WEBVTT - War Crimes with Robert and James

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<v Speaker 1>Al Zone Media.

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<v Speaker 2>What's warring my crimes? This is it could happen here

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<v Speaker 2>a podcast about things falling apart? And you know what

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<v Speaker 2>all the kids these days you're talking about is war crimes.

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<v Speaker 2>That was me being kind of blithe, but they actually are,

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<v Speaker 2>because you know what's continuing to happen to Gaza. More

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<v Speaker 2>people than probably that I can recall in recent memory

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<v Speaker 2>are talking about like war crimes, what it means to

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<v Speaker 2>commit war crimes violations of international law, which is good

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<v Speaker 2>because that's an important thing to be talking about. The

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<v Speaker 2>downside of it is, as is often the case when

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<v Speaker 2>people talk about things on the Internet, a lot of

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<v Speaker 2>people are talking about war crimes and don't actually know

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<v Speaker 2>what that means. So I figured, let's talk about like

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<v Speaker 2>what war crimes is be do. And I'm going to

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<v Speaker 2>bring on James Stout, fellow war crimes watcher, to talk

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<v Speaker 2>with me about what war crimes be James, what's your

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<v Speaker 2>favorite war crime?

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<v Speaker 3>My favorite? That's a difficult one, isn't it? Because I'm yeah,

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<v Speaker 3>because I.

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<v Speaker 2>Asked in the best season a doctor who you know

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<v Speaker 2>it is?

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah. What I like to do with reference to war

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<v Speaker 3>crimes is I wake up right and I sort of

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<v Speaker 3>you know, you're just waking up, you get your phone

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<v Speaker 3>off the charge, you there, and then you look and

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<v Speaker 3>there's a message on telegram. But that's how that's how

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<v Speaker 3>I consume war crimes, just a random.

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<v Speaker 2>If it's on telegram, there's a forty percent chance it's

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<v Speaker 2>a violation of the eighteen sixty four Geneva Convention or

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<v Speaker 2>the subsequent Geneva Conventions. Yes, so I wanted to do

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<v Speaker 2>this because I do think that one of the things

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<v Speaker 2>that is unfortunate kind of about the colloquial way in which,

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<v Speaker 2>like the positive side of the way social media has

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<v Speaker 2>impacted the coverage of conflicts is that we are now

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<v Speaker 2>seeing like, for the first time, this is not the

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<v Speaker 2>first time Israel has killed a shitload of Palestinians. This

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<v Speaker 2>is the first time that like a really substantial majority

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<v Speaker 2>of the American populace has been like and that's bad, yea.

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<v Speaker 2>And that owes a lot to the way in which

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<v Speaker 2>information is bread on social media. One of the downsides

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<v Speaker 2>of that is because this is happening in kind of

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<v Speaker 2>a colloquial diction, people are not always super accurate, and

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<v Speaker 2>a term like war crimes in particular often gets used

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<v Speaker 2>to mean like anything I don't like that happens in

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<v Speaker 2>a war, And there are a lot of things that

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<v Speaker 2>happen like war is bad, and everything that happens in

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<v Speaker 2>war nearly everything is really bad. But most of the

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<v Speaker 2>things that happen in war are not war crimes. And

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<v Speaker 2>I believe me, I'm not setting us up to say that,

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<v Speaker 2>like Israel is not committing war crimes in Gaza. They are.

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<v Speaker 2>I actually have a lot of issues with other kinds

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<v Speaker 2>of conflicts and things that happen in conflicts that get

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<v Speaker 2>discussed as if they were war crimes that I think

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<v Speaker 2>Muddy's the issue. We're going to be talking trying to

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<v Speaker 2>make it clear like what international law actually covers and

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<v Speaker 2>what kind of that coverage means and all that stuff,

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<v Speaker 2>so that hopefully, you know, people can have a little

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<v Speaker 2>bit more information going forward when they try to about

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<v Speaker 2>like is this something that's just bad that happens in

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<v Speaker 2>war versus is this a war crime, because that actually

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<v Speaker 2>matters when it comes to, you know, the theoretical idea

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<v Speaker 2>of a rules based international order in prosecuting this stuff.

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<v Speaker 2>So the first thing we have to get into is

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<v Speaker 2>the idea that like war crimes are a pretty recent conception.

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<v Speaker 2>The idea that like there would be a thing that

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<v Speaker 2>you could do as a country that the international community

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<v Speaker 2>would come in and have beef with does not go

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<v Speaker 2>back very far. Right, Yeah, we are talking the eighteenth century,

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<v Speaker 2>so really the last two hundred years has been when

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<v Speaker 2>this really all started to get codified. We start with

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<v Speaker 2>the Geneva Convention in eighteen sixty four. There are several

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<v Speaker 2>Geneva conventions in nineteen forty nine, and there's I think

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<v Speaker 2>two more in nineteen seventy seven. You also have the

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<v Speaker 2>Hague Conventions in eighteen ninety nine and nineteen oh seven,

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<v Speaker 2>and these are all so part of what that should

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<v Speaker 2>suggest is that like, even within the kind of the

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<v Speaker 2>realm of codified war crimes law, it's kind of been

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<v Speaker 2>a slap dash, catches catch can a fair right. Like

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<v Speaker 2>people have come together and made rules that were largely

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<v Speaker 2>based on the shit that either had just happened or

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<v Speaker 2>that they thought was about to happen. And one of

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<v Speaker 2>the consequences of this is that the actual legislation about

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<v Speaker 2>like what is and isn't illegal to do in war

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<v Speaker 2>is really uneven. A great example of this would be

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<v Speaker 2>the idea of dumb, dumb bullets. Right. This is a

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<v Speaker 2>thing that you get kind of around the turn of

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<v Speaker 2>the century, which is so bullets, most bullets that are

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<v Speaker 2>used in war are what are called full metal jacket, right,

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<v Speaker 2>And that just means that there's a copper generally jacket

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<v Speaker 2>around the lead bullet and there's not like a hole

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<v Speaker 2>in the middle or whatever like a modern Like if

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<v Speaker 2>you go up to a police officer and take his gun,

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<v Speaker 2>which is very easy and safe to do legally, that

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<v Speaker 2>was a joke, you will notice that all of the

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<v Speaker 2>bullets in that gun have like a little divot in

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<v Speaker 2>the middle of them, right. And the purpose of divot

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<v Speaker 2>is so that when the bullet hits a person, it

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<v Speaker 2>transfers more of its force into the meat of that

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<v Speaker 2>person's body. This is the same with any bullet that

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<v Speaker 2>like someone carries for self defense generally, and this is

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<v Speaker 2>actually a safety device in a way, because bullets like

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<v Speaker 2>this do not penetrate as much, and you don't want

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<v Speaker 2>bullets that you're using in like an urban area for

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<v Speaker 2>self defense to penetrate as much because that increases the

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<v Speaker 2>risk that if you miss or if you hit that person,

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<v Speaker 2>that it goes through them and hits something else, right,

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<v Speaker 2>But there was an understanding around the turn of the

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<v Speaker 2>century that these bullets, which initially were not manufactured. Soldiers

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<v Speaker 2>would literally like cut like crosses in the tops of

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<v Speaker 2>their bullets.

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<v Speaker 3>I used to do this when I was a child.

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<v Speaker 3>I would spend a lot of time shooting rabbits. It

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<v Speaker 3>was kind of my thing that I did when I

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<v Speaker 3>was a kid, and we used to dumb dumb that

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<v Speaker 3>rifle pede.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, And there's this there was this understanding that developed

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<v Speaker 2>that this should be illegal because it causes additional harm. Now,

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<v Speaker 2>the specific I think this is like like line twenty

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<v Speaker 2>or something from the Geneva Convention. But it's employing weapons,

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<v Speaker 2>projectiles and material and methods of warfare which are of

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<v Speaker 2>a nature to cause superfluous injury or a necessary suffering,

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<v Speaker 2>or which are inherently indiscriminate in violation of the International

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<v Speaker 2>Law of Armed Conflict. Provided such weapons, projectiles and material

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<v Speaker 2>and the methods of warfare are the subject of a

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<v Speaker 2>comprehensive prohibition and are included in an annex to this

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<v Speaker 2>Statute by an amendment in accordance with the relevant anyway,

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<v Speaker 2>so you're not supposed to employing employ bullets which quote

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<v Speaker 2>flatten or expand easily in the human body, such as

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<v Speaker 2>bullets with the hard envelope which does not entirely cover

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<v Speaker 2>its core or is pierced with incisions. You're not supposed

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<v Speaker 2>to employ asphyxiating, poisonous or their gases and all analogous liquids, materials,

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<v Speaker 2>or devices that one obviously came about as a result

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<v Speaker 2>of the horror in World War One, right, people start

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<v Speaker 2>using a lot of these poisoned gas weapons, and it's

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<v Speaker 2>decided by the international community that that absolutely should not

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<v Speaker 2>be allowed to be done. You're not allowed to employ

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<v Speaker 2>poison or poisoned weapons. Now most people can see look

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<v Speaker 2>at at and be like, well, yeah, I mean, hollow

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<v Speaker 2>points sound extra meine. Poison sounds extramine. Gas sounds extra meine.

