So pleased to see hostages being released.

bmacca

I’m not trying to wriggle out of anything I said. All the reports are “allegations”, that is the definition until a court of law makes a determination.
The point I was making, which you seem to have wilfully missed, is that whatever allegations are made does not mean we should shut up about what is being inflicted on Palestinians

No, you needn’t shut up but nobody asked you to do that.
What you do seem to be doing is questioning if rapes took place, there is reliable evidence that very many rapes took place including gang raping, sexual mutilations and other atrocities wilfully inflicted.

Callistemon21

foxie48

bmacca IMO there are two sets of bad guys here, Hamas and the Netanyahu Govt. What some seem to find difficult to accept is that it is possible to be highly critical of both but supportive of the Palestinian and the Israeli people.

I agree.

And, just to point out, bmacca, there is a difference between what could be described as sexual assault, which could mean inappropriate touching, and what the Israeli women endured at the hands of the Hamas terrorists.

Thanks foxie - it’s sad that it keeps having to be re-stated

bmacca- your suggestion that you know what most posters will say, then suggesting most don’t care about the death of Palestinian children is wrong and offensive.

I’m not the only poster who understands the legal definition of rape.

We need to stop polarising any discussion on this growing tragedy/war. Misquoting, misrepresenting others is central to the ability to have discussions about how peace can be achirved

Has anyone said we should shut up about what is being inflicted on Palestinians or anyone in Gaza for that matter. I have not read that.

Like many I’m appalled at the loss of life, injury and suffering of all, both Palestinians and Israelis.

foxie48 totally agree.

Antonio Guterres has invoked article 19
"On Wednesday, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres wrote a letter to members of the Security Council, invoking a UN article not used in decades and urging them to help avert a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza." BBC website.

When the security council voted on asking for a Ceasefire last month, the US voted against and the UK and Russia abstained, all the other members voted for it. If there is another vote I wonder if the US and the UK will change their positions. I doubt Russia will.

Russia changed it's vote leaving the UK as the only country to abstain and the US as the only country to veto. I am truly ashamed to be British. At what point does too many deaths and too much suffering become enough? The UK is out of step with the rest of the world.

We still seem to be the USA ‘s poodle. It’s truly pathetic.

Oh the irony! Russia supports a ceasefire. Perhaps they should be looking a little closer to home. Russia makes me sick, not for supporting a ceasefire in Israel, but because it’s guilty of horrific war crimes itself, including invading a sovereign country and waging war with no provocation at all, killing of civilians by bombing and shooting, murdering of civilians in occupied areas by taking them out and shooting them, multiple rapes, and deliberately targeting hospitals and schools.
Please do not speak of Russia in this discussion. It has nothing to do with Israel and Putin is wanted in The Hague for war crimes!

When it's about a UN security council vote it is totally appropriate to say who voted which way. I certainly have no wish to support Russia but I couldn't help noticing that some of the vile actions of Russia in Ukraine might be said to describe the actions of Israel in Gaza and The West Bank. ie how many Gazans have been bombed and killed who are innocent of any crime other than to be living in Gaza? How many Palestinians living legally in the West Bank have been attacked and killed by Israeli settlers with the IDF supporting them? How many Palestinians are held in prisons without charge? How many hospitals and schools have been bombed in Gaza? Is it not true that Israel has invaded both Gaza and The West Bank which did not belong to Israel in the 1967 war and in now waging war against Hamas is killing thousands of women and children? None of this excuses the oct 7th actions of Hamas or Russia for that matter but IMO the UK shows a lack of moral backbone by abstaining because the resolution did not condemn the actions of Hamas sufficiently. At least the US puts it's mouth where it's put it's money ie billions of dollars in military support to Israel, the UK is just weak and most certainly doesn't speak for me. This war needs to stop.

1400 Israelis were tortured and murdered by Hamas on 7/10 which is the event which started off this continuing harrowing situation in Gaza.
Remind me if I’m wrong, but the Ukrainians did nothing before Russia invaded it’s sovereign land. Russia shouldn’t even be on the UN! Considering it’s President is wanted for war crimes, no one can ever use Russia in their justification for anything.
The UK may not speak for you, but Russia certainly doesn’t speak for me!

MaddyOne I agree that Russia has no moral high ground but as one of the thirteen permanent members of the security council it's position is important as it has a veto just like every other permanent member. The resolution was brought by UEA (supported by 97 other countries) the UEA was one of the four countries that was prepared to sign the Abraham Accords Peace Treaty with Israel. This could have been instrumental in bringing a lasting peace to the Middle East. This is now completely blown to bits, literally! Yet another reason why this incursion is so damaging not only to Gazans but also to the ordinary Israeli but it is of note that the right wingers that Netanyahu brought into his govt, do not want a two state solution as they are extremists and want the Palestinians out of what they regard historically should be part of Israel.

maddyone

1400 Israelis were tortured and murdered by Hamas on 7/10 which is the event which started off this continuing harrowing situation in Gaza.
Remind me if I’m wrong, but the Ukrainians did nothing before Russia invaded it’s sovereign land. Russia shouldn’t even be on the UN! Considering it’s President is wanted for war crimes, no one can ever use Russia in their justification for anything.
The UK may not speak for you, but Russia certainly doesn’t speak for me!

