Israel has killed 40,000 civilians?
Editor’s note: Today’s article seems to be too long for my eMail service or for Substack. So we are going to break it into two parts. You will receive Part I (this part) and if all goes according to plan, you will shortly after receive Part II. We hope you will not find today’s offering too long.
Last week I wrote about an on line conversation with a member of my own synagogue who posted that Israel is committing genocide, then seemed to admit that this wasn’t an established fact, but still insisted it was “fine” for Capital Pride to say that it is, because Palestinians need all the “solidarity” they can get.
There is another related misconception, which I have encountered several times while engaging with severe critics of Israel. That is the claim that “Israel has murdered 40,000 Palestinians”. It’s certainly not surprising that people who believe this will also believe the genocide libel. After all, 40,000 murders would mean that almost every Palestinian dying in Gaza is a civilian. The prevalence of this view among outspoken “pro-Palestine” activists may help to explain how hostile and angry they become when I challenge their position.
One of the places I’ve been sharing our articles is a in a discussion group called “Canadian Politics on Facebook”. Back in May I wrote about a conversation I had there with some very hostile interlocutors. You can read that article here:
What About Whataboutism?
We learned as I was writing this that the bodies of three Israelis taken on October 7 have been returned to Israel in a special forces operation in Gaza. I am full of admiration for the bravery and skill of the IDF fighters who completed this difficult mission.
Whenever I post in that group about the Israel Hamas war, one of those who invariably responds is someone who posts with the handle SHawn HArvey. Not sure what the odd capitalization means, but Mr. HArvey is always quick to comment on our posts. On August 19 I shared Brian Henry’s article, “Another Day, Another Arson”, which depicted the wave of antisemitic attacks against Canadian Jews since the beginning of the war. The conversation that unfolded as a result is the main subject of this article. It provides a useful example of how impervious extremist critics of Israel are, to facts and arguments that undermine their position.
Talking Casualties with Someone Who Knows Israel is in the Wrong
In the comment, I mentioned the Capital Pride statement which we have covered in several recent articles. HArvey responded to that part of the post.
They were right about Gaza.
Israel is trying to whitewash their genocide by saying they are nicer to gay people.....
This is the oft repeated “pinkwashing” argument, which is indeed cited in the Pride statement. The pinkwashing argument has been justly and frequently ridiculed, but I began by refuting the specific claim in this SHawn HArvey post.
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
nice is not the issue. Israel is a place where gay people are not murdered for being who they are, unlike Gaza.
Saying that is simply the truth. It doesn't whitewash anything else except in the fevered imaginations of people scandalized by Israel's use of force in its own defense.
Jews who shoot back are triggering for some folks.
Harvey responded to this with the laugh emoji and replied:
Responding to David Roytenberg:
Israel is murdering gay people in Gaza as we speak.
They're murdering everyone.
Children as well.
I think you missed the point.
This canard is widely repeated by “pro-Palestine” commentators and demonstrators. It seeks to depict IDF action in Gaza as criminal. They want us to believe Israel isn’t fighting an enemy in Gaza. They claim Israel is murdering people in Gaza, which makes the entire operation a crime, not a war.
I answered:
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
Israel isn’t murdering anyone in Gaza. Israel is fighting a just war of self-defense in Gaza.
The reason you believe otherwise is that you are getting your information from the war criminals who started the war.
Israel just agreed (again) to a ceasefire deal being promoted by Qatar, the US, and Egypt. But the war criminals in Gaza don’t want a ceasefire.
So the fighting will continue. And idiots in Canada who rely on the war criminals for news will continue yelling that Israel is murdering Palestinians.
It’s you who missed the point.
In response SHawn HArvey marked my post with the “wow” emoji and wrote this:
Responding to David Roytenberg:
wow....do you ever live in denial bud.
40,000 dead.....almost all civilians.
Half children.
Disgusting.