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<v Speaker 2>You shouldn't be able to use those extra mean weapons

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<v Speaker 2>in war. But and I don't have a problem with

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<v Speaker 2>trying to limit horrifying weapons. But we still allow, for example,

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<v Speaker 2>artillery shells that are meant to create huge amounts of

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<v Speaker 2>shrapnel that are their whole purpose is to cause grievous

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<v Speaker 2>wounds to a large number of people in a large area.

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<v Speaker 2>And from where I'm standing I don't think that like

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<v Speaker 2>that's less horrible than a hollow point. I actually think

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<v Speaker 2>that's probably a lot worse than a hollow point. Yes, yeah,

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<v Speaker 2>So one of the first things that you get when

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<v Speaker 2>you look at what our war crimes is they're not

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<v Speaker 2>actually all like things that you morally should have an

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<v Speaker 2>issue with. Like, really, if you are looking at all

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<v Speaker 2>of the weapons employed in war today, there's no reason

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<v Speaker 2>a hollow point should frighten you, Right, there's so many

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<v Speaker 2>worse weapons right now. On the other hand of that,

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<v Speaker 2>poison gas is much worse than the vast majority of

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<v Speaker 2>weapons that are used in war today, and I think

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<v Speaker 2>it's good that that's a crime.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, doesn't stop people using it, It.

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<v Speaker 2>Doesn't stop like Bashar al Asade, right.

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<v Speaker 3>Friend of the show. I was just thinking about barrel bombs.

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<v Speaker 3>I didn't know if barrel bombs are specifically prohibited, and don't

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<v Speaker 3>think they are not. There would be a way to

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<v Speaker 3>do that, really, that just a barrel stuff with explosion.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, because I mean they were invented by Israel. Actually,

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<v Speaker 2>I think forty seven is the first use. It might

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<v Speaker 2>have been like fifty, yeah, but I believe it was

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<v Speaker 2>forty seven was the first recorded use of Because if

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<v Speaker 2>you have planes and you have reliable access to planes,

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<v Speaker 2>but you know, can't reliably manufacture advanced like rockets and

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<v Speaker 2>shit to shoot from them, a barrel bomb's very easy

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<v Speaker 2>to make. You're basically just taking a fifty gallon drum

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<v Speaker 2>and filling it with gunpowder and shrapnel, right, Like, I mean,

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<v Speaker 2>it's a little more complicated than that, but yea.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, the Huntern Memba have started using them as sair

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<v Speaker 3>access to Russia munitions drives up.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and there's you know, again that's one of those

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<v Speaker 2>things where it's like that's not technically a war crime

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<v Speaker 2>other than that if you it can be if you're

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<v Speaker 2>like using it indiscriminately in a civilian like against civilians.

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<v Speaker 2>But like also they basically no one ever gets prosecuted

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<v Speaker 2>for doing that, so.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yeah, right, this is the case with many of

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<v Speaker 3>these things.

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<v Speaker 2>And again, like barrel bombs can be legal, holow points can't.

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<v Speaker 2>That doesn't really make sense. It's also like I will say,

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<v Speaker 2>I've witnessed at least one war crime in person that

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<v Speaker 2>I really didn't feel like was a war crime, which

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<v Speaker 2>when I was embedded with the Iraqi Army, they tear

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<v Speaker 2>gassed an ISIS sniper to get him out of his

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<v Speaker 2>position so they could kill him, and that's definitely illegal.

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<v Speaker 2>And also of all of the things I saw done

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<v Speaker 2>in that war, like the fact that somebody threw a

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<v Speaker 2>tear gas grenade did not upset me over much, right,

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<v Speaker 2>Like the fact that I was watching apartment buildings get

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<v Speaker 2>blown up by Apache helicopters really upset me a lot

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<v Speaker 2>more than a little bit of tear gas.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, it's one of these like very sort of like, yeah,

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<v Speaker 3>if you want to take the strict legalistic definition, yeah,

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<v Speaker 3>that was a war crime. Yeah, a crime that was

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<v Speaker 3>committed that day maybe.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah. So anyway, I want to get into some of

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<v Speaker 2>this in a little bit more of an organized fashion,

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<v Speaker 2>But first let's let's have a little bit of an

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<v Speaker 2>ad break. Ah. So we're back and we're talking about

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<v Speaker 2>war crimes. So I want to just kind of go

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<v Speaker 2>through and with some commentary. Straight up, Lee read a

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<v Speaker 2>large chunk of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court,

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<v Speaker 2>Article eight, which largely defines war crimes as that term

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<v Speaker 2>has a meaning in a legal sense, and it defines

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<v Speaker 2>war crimes as grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of

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<v Speaker 2>twelfth August nineteen forty nine, namely any of the following

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<v Speaker 2>acts against persons or property committed against the provisions of

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<v Speaker 2>the relevant Geneva Convention. These include wilful killing, torture or

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<v Speaker 2>inhuman treatment, including biological experiments, wilfully causing great suffering, serious

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<v Speaker 2>injury to body or health, extensive destruction and appropriation of

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<v Speaker 2>property not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully

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<v Speaker 2>and wantonly, compelling a prisoner of war or other protected

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<v Speaker 2>person to serve in the forces of a hostile power,

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<v Speaker 2>Willfully depriving a prisoner of war or their protected person

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<v Speaker 2>of the rights of fair and regular trial, unlawful deportation

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<v Speaker 2>or transfer, or unlawful confinement and taking of hostages.

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<v Speaker 1>Right.

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<v Speaker 2>And you'll notice, among other things, a lot of that

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<v Speaker 2>is stuff that you can find Israeli soldiers doing at TikTok, right.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yeah, streaming themselves doing.

0:11:24.559 --> 0:11:27.320
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. I mean particularly the clear not maybe not the clearest,

0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:28.840
<v Speaker 2>but one that comes up to me just because of

0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:31.480
<v Speaker 2>some stuff I've seen of like soldiers posing with like

0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:36.800
<v Speaker 2>stolen canes from gosms who presumably were disabled and no

0:11:36.880 --> 0:11:39.800
<v Speaker 2>longer have their canes for whatever. Terrible reason like these

0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:43.000
<v Speaker 2>kind of like joking photos. That's a destruction and appropriation

0:11:43.040 --> 0:11:44.839
<v Speaker 2>of property. Right, You have a lot of videos of

0:11:44.880 --> 0:11:49.360
<v Speaker 2>soldiers like going through people's property, taking stuff, destroying stuff

0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:53.119
<v Speaker 2>like those are war crimes you are not as a soldier. Obviously,

0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:56.200
<v Speaker 2>property will get destroyed in gunfights. It can get to like,

0:11:56.240 --> 0:11:58.280
<v Speaker 2>so there's part of why it's kind of hard to

0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:00.680
<v Speaker 2>this stuff is not prosecuted as much as it ought

0:12:00.679 --> 0:12:02.520
<v Speaker 2>to be. But you are not supposed to just fuck

0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:05.440
<v Speaker 2>with people shit as a soldier. That is legal, you know.

0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:08.160
<v Speaker 2>Is it one of the war crimes that is probably

0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:11.560
<v Speaker 2>least prosecuted and most common. Absolutely, I think that that

0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:12.640
<v Speaker 2>is very fair to say.

0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:15.760
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, look, Boris Johnson stoles stuff from Saddam U Sin's

0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:18.800
<v Speaker 3>palace in right, you know, like he's yet to be

0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:20.319
<v Speaker 3>called today, and that.

0:12:20.240 --> 0:12:21.599
<v Speaker 2>Would be one of those Like I don't know, I

0:12:21.640 --> 0:12:23.319
<v Speaker 2>don't like Boris Johnson, but also I don't have a

0:12:23.360 --> 0:12:28.200
<v Speaker 2>problem with anyone stealing from Saddam Husse exactly specifically.

