joel rayner

I have watched the whole interview. The first thing that strikes me is that you say that 'you have visited Israel 5 times, 4 times embedded with the IDF and that you've interviewed the Prime Minister, Defence Minister etc..' So, let me note for the record that you have received one-sided information. Apparently you haven't gone to Gaza to talk to military commanders there, not even human rights organizations or one of the more than 100 aid organizations operating there. Your sole and exclusive sources are Israeli. Furthermore, you quote Natasha Hausdorff for the legal aspects of the matter. Natascha Hausdorff takes positions about territorial rights in this conflicts, which are so baseless that NO Israeli Government has even been willing to adopt them in ANY legal arena over the years. Then you say 'It is wrong to frame the acts of Hamas as insurgency. It is war'. How do you reconcile that with the fact that Gaza has been under occupation, declared illegal by the ICJ, for almost 6 decades? That is has also been under an illegal siege for 20 years now? You say 'you can't find any situation where the enemy defender has prepared the ground for 20 years for that battle.' Again, Gaza has been occupied since 1967 and it was subjected to a blockade and started to be subjected to regular bombardments by Israel 20 years ago. You say that 'how Hamas prepared Gaza for war is unique'. Isn't the combination of the longest occupation in modern history, the suffocating, illegal blockade and the regular bombardments by Israel also unique? Then you say that 'the tunnels have been built for the sole purpose of using civilians as human shields'. - Gaza is illegally occupied; - People under occupation have a right to armed resistance; - Tunnels are legitimate tools in that battle; - Israel has nuclear weapons and 2,000 lb bombs donated by the US but Hamas can't have TUNNELS? - Until 7 October tunnels have NEVER been used for terror purposes, so calling them terror tunnels was plain deception; - There is no rule per se in international law forbidding Hamas to build these tunnels, let alone that this tunnel building can be regarded as 'human shielding'. - Even if tunnels can legally be considered to have been dug too closely to civilian infrastructure, this would still NOT be human shielding. Then you say that 'Hamas wants its population to be killed'. If Hamas wants that, why is Hamas historically much more reliable in adhering to ceasefires than Israel? The fact that there currently IS a battle going on has to do with ISRAEL breaching a ceasefire it had agreed upon under auspices of the US. 'A concise summary of Israel’s violations of its Jan 2025 ceasefire deal.' xitter.gq/_ZachFoster/status/190… If Hamas wants its civilians to die, why has Hamas proposed a 10 years and 30 years ceasefire, both rejected by Israel? Why did Hamas make an explicit proposal to Israel not to target each other's civilians anymore, which Israel rejected? Besides, as far as I know, Hamas does not have a concept called 'the Hannibal Directive', which Israel does. Israel has NEVER been able to prove ONE case of human shielding by Hamas, the human shielding argument was even (implicitly) rejected by the ICJ. Then you say that 'there has never been a war where the civilian population is forced to stay in the main combat areas', followed by complaints about Egypt's refusal to allow refugees into its territory. It's Israel that historically has had a policy of not allowing civilians to flee. ‘Gaza: “The only conflict in the world in which people are not even allowed to flee” - High Commissioner Guterres.’ unhcr.org/news/briefing/2009… I also like to quote Amnesty International on this matter; 'As conditions quickly became unfit for human life, the Israeli authorities could have allowed civilians displaced from the area north of Wadi Gaza to return to their homes. They could have made arrangements to allow the temporary relocation of Palestinian civilians from Gaza to other parts of the OPT, that is, the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. They could have also allowed civilians to enter Israel, especially since some 70% of Gaza’s population are refugees or descendants of refugees displaced during the Nakba and, as such, are entitled under international law to return, if they so wish, to lands in Israel from which they or their ancestors were displaced.' amnesty.org.uk/genocide-repo… Israel, as occupier, has the obligation to protect the safety of the civilians in that territory. Egypt has no obligation to clean up Israel’s mess. It is also not true, as you say, that Israel is subject to other standards than the rest of the world. Israel is judged according to the laws by which it, and everybody else, is bound. You try to portray Israel as victim because people demand a plan from them after defeating Hamas. Even if they do so, people are still being MILD towards Israel. Because, if we really held Israel to the same standards as others (so I agree