The history of the Crimea is as chequered as that of Palestine however I think I am correct in my assertion there are those who will see Israel's incursion into Gaza and what is happening there as abhorrent as Russia's actions in Ukraine. The difference is of course is that the Gazans have nothing to defend themselves with and are not being supported by the US. For the record
I am totally against the Russian invasion of Ukraine please don't try to polarise these issues.

foxie we agree we both want a permanent peace in Israel. I imagine that’s what everyone wants. However, whatever the position of Russia in the UN, it’s my contention that Russia shouldn’t even be there and we cannot use whatever it says about Israel as justification for anything given it’s illegal and brutal war in Ukraine. It has not a leg stand on in it’s position on anywhere and anything in the world. I don’t really understand why, given the situation in Ukraine, Russia has been allowed to continue in the UN but there again, there are a considerable number of other countries which run vile and corrupt regimes and are welcomed into the UN. Sadly the UN has run its course because it has little moral backbone today. It has been corrupted by the inclusion of countries which have no place in the UN.
Russia is one such country. I can place no value in anything that Russia says as long as it continues its vile war in Ukraine.

I watched a video of a family in Gaza leaving their home. Other people spoke, for some this was the third or fourth time they had been forced to leave. Generation after generation moved on. There is a carol we sang
There isn't any room
And you can't stay here,
There isn't any room for strangers.
The wind may be chill
And the night may be cold,
And be full of nasty noises-in-the-dark
And dangers.
But there isn't any room,
There isn't any room,
There isn't any room for strangers.

The UK and USA have not only let down the Palestinians, they have supplied the fire power and stood and watched whilst they were slaughtered

It’s worth bearing in mind that the pause in fighting would have continued had Hamas not broken the deal by refusing to release the Israeli hostages on one day’s list. It was said that they were worried that the hostages would have revealed how badly they were treated.

It goes without saying that any civilian deaths, especially that of young children is dreadful but civilian casualties happen in every war. In an attempt to help minimise that, Israel, right from the start, has advised citizens to move out of areas it planned to target.

No such consideration was given to the poor innocent festival goers who were so brutally murdered back in October, or the villagers who suffered such appalling brutality at the hands of the Palestinian monsters that the full extent of what those poor souls went through has never been revealed.

No wonder Israel is determined to destroy the murderous regime which committed these atrocities.

bmacca

From the reports I’ve read, sexual assault would cover all instances being reported, as not all were reports of rape.

This is a police definition- The overall definition of sexual or indecent assault is an act of physical, psychological and emotional violation in the form of a sexual act, inflicted on someone without their consent. It can involve forcing or manipulating someone to witness or participate in any sexual acts.
The legal definition of rape is when a person intentionally penetrates another's vagina, anus or mouth with a penis, without the other person's consent.

The fact that you feel the need to post a definition of what rape is/isn’t to a bunch of mainly women is disgraceful. Shame on you.

I have posted before that the UN is as much use as a chocolate teapot.

Russia is waging what many consider to be an illegal war and is guilty of war crimes, yet it is able to vote on other conflict situations
Afghanistan has appalling human rights violations where women and girls are concerned, yet Afghanistan is joint chair of the UN committee on the women’s humans rights.

Just two examples of the hypocrisy of the UN

Sky had an interesting and verified article on the tunnels under Gaza along with the history and the new recently built lower ones posted on several social media platforms this morning (sorry I am on my iPhone and it is link averse)

Totally agree with you GrannyGravy about the UN.
Originally it was a noble institution, now a corrupt waste of space.

I think that it's shameful that the UK abstained. It's clear to anyone what's happening in Gaza yet the government do not have the wherewithal to call for a halt. I do despair.

Cadenza123

I think that it's shameful that the UK abstained. It's clear to anyone what's happening in Gaza yet the government do not have the wherewithal to call for a halt. I do despair.

I listened to the lady from the U.K.

She reiterated that the U.K. would vote for a ceasefire in order to allow aid into Gaza and the release of the remaining Israeli hostages.

She also said that the U.K. couldn’t vote for any motion which did not include condemnation of the Hamas Terrorists and their actions of 7/10.

All the UN has to do is include the above, but we all now with Afghanistan and other terrorist governed countries/states that will never happen.

*now should be know

In the interests of fairness, the US gave over $20billion to train and equip resistance groups to Afghanistan resistance groups aka the Mujahideen so they could successfully beat the Russians.This led eventually to the Taliban being in control. There are five permanent members of the security council, China, France, UK, US and Russia, by all means prove me wrong but they all have blood on their hands.

ignore the repetition!

If Hamas released every single hostage, unharmed, that would go a long way towards another pause in fighting to allow more aid to reach Gaza.

The ball is in their court.

I fully support the US and us in blocking the cease fire until these poor hostages are freed.

From The Independent, the article begins as follows:

“A badly burned toddler screaming for the mother he doesn’t know is dead — and screaming because doctors do not have enough painkillers to relieve his suffering. An eight-year-old boy whose brain is exposed as bombing damaged parts of his skull. A teenage girl, her eye surgically removed, because every bone in her face is smashed. A three-year-old double amputee, whose severed limbs are laid out in a pink box beside him.

“And in the background is the stench of rotting flesh as maggots ‘creep out of untreated wounds’.”

These horrors are all caused by a genocidal onslaught that is being backed to the hilt by the US government, who just blocked a UN resolution demanding a ceasefire to end this nightmare, with the UK abstaining. And you think this is right…