0:12:27.559 --> 0:12:29.959
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, of all the bullshit he's done, but.

0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:32.120
<v Speaker 2>This is I mean, that's one of those. Because I

0:12:32.280 --> 0:12:34.640
<v Speaker 2>would say a lot of soldiers I know who have

0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:37.719
<v Speaker 2>been and maybe didn't even realize themselves that what they

0:12:37.720 --> 0:12:39.320
<v Speaker 2>were doing was committing a war crime. But just like

0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:42.480
<v Speaker 2>you're in somebody's house, they are gone, they ran, and

0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:45.359
<v Speaker 2>like you wind up fucking with shit like it happens.

0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.840
<v Speaker 2>I think what we're seeing, I think willfully is kind

0:12:48.840 --> 0:12:51.240
<v Speaker 2>of an important term here, right, And I think that's

0:12:51.559 --> 0:12:53.560
<v Speaker 2>really what we've seen very clearly in a lot of

0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:57.280
<v Speaker 2>these IDF tiktoks, right, is people taking glee in the

0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:01.079
<v Speaker 2>destruction of property. And I think that's very easy to

0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:02.760
<v Speaker 2>prove as a war crime.

0:13:03.400 --> 0:13:05.839
<v Speaker 3>I think anyone can make a moral distinction right between

0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:09.199
<v Speaker 3>Like I was recently in Rajava and I was talking

0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:10.959
<v Speaker 3>to some friends and they were talking about how they

0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:14.600
<v Speaker 3>a lot of people died in ied blasts because they

0:13:14.640 --> 0:13:19.000
<v Speaker 3>were going into buildings to try and get food or tea, right, sugar, Yeah,

0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:21.400
<v Speaker 3>there's a distinction between going into the kitchen of abandoned

0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:24.560
<v Speaker 3>building and taking some sugar or whatever rice.

0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:24.920
<v Speaker 1>You know.

0:13:25.360 --> 0:13:29.280
<v Speaker 3>Then yeah, these guys going through women's underwear drawers taking

0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:30.400
<v Speaker 3>pictures with their underwear.

0:13:30.720 --> 0:13:33.560
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, I know some some US Marines who like

0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:36.800
<v Speaker 2>happened upon a cigarette factory during the invasion. I had,

0:13:36.840 --> 0:13:39.680
<v Speaker 2>like the uncut cigarettes that are like five feet long

0:13:39.720 --> 0:13:41.640
<v Speaker 2>and they just started like smoking up on them. I

0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:44.400
<v Speaker 2>guess that's destruction of property. Probably not going to be

0:13:44.440 --> 0:13:47.199
<v Speaker 2>my priority as the ic Z, but it also doesn't

0:13:47.200 --> 0:13:49.840
<v Speaker 2>seem like the clearer stuff is their priority. So I

0:13:49.840 --> 0:13:50.120
<v Speaker 2>don't know.

0:13:50.160 --> 0:13:52.160
<v Speaker 3>Free my man with the five foot cigarette he did?

0:13:52.400 --> 0:13:59.240
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah. So other war crimes include intentionally directing attacks

0:13:59.240 --> 0:14:03.319
<v Speaker 2>against the civilian population as such, or against individual civilians

0:14:03.400 --> 0:14:06.000
<v Speaker 2>not taking part in hostilities. There's a video going around

0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:08.960
<v Speaker 2>right now, man in his fifties in Gaza who was

0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:13.440
<v Speaker 2>working a market stall and was shot by an Israeli drone,

0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:17.000
<v Speaker 2>just executed. There's no way to describe that other than

0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:20.720
<v Speaker 2>intentionally directing an attack against a civilian not taking direct

0:14:20.720 --> 0:14:23.680
<v Speaker 2>part in hostilities. That is a war crime. That's one

0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:26.240
<v Speaker 2>example of I mean, that's just the clearest video that

0:14:26.280 --> 0:14:27.840
<v Speaker 2>I saw recently, right.

0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:31.560
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, I heard from people who listen. I think I

0:14:31.560 --> 0:14:33.440
<v Speaker 3>think this was in the episode, but when we talk

0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:35.080
<v Speaker 3>to our friends at PK Guy that they were talking

0:14:35.080 --> 0:14:38.040
<v Speaker 3>about one of the members of their group was recovering

0:14:38.120 --> 0:14:41.200
<v Speaker 3>bodies from a bombed building and was shot by a

0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:44.760
<v Speaker 3>quad coptail, not like a drone, like ten thousand feet

0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:47.360
<v Speaker 3>in the air dropping a missile like a drone. Yeah,

0:14:47.480 --> 0:14:49.080
<v Speaker 3>like in the air firing.

0:14:48.920 --> 0:14:51.040
<v Speaker 2>A drone like you can buy at a fucking best

0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:52.320
<v Speaker 2>Buy that's been modified.

0:14:52.480 --> 0:14:52.640
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.

0:14:52.720 --> 0:14:55.160
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, that shoots like it shoots a rifle, like just

0:14:55.480 --> 0:14:58.880
<v Speaker 3>like a soldiers shooting rifle, where the operator is looking

0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:02.760
<v Speaker 3>and seeing that and pressing a button to fire bullet.

0:15:02.920 --> 0:15:06.480
<v Speaker 3>It's not collateral damage. It's deliberate civilians.

0:15:07.000 --> 0:15:10.760
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, absolutely continue from that list of war crimes

0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:14.200
<v Speaker 2>intentionally directing attacks against civilian objects, that is, objects which

0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:17.680
<v Speaker 2>are not military objectives. A great example of this that's

0:15:17.720 --> 0:15:21.280
<v Speaker 2>been happening in Gaza in particular is destruction of mosques, right,

0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:25.560
<v Speaker 2>very clear, civilian objects. Now there are exceptions. For example,

0:15:25.960 --> 0:15:29.240
<v Speaker 2>one thing that does sometimes happen. I don't think it happened.

0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:31.560
<v Speaker 2>It certainly have not seen evidence of it happening often

0:15:31.800 --> 0:15:35.160
<v Speaker 2>in most of the places where there are attacks on mosques,

0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:39.160
<v Speaker 2>but like periodically, like if somebody, if if a fighter

0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:42.640
<v Speaker 2>or a military unit sets up inside a mosque or right,

0:15:42.800 --> 0:15:45.080
<v Speaker 2>or a church or whatever, which happened in World War

0:15:45.080 --> 0:15:46.840
<v Speaker 2>two a lot, Right, you would have like churches used

0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:49.440
<v Speaker 2>as strong points because they're well made buildings. You can

0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:52.680
<v Speaker 2>attack that, right, like the It's not like magical, right,

0:15:52.760 --> 0:15:55.440
<v Speaker 2>Like you can't suddenly not attack soldiers who are shooting

0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:57.240
<v Speaker 2>at you from a church, but you are not supposed

0:15:57.240 --> 0:16:00.760
<v Speaker 2>to intentionally direct attacks against civilian objects that are not

0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:06.480
<v Speaker 2>military objectives. Intentionally directing attacks against personnel installations, materiel units,

0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:10.320
<v Speaker 2>or vehicles involved in a humanitarian assistance or peacekeeping mission

0:16:10.320 --> 0:16:12.600
<v Speaker 2>in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, as

0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:14.480
<v Speaker 2>long as they are entitled to the protection given to

0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:17.760
<v Speaker 2>civilians or civilian objects under international law of armed conflict.

0:16:18.160 --> 0:16:21.360
<v Speaker 2>Best example of this from Gaza recently would be those

0:16:22.080 --> 0:16:26.160
<v Speaker 2>World Kitchen employees and their bodyguards who were essentially murdered

0:16:26.200 --> 0:16:30.360
<v Speaker 2>by the Israelis. Right, very clear internationally recognized humanitarian assistance,

0:16:30.440 --> 0:16:34.040
<v Speaker 2>very clear war crime if you can prove it was intentional.