with you that Israel is held to different standards but only to its benefit), we would only ask one thing from Israel; to pack its bags and STOP occupying Gaza. Then you question the numbers of the ‘Hamas Ministry of Health’ again. Even Israel’s own intelligence has confirmed the accuracy of the numbers, organisations such as the Lancet and Doctors without Borders and the UN etc. as well. ‘The (Gaza) Ministry's figures have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN and the WHO.’ thelancet.com/journals/lance… You mock people who claim the real death toll may be higher, but prominent sources, including the same Lancet, make the same claim, so stop mocking, John. Your remark about the civilian to combatant ratio and that that is ‘not the way the law works’ is deceptive at least. Proportionality is an important legal principle after all. Israel has been found to accept ratios of 15/20 to 1 to even 50 to 1. IDF members have confirmed this. This is illegal, John. Then your remark about people having ‘BDS’, Bibi Derangement Syndrome. It attests to your lack of impartiality that you think that Israel would NOT forbid Palestinians who have fled to Egypt, to return to Gaza. Israel has a long history of expelling Palestinians and refusing them the right to return. In 1948 and 1967 Israel expelled more than one million Palestinians and NEVER allowed them return. Gaza’s population consists for 74% of refugees. (Netanyahu and) Netanyahu’s Government members have repeatedly advocated for ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza. And nothing says naivety, stupidity or both more than referencing Israel’s Minister of Strategic Affairs who suggests to ‘pass a UN Security Council Resolution, based on which the Palestinians can come back’. After the 1948 war, in which Israel expelled 750,000 people, a similar Resolution was issued, saying that Israel had to allow all these people return. Did Israel comply? The idea that a serial UN Resolution violator like Israel would comply is too absurd to imagine. You also say; ‘If somebody is so adamant that Israel just wants to eradicate people, you don’t listen to the words of, actually, Israeli leaders.’ SERIOUSLY? Even Israel’s judge in the International Court of Justice voted in favor of a decision to indicate measures to prevent Israeli leaders from making genocidal statements. And that was AT THE BEGINNING OF LAST YEAR. Any idea what horrible things have been said by Israeli leaders afterwards? We have the receipts. zionism.observer/ Then you say that ‘Hamas started a war’. How can you say that when it’s Israel that has occupied their lands for decades? People under occupation have a right to armed resistance. People living in an illegal open-air prison have a right to break out of the prison. How can you say that ‘Hamas started a war’ when it’s Israel that has subjected Gaza to an illegal blockade for 2 decades? Aren’t Israel supporters always the ones saying that Israel had the right to attack Egypt in 1967 cause the blockade of the Straits of Tiran was an act of war? Well, what about the much more brutal and harmful blockade of Gaza? There was no ceasefire on 6 October 2023. Before that day, Israel had, in 2023 alone, already killed more than 200 Palestinians. So, it’s absurd to claim that Hamas started a war. Your claim that Trump did not intend to ethnically cleanse Gazans is also too ludicrous to be true. I don’t like quoting AI but let me make an exception here. Chat GPT; ‘Short answer: based on his own statements in February 2025, there’s strong evidence that Trump proposed permanently removing (resettling) Palestinians from Gaza—something major human-rights groups explicitly labeled “ethnic cleansing.”‘. Your comparison with a similar attack as 7 October on the United States is flawed because the United States does not occupy any of its neighbouring countries, locking people up in an open-air concentration camp. Then you start complaining about Hamas rockets. Again, people under occupation have a right to armed resistance. You don’t like rockets? Stop the occupation. Then you say; ‘I challenge anybody to prove me wrong that Israel has done more to protect civilians as in the measures that any military has ever created in history’. It’s very easy to prove you wrong. We just have to quote the majority of reputable genocide experts who claim that Israel commits genocide. Then there is this; ‘ "according to two of the sources, the army also decided during the first weeks of the war that, for every junior Hamas operative that Lavender marked, it was permissible to kill up to 15 or 20 civilians (...) the army on several occasions authorized the killing of more than 100 civilians in the assassination of a single commander." ’ 972mag.com/lavender-ai-israe… Israel accepts a civilian to combatant ratio of 100 to 1 and you have the chutzpah to claim that it has ‘done more to protect civilians as in the measures that any military has ever created in history’? Then you accuse Piers Morgan of lying, cause he said that 20,000 children had been killed in Gaza. What is it you don’t understand about Israel’s intelligence considering Gaza’s death figures reliable? Then you say that ‘the Hamas Gaza Health Ministry numbers have been shown to be methodologically, and statistically, even datacentrically wrong’. Many people agree with you; the actual death toll is probably (much) higher ... ‘ “10% of Gaza’s population has effectively been wiped out” Says Dr. Nick Maynard, noting that the true death toll is far higher than commonly reported. The Israelis aren't wrong, the figures from the Ministry are inaccurate. The figures are much worse.’ xitter.gq/DmodosCutter/status/19… Then you accuse Hamas of deploying child soldiers. There is no shred of proof. Absolutely zero. If Israel claims the opposite, the onus is on Israel to prove so. From what I know, more than 20 years ago Hamas already abandoned the use of child soldiers. Read this; ‘During 2002, Hamas disavowed the use of children. In April 2002 Hamas called on mosque imams to give this issue some mention in their sermons.’ hrw.org/reports/2004/childso… Then you say ‘Majority women, majority children. False. False.’ There is an abundance of credible sources saying the exact same thing; that the majority of the deaths are women and children. Here is an example; ‘Even if the war hasn't yet crossed 100,000 dead, it's very close. According to the survey's data, 56% of those killed have been children up to 18, or women. That's an exceptional figure when compared with almost every other conflict since World War II.’ haaretz.com/israel-news/2025… or archive.ph/QN4vb#selection-7… Some even have said the percentage is 70%. ‘Around 70% of deaths in Gaza are women and children.‘ edition.cnn.com/2024/11/09/m… Then you claim that, since 20% of rockets fired by Hamas land in Gaza, ‘Hamas wants to kill Gazans’. This is a textbook non sequitur fallacy. Do you also think that, just because in some instances the IDF killed its own people in friendly fires (the IDF even killed Israeli hostages holding white flags by mistake), the IDF actually wants ALL their people to die? Does the term ‘Hannibal Directive’ ring a bell to you? You claim that ‘there is not a single case that Israel targeted civilians’. You say that the answer to the question if Israel follows the laws of war and distinction, necessity, proportionality is ‘overwhelming yes’. First, with respect to the claim ‘that Israel does not target civilians’; not only DOES it target them, it buries them, them being children, alive. ‘Dr Mark Perlmutter describes how children were buried alive while screaming, by Israeli bulldozers. @mperlmuttermd‘ xitter.gq/xIsraelExposedx/status… But there is more. ‘ "We have documented that 1,857 Palestinians were killed while seeking food... most of these killings appear to have been committed by the Israeli military" UN human rights office spokesperson.’ xitter.gq/SaulStaniforth/status/… Then there is this. ‘We gathered accounts of 160 cases of children shot. In 95 cases the child had been shot in the head or chest. In 59 of those 57 were shot by the IDF fleeing battle zones, but many others while playing in humanitarian zones and some in evacuation corridors' bbc.com/news/videos/cjelp738… Then there is this; ‘I’ve seen violence and worked in conflict zones. But of the many things that stood out about working in a hospital in Gaza, one got to me: Nearly every day I was there, I saw a new young child who had been shot in the head or the chest, virtually all of whom went on to die. Thirteen in total.’ nytimes.com/interactive/2024… Then there is this; ‘British surgeon Nick Maynard: 'The clustering was far far too obvious to be coincidental. And it seemed to us like this was almost like a game of target practice: ‘We're going to shoot the head today. Tomorrow, it'll be the chest. The next day, it'll be the testicles." ‘ xitter.gq/medialens/status/19486… Then there is this; ‘Two respected former Israeli Air Force pilots; 'Israel has continued relentless strikes on Gaza. Entire buildings with children, women and civilians are bombed. Even if some targets are legitimate, the disproportionate harm to civilians cannot be denied.'’ nytimes.com/2025/06/10/opini… Then there is this; ‘11.28, IDF commander; ‘Everyone you encounter is an enemy. Identify a figure, open fire, eliminate, move forward.’ ‘ bbc.com/news/videos/cjelp738… Ex Israeli PM Ehud Olmert; ‘What we are doing in Gaza is a war of devastation: indiscriminate, limitless, cruel and criminal killing of civilians. It’s the result of government policy – knowingly, evilly, maliciously, irresponsibly dictated‘ xitter.gq/normfinkelstein/status… Then there is this. ‘To those still sceptical that Israel is committing war crimes: Will you believe it when it comes from a literal IDF officer saying "yes we murder civilians and then pretend they were terrorists"? If not then, then what amount of evidence will suffice?’ xitter.gq/NathanJRobinson/status… Remember Hind Rajab? ‘355 bullets. If you’re still supporting this, supporting the killing of kids in Gaza, you’re a sociopath. No other word for it.’ xitter.gq/mehdirhasan/status/180… I can go on like this forever. I have many more links I can share. Next thing you do is complain that Hamas doesn’t distinguish itself enough from civilians. Although no rule in international law obliges Hamas to wear uniforms, one has to ask himself how relevant this is when Israel usually doesn’t target Hamas members while they are in combat. They prefer to target them in their homes. ‘Moreover, the Israeli army "systematically attacked the targeted individuals while they were in their homes — usually at night while their whole families were present — rather than during the course of military activity". In fact Israel developed another automated system called “Where’s Daddy?” used "specifically to track the targeted individuals and carry out bombings when they had entered their family’s residences".’ 972mag.com/lavender-ai-israe… ‘ “Israel actually prefers to target militants when they are among civilians in their houses with their families.” xitter.gq/MiddleEastEye/status/1… Then the accusation ‘that Hamas doesn’t allow civilians to use the tunnels.’ The tunnels are military infrastructure. If Hamas would let the civilians use this infrastructure THAT would be using them as human shields. You expect not only Egypt but also Hamas, to do what Israel has to do; provide shelter for innocent civilians. If Hamas allowed civilians to hide in the tunnels, Israel would bomb the tunnels regardless. It has no respect for Palestinian civilian life. And even if it could be argued that Hamas has to allow civilians in the tunnels, that doesn’t change the fact that IT IS ISRAEL THAT CONSTANTLY PULLS THE TRIGGER. And it is ISRAEL’S CRUEL POLICIES that create the necessity for safe spaces for civilians in the first place. A civilian remains a civilian, whether he should actually be in a tunnel or not. Shooting children in the chest and head (and testicles) is a war crime, whether they should actually be in tunnels or not. Even if Hamas should let civilians stay in the tunnels, that doesn’t absolve Israel in any way. Then you claim that Israel decided to ‘center aid in the south of Gaza’. That’s another way of saying that it REFUSED to provide aid in the North. I quote Amnesty International; ‘In a particularly egregious pattern, the Israeli authorities repeatedly restricted humanitarian access to the area north of Wadi Gaza. On 6 January 2024, Israel announced it had successfully dismantled Hamas in northern Gaza (although fighting in the north continued). Nevertheless, over the following weeks, Israel impeded humanitarian organizations’ access to the north, as confirmed by OCHA and the UN Secretary-General (…) Convoys loaded with supplies to meet water and sanitation and medical needs in the area north of Wadi Gaza were repeatedly blocked by the Israeli authorities, OCHA reported. According to OCHA, between late December 2023 and early January 2024, requests to bring aid to the Central Drug Store, administered by the Gaza-based Ministry of Health, had been denied five times, meaning that “hospitals in northern Gaza remain without sufficient access to life-saving medical supplies and equipment”, and fuel delivery had been refused six times, “leaving people without access to clean water and increasing the risk of sewage overflows and the spread of communicable disease.” ' You make it look as if cutting off (roughly) half of the Gaza trip for food aid is an act of benevolence by Israel. You also say that ‘Gaza is flooded with aid’. Tell me you’re a liar without telling me you are. For almost 2 years there has been food shortage and starvation in Gaza due to Israeli policies. Even the International Court of Justice recognised this. Almost 2 years ago. As for Hamas stealing aid (although it is not clear whether you make that claim), read this; ‘Israeli officials said in the NYT there is no evidence for it. USAID did a study showing Hamas is not stealing aid. The EU did a study saying Hamas is not stealing aid.’ xitter.gq/mehdirhasan/status/195… Then you call a two state solution ‘ridiculous’. You clearly disqualify yourself as a racist who wants to deny millions of Palestinians their right to self determination. You say that Hamas’ overall goal is the destruction of Israel. Even if true (quod non) can you blame them? If one country, Israel, is the only thing standing in the way between you and freedom, isn’t it humanly understandable that your goal will be to destroy that country? You have this absurd idea of a benevolent country holding on to territory it is not entitled to hold on to, solely for the benefit of the inhabitants, while Israel has been a brutal occupying power that had turned Gaza before 7 October already into the largest open air concentration camp in human history. But there is a simple solution for the problem of Hamas wanting to destroy Israel; stop occupying other people’s land. Simple, no? In minute 53 you reiterate your bullshit of blaming Egypt for not taking in civilians from Gaza. It is bad enough that you talk bullshit, but you keep repeating it. You call it ‘rubbish’ that Netanyahu has a life long goal to strike Iran. Really? I quoteJeffrey Sachs; ‘For nearly 30 years, Netanyahu has driven the Middle East into war and destruction. The man is a powder keg of violence. Throughout all the wars he has championed, Netanyahu has always dreamed of the big one: to defeat and overthrow the Iranian Government.’ commondreams.org/opinion/net… I'm pretty sure plenty of other evidence exists of Netanyahu’s hawkish position on Iran for the last (close to) 30 years. You constantly LIE. Then you say that ‘three Arab armies attacked Israel in 1967’. That is a lie, Israel started that war, with an attack on Egypt. Egypt had built up troops because an attack by Israel on Syria was imminent and Egypt had a defence pact with Syria. You also lie if you say that, if Hamas is defeated, the people in Gaza will be ‘free’. No, John, Israel will the just continue its occupation and blockade of Gaza. How is that freedom by any metric? You also say that Israel ‘has left 25% of Gaza untouched’. How come then that according to independent estimates, at least 90% of all buildings in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed? Until the end of the interview, you keep doing what all Israel supporters do; WHINE about Hamas. Listen, John, if Israel doesn’t like Hamas I have a great advice for them; STOP Apartheid, occupation, illegal settlements, ethnic cleansing, collective punishment, imprisonment without trial, torture, sexual molestation, home demolitions and genocide. Simple, no? Israel is the only country in the world that expects flowers for (guess what?) Apartheid, occupation, illegal settlements, ethnic cleansing, collective punishment, imprisonment without trial, torture, sexual molestation, home demolitions and genocide. I can’t think of any other situation where the oppressor plays victim like Israel does. 'Examine any occupation and the story repeats itself. It happened to the Brits, the French, to European settlers in North America. Israel is not so unique as to avoid an equation as old as time: Occupation and colonialism produce violent responses.' nytimes.com/2014/08/05/opini… What would you do, John? If you had been expelled from your home and you were locked up in an open-air concentration camp that was bombed to oblivion on regular basis? You know what Barak would do? Read this; ‘Why Israeli leaders admit if they were Palestinian they would fight for freedom. Barak's identification with Palestinians is unreserved and in an interview with Israeli newspaper Haaretz he asserted: 'If I were a Palestinian, I'd also join a terror group' ‘ middleeasteye.net/opinion/is… If Barak had lived in Gaza, he would have joined Hamas, John. That’s what people do under occupation; they fight back and they have the right to do so. Again, if you don’t like that, stop the occupation! And then I haven’t even touched upon the inconvenient fact that Netanyahu has actively supported Hamas in order to have a scapegoat to hide behind for refusing to talk about peace. ‘The not-so-secret history of Netanyahu’s support for Hamas: From sabotaging Oslo to funneling Qatari cash into Gaza," Netanyahu "has spent his career bolstering Hamas to help perpetuate the conflict" and prevent the emergence of a Palestinian state.’ xitter.gq/KenRoth/status/1858223… ‘Netanyahu; whoever is against a Palestinian state should be for transferring Qatar funds to Gaza, because maintaining a separation between the PA and Hamas helps prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.’ jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Confl… You are nothing but a victim blamer who kisses up to the high powers, probably for the advancement of your own career. You talk about ‘children in Gaza trying to MAKE stories’. How sick can you be? This is Holocaust deniers level. No Gazan kid has to MAKE stories, unfortunately the stories ARE THERE. And we can watch them every day, livestreamed. You call this war a war ‘for defence of Israel’s borders’. No, John, this is a war to defend illegal occupation as Israel has been doing for decades. At 1 hour, 9 minutes and 27 seconds you have the chutzpah to say ‘I am pro truth’. No John, you are a bald faced liar. You talk about COGAT and how it (I quote you) ’alleviates civilian harm’. There is starvation, John, hundreds of people have already directly died from lack of food, (probably) thousands because of the indirect effects of malnutrition. You depict Ben Gvir and Smotrich as some radical, fringe elements who don’t represent Israel’s Government and society. That's wrong. Read this; zionism.observer/quotes/dehu… zionism.observer/quotes/geno… zionism.observer/quotes/inci… It is shocking that people like you get a podium for their lies and get away with them. /End