This brings us to the main topic of this article. SHawn HArvey believes that almost everyone killed on the Palestinian side is a civilian. He also believes that 40,000 have died which is the number reported dozens of times daily by news services all over the world. If they are honest, those news services will mention that this number is “according to the Gaza Ministry of Health”, and if they are exceptionally honest they will acknowledge that the the Gaza Ministry of Health is controlled by Hamas.
Note that this reaction takes for granted that what I wrote is false. It is a visceral argument against me for daring to make the claim. My argument is not just wrong. It is disgusting.
Nevertheless, SHawn HArvey is not at all unusual in treating the number emitted by Hamas as the truth. I tried to point this out to him.
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
like I said your information is only as good as your source.
17000 enemy combatants have been killed according to the IDF..
25,000 of the dead have been identified according to the UN.
The other 15,000 are based on unverified reports from the war criminals who started the war.
So 25,000 confirmed dead, the majority of them combatants.
Different picture, right? War, not murder. Still terrible, but much better than the campaign that defeated the Tamil Tigers, in Sri Lanka. Which the UN Human Rights Council said was a legal war against a criminal terrorist organization.
Are you sure Hamas is telling the truth and Israel is lying? Maybe you are on the wrong side of this issue.
I should mention that I have since searched for the UN Human Rights Council report which I mentioned in this post and I think I had it wrong. It was actually a 2008 resolution of the UN Security Council that stated that the Sri Lankan government had the right and responsibility to fight terrorism and that the high civilian death toll was attributable to the Tamil Tigers’ use of civilians as human shields.
In response to the numbers I laid out to refute the claim that most of the dead in Gaza are civilians HArvey then made a very strange claim.
Responding to David Roytenberg:
The June 19 UN report confirmed
37 396 dead in Gaza.
They recently gave an estimate that dead had surpassed 40,000.
Given the population demographics of Gaza, it is statistically impossible (my emphasis Ed.) that 17,000 were combatants.
Israel is lying.
Of course they are, they are committing genocide.
The UN report he is referring to is from the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). We noted in an earlier article that in May OCHA quietly cut the number of confirmed deaths of women and children in half, which confirmed suspicions that the HAMAS numbers they were disseminating are fabricated. For reasons best explained by them, OCHA didn’t reduce the headline number of deaths (around 38,000 at the time), instead moving the 5,000 women and 8,000 children previously reported as killed to another category of deaths “not yet identified”, which they still included in the total. By excluding the numbers that had been removed from the previous total of women and children, I calculated the approximately 25,000 confirmed dead which I mentioned in the post above.
I replied:
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
statistically impossible? I’m genuinely interested in hearing what makes you believe that.
and he wrote:
Responding to David Roytenberg:
Look, unless you believe most women and children are hamas fighters, there's no way 42% of the dead are combatants.
That's Israeli propaganda.
I answered:
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
so you say. But you haven’t explained why you think so.
Israel has been fighting on the ground in Gaza for ten months. They have encountered fierce resistance. Hundreds of Israelis have died in combat.
When Israelis fight they shoot back at the people who attack them. Presumably most of those people are men. A good number may be “children” if you define anyone up to 20 as a child, as Hamas apparently does. But if a “child” is shooting at you it is not murder when you shoot back.
In spite of what you think, Israel isn’t killing people at random. So your argument makes no sense unless you assume the thing you are trying to prove. Which would be unsound.
So I suggest you examine what you believe and ask yourself how you know it to be true.
I point out that he seems to be engaging in circular reasoning. Israel is committing genocide. Therefore Israel is lying about the number of combatants. Which is how we know Israel is committing genocide.
He wrote:
Responding to David Roytenberg
demographics.
The Israeli numbers don't add up
This argument doesn’t seem to make sense. There is something he is leaving out. I think that something is the “fact” (already refuted) that 70% of the dead are women and children, but he doesn’t actually say that. He just insists that Israel’s numbers can’t be true.
I tried to get at this point with three posts to which the only reply was the “laugh” emoji.