0:16:34.600 --> 0:16:36.880
<v Speaker 2>I'm sure there's you know, that's a court case, right,

0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:42.040
<v Speaker 2>but I think pretty clear. And then there is intentionally

0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:44.280
<v Speaker 2>launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will

0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:47.239
<v Speaker 2>cause instident a loss of life or injury to civilians,

0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:50.480
<v Speaker 2>or damage to civilian objects, or widespread, long term and

0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:52.960
<v Speaker 2>severe damage to the natural environment, which would be clearly

0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.000
<v Speaker 2>excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military

0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:59.040
<v Speaker 2>advantage and dissipated. This is one of the top things

0:16:59.040 --> 0:17:02.000
<v Speaker 2>that is a war crime never gets punished because it

0:17:02.040 --> 0:17:04.960
<v Speaker 2>is so hard, because that it seemed like most I

0:17:04.960 --> 0:17:07.159
<v Speaker 2>would say, most of what I have seen planes do

0:17:07.400 --> 0:17:10.440
<v Speaker 2>in war seems like it falls under this where it's like, wow,

0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.280
<v Speaker 2>that's a lot of environmental damage, a lot of incidental

0:17:13.280 --> 0:17:15.679
<v Speaker 2>loss of life and injury, But is it excessive in

0:17:15.720 --> 0:17:18.480
<v Speaker 2>relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage. Well,

0:17:18.800 --> 0:17:21.680
<v Speaker 2>the people ordering those air strikes would say no, right,

0:17:21.800 --> 0:17:24.400
<v Speaker 2>and like right, yeah, And that is one of those

0:17:24.440 --> 0:17:26.359
<v Speaker 2>things where it's like, well, I know what looks like

0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:31.160
<v Speaker 2>crime to me. Yeah, But could I win an ICC

0:17:31.359 --> 0:17:32.520
<v Speaker 2>case about that? I don't know.

0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:33.280
<v Speaker 1>Now.

0:17:33.320 --> 0:17:35.440
<v Speaker 2>I want to actually move over to talk about Ukraine

0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.160
<v Speaker 2>here because I think that that number one doesn't happen

0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:40.040
<v Speaker 2>enough on the left, and I think there's really good,

0:17:40.280 --> 0:17:43.800
<v Speaker 2>clear examples of Russian war crimes here, because one thing

0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:46.040
<v Speaker 2>that you're not allowed to do is quote, attacking or

0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:49.640
<v Speaker 2>bombarding by whatever means towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which

0:17:49.680 --> 0:17:53.320
<v Speaker 2>are undefended and which are not military objectives. And both

0:17:53.359 --> 0:17:55.640
<v Speaker 2>of those last two points make it very clear that

0:17:55.680 --> 0:17:58.960
<v Speaker 2>the Russian military committed war crimes against Ukraine from March

0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.600
<v Speaker 2>fourth to March thirty five, twenty twenty two, when they

0:18:01.640 --> 0:18:04.399
<v Speaker 2>occupied the town of Buka, which was about it is

0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:07.480
<v Speaker 2>about thirty kilometers north of Kiv. This is one of

0:18:07.520 --> 0:18:10.240
<v Speaker 2>the best, probably the best documented Russian war crime in

0:18:10.400 --> 0:18:12.960
<v Speaker 2>Ukraine at the moment. And I'm not saying that this

0:18:13.080 --> 0:18:15.679
<v Speaker 2>is only it's not nearly the only. It's just like

0:18:15.880 --> 0:18:21.040
<v Speaker 2>a particularly well documented example. As of this point, you know,

0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:24.760
<v Speaker 2>we're almost two years past when Buka got liberated. The

0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:27.400
<v Speaker 2>bodies of more than a thousand civilians have been discovered

0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:30.439
<v Speaker 2>in the Buka region. At least about six hundred and

0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:33.439
<v Speaker 2>fifty people are known to have been executed by the

0:18:33.520 --> 0:18:39.159
<v Speaker 2>Russian army, and these are pretty hideous mass executions. A

0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:41.520
<v Speaker 2>lot of people were held for a week or two

0:18:41.600 --> 0:18:45.359
<v Speaker 2>prior to being executed. There's significant evidence of torture of

0:18:45.440 --> 0:18:50.000
<v Speaker 2>beatings of civilians before their summary execution. And yeah, it's

0:18:50.080 --> 0:18:53.560
<v Speaker 2>like it's a very clear example of a war crime.

0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:56.720
<v Speaker 2>Like I don't know how else to say it. I

0:18:56.800 --> 0:18:59.280
<v Speaker 2>will read a quote from this Human Rights Watch article

0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:03.320
<v Speaker 2>that interviewed some funeral home workers in Bukka. Another funeral

0:19:03.320 --> 0:19:06.439
<v Speaker 2>homeworker Sergei Makyuk, who helped collect bodies, said that he

0:19:06.480 --> 0:19:08.960
<v Speaker 2>personally collected about two hundred bodies from the streets since

0:19:09.000 --> 0:19:11.480
<v Speaker 2>the Russian invasion began on February twenty fourth. Most of

0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:13.560
<v Speaker 2>the victims were men, he said, but some were women

0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:15.920
<v Speaker 2>and children. Almost all of them had bullet wounds, he said,

0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:18.760
<v Speaker 2>including around fifty whose hands were tied and whose bodies

0:19:18.800 --> 0:19:22.119
<v Speaker 2>had signs of torture. Bodies with hands tied strongly suggest

0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:25.600
<v Speaker 2>that the victims had been detained and summarily executed. And

0:19:25.640 --> 0:19:27.920
<v Speaker 2>that's a I mean a thousand pitce a hideous war crime,

0:19:28.040 --> 0:19:32.159
<v Speaker 2>right Like, that's a mass killing of civilians in a

0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:36.400
<v Speaker 2>crucially there's no argument and one way in which civilians

0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:39.800
<v Speaker 2>always die are killed in war, and it's not usually

0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:42.840
<v Speaker 2>a war crime because it generally happens while there's gun

0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:45.879
<v Speaker 2>fights going on, while you're carrying and you can claim like, well, look,

0:19:46.440 --> 0:19:49.120
<v Speaker 2>you know, you can't stop bullets from going through buildings,

0:19:49.160 --> 0:19:51.359
<v Speaker 2>you can't stop people from getting hit by a shrapnel.

0:19:51.400 --> 0:19:53.680
<v Speaker 2>You're fighting in a city, Civilians are going to die.

0:19:53.840 --> 0:19:57.160
<v Speaker 2>This is a very clear case of this town was occupied,

0:19:57.280 --> 0:19:59.920
<v Speaker 2>there was not resistance ongoing in it, and they were

0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:03.600
<v Speaker 2>mass executing civilians. That's illegal. You're not allowed to do

0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:09.040
<v Speaker 2>that theoretically, if international law means anything. Now, I do

0:20:09.119 --> 0:20:11.960
<v Speaker 2>want to get to another case of a war crime,

0:20:12.240 --> 0:20:14.800
<v Speaker 2>that or a thing that people call a war crime

0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:16.720
<v Speaker 2>that isn't a war crime. And this we're actually going

0:20:16.800 --> 0:20:19.719
<v Speaker 2>to go back to the Iraq the first Iraq war,

0:20:19.800 --> 0:20:23.119
<v Speaker 2>desert Storm. Before we go to desert Storm, let's go

0:20:23.200 --> 0:20:37.320
<v Speaker 2>to these ads. All right, we're back, James. What do

0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:38.720
<v Speaker 2>you know about the Highway of Death?

0:20:39.240 --> 0:20:39.359
<v Speaker 1>Oh?

0:20:39.640 --> 0:20:41.280
<v Speaker 3>And a little bit about the Highway of Death. Yeah,

0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:42.840
<v Speaker 3>let's a throwback, isn't it.

0:20:42.840 --> 0:20:47.040
<v Speaker 2>It's a throwback. I hear it described by particularly leftists

0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:50.000
<v Speaker 2>on the internet a lot as a US war crime. Yeah,

0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:54.600
<v Speaker 2>and as a spoiler, it's not. It's ugly, it's really hideous.

