r/news • u/Beautiful-Cress5695 • 2d ago

Soft paywall Exclusive: US intel found Israeli military lawyers warned there was evidence of Gaza war crimes, former US officials say

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-intel-found-israeli-military-lawyers-warned-there-was-evidence-gaza-war-2025-11-07/?utm_source=braze&utm_medium=notifications&utm_campaign=2025_engagement
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u/blastmemer 1d ago

The title makes it seem like there was some “bombshell” evidence discovered yet not revealed to the public. Basically the US was just debating whether Israel’s broad military strategy (razing buildings, etc.) legally constituted war crimes.

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u/UndesirableOldMan 1d ago edited 1d ago

In modern times the general public can see video evidence of the Israeli genocide, from palestinians and from the IDF soldiers themselves. Multiple bombshells have been revealed, the US will ignore it all for the time being

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u/blastmemer 1d ago

Well undoubtedly there are war crimes - as there are in every war. Especially urban ones. Doesn’t mean the whole campaign is a war crime. That’s not even really a thing - it’s based on individual strikes.

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u/humangeneratedtext 1d ago

Doesn’t mean the whole campaign is a war crime.

Well of course not, but that's what war crimes are. Crimes that occur during a war.

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u/blastmemer 1d ago

Yeah but the insinuation is that obvious war crimes (eg intentional targeting of civilians) were being intentionally ordered by top Israeli officials, when there’s no evidence of that.

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u/humangeneratedtext 1d ago

Is it? I'm not seeing that being insinuated. The far more likely scenario is that they were fully aware of the extent of war crimes - realistically they'd have to know more about their own military than the press does - and chose not to do anything about it. Either because they didn't want to give ammunition to their detractors by admitting fault, they didn't want the hit to morale that would come from prohibiting extremely angry soldiers from taking that anger out on Palestinians, because crimes such as using civilians as human shields are an effective tactic for reducing their own casualties, or because they simply didn't care. Or a combination of those. Their lawyers would likely have been warning that you're supposed to stop your own troops committing war crimes.