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
I’ve shown you my numbers. Which ones are wrong and how do you know they are wrong?
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
i don’t understand what you mean. We know there are over two million people in Gaza. There are certainly 17000 men of fighting age.
Before the war, Hamas was estimated to have 30,000 to 40,000 trained fighters.
So how is it demographically impossible that 17,000 combatants have been killed? Serious question.
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
while you seem to have no further reply other than the laugh emoji, I linked an earlier article we published on the demographics of the reported deaths in Gaza for the information of anyone who is interested.
His response was:
Responding to David Roytenberg:
yes, you keep sharing IDF propaganda.....
So he makes no further effort to grapple with the numbers or the argument. Instead he disparages what I wrote as IDF propaganda.
I tried again:
Responding to: SHawn HArvey
we shared UN numbers actually. But you would know that if you had actually read the article.
“While more than 9,500 women and 14,500 children were reported among the fatalities by the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on May 6, two days later that number was revised significantly downward. Today, under 5,000 women and 8,000 children are now officially listed by the UN as casualties.”
This solves your demographic problem. Hamas publishes daily casualty numbers. Whatever number they published, they claimed every day that 70% of the dead were women and children. The uniformity of this ratio already made the numbers look suspicious.
Then in May the UN cut the cumulative number of women and children in half. So since May we have known that all the numbers published up to then by the Gaza ministry of health were false. The numbers of women and children among the casualties are 35%, not 70%. This is the UN saying this, not the IDF.
So 17,000 combatants out of 40,000 dead is perfectly plausible. But to know that you would have to read sources that aren’t getting all their information from Hamas.
In response to this, SHawn HArvey completely misrepresents what I’ve written and then dismisses the argument, presumably because I’m a horrible person.
Responding to: David Roytenberg
so 8,000 murdered children is OK then...?
Whatever dude.
I replied accordingly:
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
i never said that. But if course you know that. 8000 dead children is a catastrophe.
We were talking about your claim that it is demographically impossible that Israel killed 17,000 combatants.
Do you understand now that you are mistaken about that?
After which, he ignores my point. He pretends that my introductory statement that 8,000 dead children is a catastrophe, is a claim to have said it earlier. He triumphantly refutes this thing that I didn’t say. And repeats his unsupported claim that I have just offered evidence to refute.
Responding to David Roytenberg:
no....you never did say it was a catastrophe...
I did.
And it's a lot higher than that.
I doggedly persist in trying to have a coherent conversation:
No answer but
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
so the UN is lying too, according to you?
How do you convince yourself of that?
He answers by referencing a Reuters article:
Responding to David Roytenberg:
no.....I don't believe you.
This is August 15 from Reuters.....
Image: Screen capture posted to Facebook by SHawn HArvey
This gives us something to work with. I use his own evidence to bolster the argument I’ve been making throughout our exchange:
Responding to SHawn HArvey:
right. Reuters tells us that Palestinian Health Authorities (the Gaza Health ministry which is controlled by Hamas) report that 40,000 people have been killed, mostly civilians.
As I've said all along, if you believe Hamas (the perpetrators of the October 7 atrocities in Israel who are continuing the international crime of hostage taking) Israel is definitely committing genocide. But why would you believe Hamas? They are the criminals who murdered 1200 Israelis and started the war. The destruction they perpetrated in Israeli villages amounts to genocide if you read the statute. And Hamas has made it clear that genocide of Israelis is their goal.
Israel reports that 17,000 enemy combatants have been killed in Gaza, which makes sense to me given that Israelis have been fighting there for ten months. You say that you don't believe that because Israel is committing genocide. But how do you know that? Hamas is telling you that. The question is why do you believe Hamas war criminals who committed genocide themselves when they accuse Israel of genocide?
Does it really make sense that thousands of Israeli troops have deployed to Gaza for months at a time and only killed civilians? And if they are only attacking civilians, how did over 300 Israelis die in combat?
To which our expert on the death toll in Gaza offered no reaction at all.