0:20:54.720 --> 0:20:58.440
<v Speaker 2>It's like a horrifying thing. But it's just war, right,

0:20:58.480 --> 0:21:01.119
<v Speaker 2>And it was come back to fighting combat Yeah, it

0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:05.840
<v Speaker 2>was combatants killing retreating combatants, which people think sometimes shouldn't

0:21:05.840 --> 0:21:08.119
<v Speaker 2>be allowed. But it doesn't really make sense for that

0:21:08.160 --> 0:21:09.959
<v Speaker 2>to not be allowed if you just like know what

0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:12.760
<v Speaker 2>war is. And I'm going to talk about why here,

0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:16.560
<v Speaker 2>and like I'm not trying to justify this, because nothing

0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:19.439
<v Speaker 2>in war make it does like you don't justify it,

0:21:19.520 --> 0:21:22.880
<v Speaker 2>just is a thing that happens, right, Like it's all

0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:25.600
<v Speaker 2>hideous if you've been through it, you see in humanity

0:21:25.640 --> 0:21:28.359
<v Speaker 2>every second. But one of the things that you learn

0:21:28.480 --> 0:21:31.720
<v Speaker 2>if you study war on an academic level is that

0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:35.639
<v Speaker 2>a massive part of it is retreating. Like all the time,

0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:40.280
<v Speaker 2>all throughout history, armies retreat, regroup, and then carry out

0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:44.440
<v Speaker 2>additional offensives. Right. That is war in a nutshell, Right,

0:21:44.840 --> 0:21:48.440
<v Speaker 2>And so when armies are retreating, you're allowed to keep

0:21:48.560 --> 0:21:53.280
<v Speaker 2>killing them. And in fact, that's the norm, and most soldiers,

0:21:53.359 --> 0:21:55.920
<v Speaker 2>up until the modern era, the vast majority of combat

0:21:55.920 --> 0:21:57.240
<v Speaker 2>deaths we're during retreats.

0:21:57.400 --> 0:21:57.560
<v Speaker 3>Right.

0:21:57.880 --> 0:22:01.000
<v Speaker 2>This is the primary way in which soldiers are killed.

0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:02.080
<v Speaker 2>This is when they're retreating.

0:22:02.200 --> 0:22:02.400
<v Speaker 3>Right.

0:22:02.920 --> 0:22:06.200
<v Speaker 2>And so what actually happened is in August. So obviously

0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:09.840
<v Speaker 2>August of nineteen ninety, the US leads a coalition against

0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:13.639
<v Speaker 2>the Iraqi army who have invaded and occupied Kuwait illegally.

0:22:14.880 --> 0:22:16.959
<v Speaker 2>You know, one of my stances on this is that

0:22:17.080 --> 0:22:20.520
<v Speaker 2>Iraq very clearly violated international law and they shouldn't have

0:22:20.560 --> 0:22:23.520
<v Speaker 2>been allowed to occupy Kawait. Now there's a lot of

0:22:24.040 --> 0:22:27.280
<v Speaker 2>things about like US involvement in Iraq prior to this,

0:22:27.400 --> 0:22:30.520
<v Speaker 2>that are you could say extenuating, including the fact that

0:22:30.600 --> 0:22:33.560
<v Speaker 2>like we had kind of pushed them to invade Iran

0:22:34.440 --> 0:22:36.679
<v Speaker 2>and then played both sides of that conflict, and that

0:22:36.800 --> 0:22:39.400
<v Speaker 2>was part of what Saddam was pissed about. But that

0:22:39.440 --> 0:22:42.359
<v Speaker 2>doesn't justify in Kuwait being occupied.

0:22:42.440 --> 0:22:44.800
<v Speaker 3>Right. You can't just get mad and invade somewhere unless

0:22:44.840 --> 0:22:45.680
<v Speaker 3>you're America.

0:22:45.840 --> 0:22:47.920
<v Speaker 2>Unless you're America, which we're going to do to Iraq

0:22:48.000 --> 0:22:50.800
<v Speaker 2>not much longer after this, but in this case, you know,

0:22:51.200 --> 0:22:53.840
<v Speaker 2>we're more or less on the on the on the

0:22:53.880 --> 0:22:57.400
<v Speaker 2>better side of things, right, and we basically immediately throw

0:22:57.440 --> 0:23:00.840
<v Speaker 2>the Iraqi army into a full fledged retreat. This culminates

0:23:00.880 --> 0:23:03.680
<v Speaker 2>in late February nineteen ninety one with a huge number

0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:06.479
<v Speaker 2>of Iraqi soldiers and military vehicles jammed up on a

0:23:06.520 --> 0:23:10.040
<v Speaker 2>convoy on Highway eighty, which is the highway that connects

0:23:10.040 --> 0:23:12.720
<v Speaker 2>Iraq to Kuwait. And what we do is we use

0:23:12.760 --> 0:23:15.679
<v Speaker 2>our planes to blow up vehicles on both ends of

0:23:15.720 --> 0:23:19.400
<v Speaker 2>this convoy of like three thousand vehicles, which then traps

0:23:19.560 --> 0:23:22.600
<v Speaker 2>thousands and thousands of soldiers inside these walls of fire.

0:23:22.720 --> 0:23:25.560
<v Speaker 2>So we can spend ten hours bombing them and this

0:23:25.720 --> 0:23:29.480
<v Speaker 2>is fucking hideous. The event is memorialized, and this is

0:23:29.520 --> 0:23:31.359
<v Speaker 2>part of why people think of it as a war crime.

0:23:32.080 --> 0:23:34.359
<v Speaker 2>In a picture by a photojournalist of the corpse of

0:23:34.400 --> 0:23:37.960
<v Speaker 2>an Iraqi soldier hideously burned, frozen in time as he

0:23:38.000 --> 0:23:41.520
<v Speaker 2>tried to flee his flaming tank, and that picture you

0:23:41.600 --> 0:23:45.240
<v Speaker 2>can find it. It's I mean, it's horrible. It's a

0:23:45.320 --> 0:23:47.639
<v Speaker 2>great example of why war is bad and we should

0:23:47.680 --> 0:23:49.439
<v Speaker 2>do less of it. And it is, you know, it's

0:23:49.440 --> 0:23:51.320
<v Speaker 2>one of those things. A lot of US soldiers who

0:23:51.320 --> 0:23:55.320
<v Speaker 2>participate in this feel uncomfortable with it, feel like they

0:23:55.359 --> 0:23:58.840
<v Speaker 2>are unnecessarily killing a large number of people. And you

0:23:58.920 --> 0:24:01.919
<v Speaker 2>can make that case. You can make a case and

0:24:01.960 --> 0:24:04.760
<v Speaker 2>I'll listen to it that this was hideously evil, but

0:24:04.840 --> 0:24:07.960
<v Speaker 2>it's not a war crime. Right now, Sodam's going to

0:24:08.000 --> 0:24:10.040
<v Speaker 2>make that claim, arguing that his soldiers are trying to

0:24:10.040 --> 0:24:14.119
<v Speaker 2>peacefully withdraw. But there's like a definition of that, and

0:24:14.200 --> 0:24:16.800
<v Speaker 2>what the Iraqis were doing didn't meet it. What actually

0:24:16.840 --> 0:24:19.960
<v Speaker 2>happened is that the Iraqi army made contact with the

0:24:20.080 --> 0:24:23.920
<v Speaker 2>US army and then they went into a retreat. They

0:24:23.920 --> 0:24:27.840
<v Speaker 2>were attempting to leave the area after losing a fight

0:24:28.359 --> 0:24:31.400
<v Speaker 2>and they had not formally surrendered, And there's nothing an

0:24:31.400 --> 0:24:34.480
<v Speaker 2>international law that makes it illegal to kill soldiers who

0:24:34.520 --> 0:24:35.639
<v Speaker 2>happened to be withdrawing.

0:24:35.880 --> 0:24:36.080
<v Speaker 1>Right.

0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:38.320
<v Speaker 2>A great example of this would be nineteen forty four

0:24:38.400 --> 0:24:40.600
<v Speaker 2>during the Battle of Normandy. There are reports of retreating

0:24:40.640 --> 0:24:43.640
<v Speaker 2>German soldiers shot by US soldiers and there was debate

0:24:43.680 --> 0:24:46.240
<v Speaker 2>at the time as like, well, is this a violation

0:24:46.320 --> 0:24:48.760
<v Speaker 2>of the Geneva Conventions, right, And the conclusion that was

0:24:48.800 --> 0:24:51.720
<v Speaker 2>generally reached in is that you shouldn't kill an enemy

0:24:51.720 --> 0:24:55.200
<v Speaker 2>who is number one not in combat and number two surrendering,

0:24:55.240 --> 0:24:57.960
<v Speaker 2>and there is kind of a blurry line between that

0:24:58.160 --> 0:25:02.560
<v Speaker 2>and retreat. But again, the vast majority of soldiers killed

0:25:02.600 --> 0:25:06.520
<v Speaker 2>in war are killed running away, right, Like that's just

0:25:06.680 --> 0:25:08.639
<v Speaker 2>kind of how I mean, that's changed a bit in

0:25:08.680 --> 0:25:11.199
<v Speaker 2>the modern era, But like, this is I think more

0:25:11.240 --> 0:25:14.239
<v Speaker 2>falls under one of those things where everyone sees this

0:25:14.280 --> 0:25:16.840
<v Speaker 2>as a nightmare, because it is a nightmare. Those random

0:25:16.880 --> 0:25:20.040
<v Speaker 2>Iraqi conscripts did not deserve to burn to death in

0:25:20.080 --> 0:25:23.159
<v Speaker 2>this Charnel house we created on the Highway eighty. And

0:25:23.280 --> 0:25:25.639
<v Speaker 2>also like, well that's just what war is, man. You

0:25:25.680 --> 0:25:27.640
<v Speaker 2>think we didn't do that to the Nazis? You think

0:25:27.680 --> 0:25:30.400
<v Speaker 2>the Nazis didn't do that to the fucking Russians. You think,

0:25:30.440 --> 0:25:32.879
<v Speaker 2>like you think that hasn't happened to every war, Like,

0:25:32.920 --> 0:25:35.520
<v Speaker 2>that's just what war is, man, That's why we shouldn't

0:25:35.560 --> 0:25:36.879
<v Speaker 2>do it. It's really bad.

0:25:37.320 --> 0:25:39.359
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, it's fucked. The things are allowed to do a

0:25:39.400 --> 0:25:41.679
<v Speaker 3>fuck so you think you're allowed to do Yeah, we

0:25:41.720 --> 0:25:45.240
<v Speaker 3>did do some things in the specifically in that incident,

0:25:45.280 --> 0:25:47.919
<v Speaker 3>which are now I don't think the war crimes, but

0:25:47.960 --> 0:25:50.760
<v Speaker 3>like they used cluster bombs on the highway of Taks. Yes,

0:25:51.080 --> 0:25:53.879
<v Speaker 3>it's a separate agreement. It's not part of THEMA Convention, right.

0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:56.199
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, I think that's a separate agreement. And like

0:25:56.240 --> 0:25:59.359
<v Speaker 2>obviously things have, like at our doctrine and kind of

0:25:59.600 --> 0:26:02.119
<v Speaker 2>internet like has changed as a result of that, in

0:26:02.119 --> 0:26:04.399
<v Speaker 2>part because like a lot of American soldiers were like,

0:26:04.840 --> 0:26:07.920
<v Speaker 2>I really didn't feel good about this. My kid, doesn't

0:26:07.960 --> 0:26:11.440
<v Speaker 2>seem like this was necessary at all. Yeah, And I

0:26:11.720 --> 0:26:14.040
<v Speaker 2>don't think it was necessary, right, Like, I don't think

0:26:14.040 --> 0:26:15.760
<v Speaker 2>it was needed to do this to beat I think

0:26:15.800 --> 0:26:18.440
<v Speaker 2>the Iraqi army was already beaten. But the question isn't

0:26:18.520 --> 0:26:21.679
<v Speaker 2>wasn't necessary? The question is was this not something that

0:26:21.840 --> 0:26:26.040
<v Speaker 2>is generally acceptable in war, and it is because war

0:26:26.200 --> 0:26:32.399
<v Speaker 2>like again, blowing, like making exploding pieces like giant boxes

0:26:32.560 --> 0:26:37.200
<v Speaker 2>filled with shards of metal in order to wound hundreds

0:26:37.240 --> 0:26:39.640
<v Speaker 2>of people at a time, it's acceptable in war, right,

0:26:39.800 --> 0:26:41.200
<v Speaker 2>Like it's bad.

0:26:41.760 --> 0:26:44.159
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, bad things happening. Well, we should have wit if

0:26:44.200 --> 0:26:44.679
<v Speaker 3>we can.

0:26:44.960 --> 0:26:47.919
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, So let's continue our list of things that be

0:26:48.040 --> 0:26:50.320
<v Speaker 2>war crimes. One of them is making improper use of

0:26:50.359 --> 0:26:52.359
<v Speaker 2>a flag of truce. So you're not allowed to like

0:26:52.400 --> 0:26:55.639
<v Speaker 2>pretend to surrender or pretend to try to negotiate and

0:26:55.640 --> 0:26:58.679
<v Speaker 2>then start shooting. That's a war crime. Actually, you're not

0:26:58.720 --> 0:27:02.159
<v Speaker 2>allowed to transfer parts of the population of like the

0:27:02.160 --> 0:27:05.320
<v Speaker 2>civilian population of a territory you occupy, to other parts

0:27:05.320 --> 0:27:08.120
<v Speaker 2>of your territory, which the Russians have done in Ukraine.

0:27:08.119 --> 0:27:10.679
<v Speaker 2>They have been taking particularly Ukrainian children and moving them

0:27:10.720 --> 0:27:13.360
<v Speaker 2>to elsewhere in Russia, adopting them out to the families.

0:27:13.440 --> 0:27:15.840
<v Speaker 3>That is a war crime. Turkey's done it in Aphrem.

0:27:16.359 --> 0:27:18.119
<v Speaker 2>Turkey does a hell of a lot of this, right,

0:27:18.119 --> 0:27:20.600
<v Speaker 2>They've done a lot of that in Afrin, yes, as

0:27:20.640 --> 0:27:24.600
<v Speaker 2>you said, and obviously the Israelian well, I mean these

0:27:24.640 --> 0:27:27.159
<v Speaker 2>really military we're actually gonna talk about their abduction and

0:27:27.200 --> 0:27:31.919
<v Speaker 2>imprisonment of Palestinians, because that also violates that arguably violates this,

0:27:32.160 --> 0:27:36.360
<v Speaker 2>but there's a separate segment of the Roman statues that violates.

0:27:37.080 --> 0:27:41.879
<v Speaker 2>And then intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science,

0:27:41.960 --> 0:27:46.960
<v Speaker 2>or charitable purposes. I'm thinking about historical monuments. Hospitals very

0:27:46.960 --> 0:27:48.720
<v Speaker 2>easy to find examples of that in Gaza.

0:27:48.800 --> 0:27:49.040
<v Speaker 3>Right.

0:27:49.760 --> 0:27:51.879
<v Speaker 2>Again, the little bit of wiggle room here is like

0:27:51.960 --> 0:27:55.320
<v Speaker 2>if they're being occupied as like an enemy HQ, which

0:27:55.359 --> 0:27:58.800
<v Speaker 2>is basically what everyone claims when they bomb hospitals. Right.

0:27:59.000 --> 0:28:01.600
<v Speaker 2>The US has done this a lot too, like we have,

0:28:01.760 --> 0:28:04.280
<v Speaker 2>especially in Afghanistan. We had a number of hospitals and

0:28:04.280 --> 0:28:05.760
<v Speaker 2>it was always like, well, we thought there were some

0:28:05.800 --> 0:28:08.920
<v Speaker 2>guys there we were trying to right, and Russia and

0:28:09.000 --> 0:28:12.479
<v Speaker 2>Israel both have extensive histories doing this. During the Syrian

0:28:12.520 --> 0:28:15.920
<v Speaker 2>Civil War, Russian planes backing the ASAD regime regularly targeted

0:28:15.960 --> 0:28:19.359
<v Speaker 2>medical facilities in Aleppo at least twenty seven times from

0:28:19.440 --> 0:28:21.720
<v Speaker 2>fall of twenty fifteen to the winter of twenty sixteen.

0:28:22.080 --> 0:28:25.040
<v Speaker 2>More recently, Russia has targeted hospitals in Kherson, per this

0:28:25.160 --> 0:28:28.960
<v Speaker 2>Guardian article quote. Since December twenty two, the Russian army

0:28:28.960 --> 0:28:31.320
<v Speaker 2>has been bombarding Karson from dug in positions on the

0:28:31.320 --> 0:28:34.040
<v Speaker 2>nearby left eastern flank of the Nipro River. It has

0:28:34.080 --> 0:28:38.080
<v Speaker 2>attacked civilian infrastructure including schools, private residential houses, hospitals and

0:28:38.120 --> 0:28:42.280
<v Speaker 2>the railway station. And yeah, it's pretty hideous like these

0:28:42.280 --> 0:28:45.680
<v Speaker 2>are systematic attacks. The Cinema for in Information Resilience has

0:28:45.720 --> 0:28:49.080
<v Speaker 2>documented fourteen separate attacks over six months between December of

0:28:49.080 --> 0:28:52.000
<v Speaker 2>twenty twenty two and May of twenty twenty three, striking

0:28:52.040 --> 0:28:55.560
<v Speaker 2>hospital facilities several times with the apparent purpose of degrading

0:28:55.560 --> 0:28:59.200
<v Speaker 2>their capacity to continue to serve the civilian population. The

0:28:59.240 --> 0:29:02.240
<v Speaker 2>targeting of hospit has also been utterly endemic to Israeli

0:29:02.280 --> 0:29:05.080
<v Speaker 2>activities in Gaza. In November of twenty thirteen, they killed

0:29:05.080 --> 0:29:07.520
<v Speaker 2>at least twelve people in attacks on the Indonesian hospital

0:29:07.600 --> 0:29:11.320
<v Speaker 2>in bait Lahia, Gaza, and basically every medical facility in

0:29:11.360 --> 0:29:13.400
<v Speaker 2>Gaza has been targeted, and more than twenty of the

0:29:13.400 --> 0:29:16.080
<v Speaker 2>thirty five hospitals in Gaza Gaza have at this point

0:29:16.120 --> 0:29:18.640
<v Speaker 2>been taken out of service due to damage. The most

0:29:18.680 --> 0:29:20.920
<v Speaker 2>famous of these was the Al Shifa Hospital, which held

0:29:20.960 --> 0:29:23.400
<v Speaker 2>dozens of premature babies, thirty one of whom had to

0:29:23.440 --> 0:29:26.280
<v Speaker 2>be evacuated after weeks of losing power to their incubators

0:29:26.480 --> 0:29:29.480
<v Speaker 2>and being fed a formula mixed with poisoned water. Eight

0:29:29.640 --> 0:29:32.480
<v Speaker 2>infants died at least I'm sure that number is higher

0:29:32.680 --> 0:29:36.480
<v Speaker 2>before evacuation. This is obvious war crime, right.

0:29:37.320 --> 0:29:39.960
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, A friend, Tara Klubani, who I've interviewed for the

0:29:40.000 --> 0:29:43.480
<v Speaker 3>show before, was in the was working with the premature

0:29:43.520 --> 0:29:45.840
<v Speaker 3>babies at that time. Yeah, you can find excuse with him.

0:29:46.000 --> 0:29:48.880
<v Speaker 3>It's just it's like, I would not recommend reading it

0:29:48.880 --> 0:29:50.920
<v Speaker 3>evenless you want to traumatize yourself. It's honestly one of

0:29:50.920 --> 0:29:54.000
<v Speaker 3>the most horrible things I've ever had to try about.

0:29:54.640 --> 0:29:59.800
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, it's nightmarish stuff. And I mean a lot of

0:29:59.800 --> 0:30:03.440
<v Speaker 2>these are right. The Rome Statues continues with committing outrages

0:30:03.520 --> 0:30:07.120
<v Speaker 2>upon personal dignity and particular humiliating the degrading treatment. And

0:30:07.200 --> 0:30:10.520
<v Speaker 2>my god, there's a lot of examples of that from Gaza.

0:30:10.640 --> 0:30:14.440
<v Speaker 2>Committing rape, sexual slavery, and forced prostitution, forced pregnancy as

0:30:14.480 --> 0:30:17.480
<v Speaker 2>to find an Article seven paragraph too, and forced sterilization

0:30:17.600 --> 0:30:20.280
<v Speaker 2>or any other form of sexual violence also constitutes a

0:30:20.280 --> 0:30:23.480
<v Speaker 2>grave breach of the Geneva Conventions. Utilizing the presence of

0:30:23.520 --> 0:30:26.360
<v Speaker 2>a civilian or other protected person to render certain points,

0:30:26.400 --> 0:30:29.840
<v Speaker 2>areas or military forces immune from military operations, So using

0:30:29.840 --> 0:30:33.200
<v Speaker 2>civilians as shields. Right, If you're hiding military forces among

0:30:33.240 --> 0:30:36.440
<v Speaker 2>a civilian populace, you know that is also a war crime.

0:30:37.040 --> 0:30:40.760
<v Speaker 2>Intentionally Directing attacks against buildings, material medical units, you know,

0:30:40.840 --> 0:30:44.920
<v Speaker 2>that's supposed to be illegal. Starvation force starvation of civilians

0:30:44.960 --> 0:30:47.480
<v Speaker 2>is supposed to be illegal. And conscripting or enlisting children

0:30:47.560 --> 0:30:49.920
<v Speaker 2>under the age of fifteen years old into the national forces,

0:30:49.960 --> 0:30:53.160
<v Speaker 2>which I've noticed, you know when I would report on

0:30:53.160 --> 0:30:55.640
<v Speaker 2>the YPG, some of the people that I reported on

0:30:55.680 --> 0:30:58.280
<v Speaker 2>that were like seventeen and people like using child soldiers.

0:30:58.320 --> 0:31:00.360
<v Speaker 2>You can enlist in the British Army at six team.

0:31:00.440 --> 0:31:04.320
<v Speaker 2>That's not legal. Yeah, you seventeen year olds have always

0:31:04.360 --> 0:31:07.640
<v Speaker 2>been allowed to do war. Yeah, I think they don't

0:31:07.640 --> 0:31:12.200
<v Speaker 2>deploy them, right, certainly not sixteen year olds, right, Yeah,

0:31:12.240 --> 0:31:15.080
<v Speaker 2>but then the the yeah, and it's I've often women

0:31:15.080 --> 0:31:16.920
<v Speaker 2>at She's from the YPKA, right, because they've come from

0:31:16.960 --> 0:31:19.760
<v Speaker 2>abusive homes, and they also make an FM not to

0:31:19.760 --> 0:31:20.080
<v Speaker 2>deploy it.

0:31:20.080 --> 0:31:21.600
<v Speaker 3>And I understand, yes, yes.

0:31:21.760 --> 0:31:25.360
<v Speaker 2>But you are theoretically you're allowed to deploy sixteen year olds, right, Yeah,

0:31:25.400 --> 0:31:30.720
<v Speaker 2>so at least as regards international law. So and then

0:31:30.720 --> 0:31:33.440
<v Speaker 2>of course we get to kind of some of the

0:31:33.720 --> 0:31:36.120
<v Speaker 2>some of our our final war crimes, which you know,

0:31:36.160 --> 0:31:38.920
<v Speaker 2>I haven't gone over a comprehensive list, but this gives

0:31:38.920 --> 0:31:41.440
<v Speaker 2>you a good list of the things covered, you know,

0:31:41.520 --> 0:31:46.480
<v Speaker 2>between the various different statutes and international agreements. Violation to

0:31:46.520 --> 0:31:49.240
<v Speaker 2>life in person in particular, murder of all kinds, mutilation,

0:31:49.360 --> 0:31:53.360
<v Speaker 2>cruel treatment and torture, committing outrageous upon personal dignity, in

0:31:53.400 --> 0:31:58.160
<v Speaker 2>particular humiliating or degrading treatment, which is maybe the most

0:31:58.280 --> 0:32:01.320
<v Speaker 2>common by numbers thing that I see happening at Gotza, right, certainly,

0:32:01.440 --> 0:32:04.920
<v Speaker 2>not like as it does, you know, the killing is

0:32:05.000 --> 0:32:08.520
<v Speaker 2>much more offensive, but like there's so many examples of

0:32:08.640 --> 0:32:12.760
<v Speaker 2>like outrages upon personal dignity, you know, the taking of hostages,

0:32:13.040 --> 0:32:15.760
<v Speaker 2>the passing of sentences, and the carrying out of executions

0:32:15.800 --> 0:32:19.800
<v Speaker 2>without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court. And

0:32:19.840 --> 0:32:24.000
<v Speaker 2>then you get to paragraph two, there's a note like

0:32:24.120 --> 0:32:25.720
<v Speaker 2>after this all of this stuff that like you're not

0:32:25.720 --> 0:32:28.080
<v Speaker 2>supposed to do violence to life in person, committing outrages

0:32:28.120 --> 0:32:32.360
<v Speaker 2>upon personal dignity, taking hostages, doing summary executions, and then

0:32:32.400 --> 0:32:34.320
<v Speaker 2>there's a note that like, this does not apply. This

0:32:34.360 --> 0:32:37.680
<v Speaker 2>applies only to armed conflicts and not situations of internal

0:32:37.680 --> 0:32:40.640
<v Speaker 2>disturbances and tensions such as riots, isolated and sporadic acts

0:32:40.640 --> 0:32:43.160
<v Speaker 2>of violence or other acts of a similar nature, which

0:32:43.200 --> 0:32:45.640
<v Speaker 2>is fun to me because it's like the international agreements like, well,

0:32:45.640 --> 0:32:47.240
<v Speaker 2>I mean, countries can do this to their own people

0:32:47.280 --> 0:32:49.640
<v Speaker 2>if they want, right, Like, that's not a problem, you know, go,

0:32:50.600 --> 0:32:53.280
<v Speaker 2>which I guess is probably we're in a gray area

0:32:53.320 --> 0:32:55.880
<v Speaker 2>with some of what Israel does to Palestinians here because

0:32:55.960 --> 0:32:58.760
<v Speaker 2>like one of the things that has been happening for

0:32:58.760 --> 0:33:00.400
<v Speaker 2>a long time is continue to happen, as there are

0:33:00.400 --> 0:33:03.360
<v Speaker 2>presently ninety five hundred at least Palestinians from the occupied

0:33:03.360 --> 0:33:06.280
<v Speaker 2>West Bank in captivity. Prior to October seventh, that was

0:33:06.320 --> 0:33:09.720
<v Speaker 2>just fifty two hundred people, so this escalated significantly after that.

0:33:10.160 --> 0:33:12.280
<v Speaker 2>Most of these were people who had been arrested before

0:33:12.400 --> 0:33:15.480
<v Speaker 2>for stuff literally like waving a flag or like posting

0:33:15.480 --> 0:33:18.720
<v Speaker 2>on social media in sympathy with Gaza. Fifteen of these

0:33:18.720 --> 0:33:21.880
<v Speaker 2>people have died since October seventh. A number of them

0:33:21.880 --> 0:33:24.360
<v Speaker 2>have been tortured and beaten. This is the kind of

0:33:24.400 --> 0:33:27.440
<v Speaker 2>thing that could be a warcrime, except for again you

0:33:27.520 --> 0:33:29.520
<v Speaker 2>have that little note that like this doesn't apply to

0:33:29.600 --> 0:33:32.000
<v Speaker 2>internal disturbances in the West Bank, you can say that

0:33:32.000 --> 0:33:37.440
<v Speaker 2>that's an internal disturbance, right, which is you know, shit, yeah, yeah,

0:33:37.200 --> 0:33:39.640
<v Speaker 2>I don't love that. That's the way that that works.

0:33:40.160 --> 0:33:43.680
<v Speaker 2>And yeah, it's one of those things. And another thing,

0:33:43.720 --> 0:33:45.800
<v Speaker 2>you know, to be fair here, one thing I should note,

0:33:45.800 --> 0:33:48.360
<v Speaker 2>because we're about to talk about the actual ICC investigation

0:33:48.480 --> 0:33:51.600
<v Speaker 2>that's going on, the taking of hostages is a war crime.

0:33:51.640 --> 0:33:54.720
<v Speaker 2>So it's there's been a lot of talk about because

0:33:54.760 --> 0:33:58.880
<v Speaker 2>there's been disinformation about how many civilians did Hamas kill, right,

0:33:58.960 --> 0:34:01.200
<v Speaker 2>like how many we had that bleak period if we

0:34:01.200 --> 0:34:03.400
<v Speaker 2>were arguing looking at dead babies and arguing where those

0:34:03.440 --> 0:34:06.680
<v Speaker 2>babies beheaded or their heads just come off because they burned?

0:34:06.720 --> 0:34:10.480
<v Speaker 2>To like, Hamas definitely committed war crimes, and we know

0:34:10.480 --> 0:34:13.160
<v Speaker 2>that because they admitted to them, because they the Hamas

0:34:13.160 --> 0:34:17.200
<v Speaker 2>does not deny that they took hostages. That's a war crime. Right. Again,

0:34:17.880 --> 0:34:20.400
<v Speaker 2>should you be as offended by the taking of hostages

0:34:20.480 --> 0:34:22.959
<v Speaker 2>as the killing of thirty five thousand people from the sky?

0:34:23.440 --> 0:34:25.360
<v Speaker 2>Well no, But I would also say that the taking

0:34:25.400 --> 0:34:28.200
<v Speaker 2>of hostages is not like tear gassing a sniper. I

0:34:28.280 --> 0:34:31.640
<v Speaker 2>think that that's bad. You shouldn't take civilian hostages. Yeah,

0:34:31.680 --> 0:34:34.400
<v Speaker 2>that makes sense as a war crime to me. Now

0:34:34.880 --> 0:34:37.280
<v Speaker 2>this kind of leads us to the crux of our discussion,

0:34:37.280 --> 0:34:40.360
<v Speaker 2>which is like, should you actually care about what a

0:34:40.400 --> 0:34:44.160
<v Speaker 2>war crime is and isn't right? And I'm gonna argue yes,

0:34:44.200 --> 0:34:46.719
<v Speaker 2>even though, as we've made the case here, it's not

0:34:46.800 --> 0:34:49.480
<v Speaker 2>a perfect thing. This is not a perfect Whether or

0:34:49.520 --> 0:34:51.279
<v Speaker 2>not something is a war crime does not make it

0:34:51.320 --> 0:34:54.200
<v Speaker 2>a perfect measure of morality. I don't think a soldier

0:34:54.600 --> 0:34:57.160
<v Speaker 2>tossing a tear gas grenade and a sniper because they

0:34:57.200 --> 0:34:59.719
<v Speaker 2>don't want to get shot by a sniper is like

0:34:59.840 --> 0:35:04.160
<v Speaker 2>a thing that is horrifying to me. And I do

0:35:04.239 --> 0:35:08.000
<v Speaker 2>think that, for example, the use of shrapnel shells is

0:35:08.040 --> 0:35:11.239
<v Speaker 2>horrifying to me, having seen what happens to people when

0:35:11.280 --> 0:35:14.000
<v Speaker 2>they get gutted by shrapnel. I don't think those are good,

0:35:14.840 --> 0:35:16.600
<v Speaker 2>and I know what I think is a worse thing

0:35:16.640 --> 0:35:19.120
<v Speaker 2>to do. But even with that taken into account, I

0:35:19.120 --> 0:35:21.279
<v Speaker 2>think that a lot of this does matter, and that

0:35:21.360 --> 0:35:25.680
<v Speaker 2>it is good that the ICC has recently announced a

0:35:25.719 --> 0:35:30.080
<v Speaker 2>set of warrants both against Benjamin Netanyahu and against three

0:35:30.360 --> 0:35:33.520
<v Speaker 2>Hamas leaders, right. And I saw some people saying when

0:35:33.520 --> 0:35:35.600
<v Speaker 2>this got announced that there were like these warrants against

0:35:35.600 --> 0:35:38.480
<v Speaker 2>these Hamas leaders alongside net Yahou and his defense minister.

0:35:38.600 --> 0:35:41.080
<v Speaker 2>You'll have gallant that like, oh, they're both sides in it. No,

0:35:41.760 --> 0:35:45.840
<v Speaker 2>Hamas took hostages. If the ICC is going after Israel

0:35:45.880 --> 0:35:48.319
<v Speaker 2>for its clear and obvious war crimes, we know that

0:35:48.360 --> 0:35:51.839
<v Speaker 2>Hamas took hostages. It's not wrong that the ICC would

0:35:51.840 --> 0:35:54.840
<v Speaker 2>issue a warrant there. That's their job, right, And I

0:35:54.880 --> 0:35:57.440
<v Speaker 2>think that that actually it's kind of important to do

0:35:57.480 --> 0:35:59.759
<v Speaker 2>that because if you don't, the Israelis are going to

0:35:59.760 --> 0:36:02.160
<v Speaker 2>be like, well, they took hostages, that's definitely a war crime.

0:36:02.200 --> 0:36:05.200
<v Speaker 2>The ICC is invalid because they're not prosecuting this now.

0:36:05.640 --> 0:36:09.440
<v Speaker 2>The reality is that not only has Israel is now

0:36:09.560 --> 0:36:11.200
<v Speaker 2>Israel kind of gearing up to go to war with

0:36:11.200 --> 0:36:13.319
<v Speaker 2>the International Criminal Court, that they have been doing that

0:36:13.440 --> 0:36:19.480
<v Speaker 2>for years prior to October seventh, right, and in fact,

0:36:19.840 --> 0:36:22.319
<v Speaker 2>a couple of years ago, I think in twenty twenty one,

0:36:22.480 --> 0:36:28.120
<v Speaker 2>the ICC launched an investigation into Israeli actions in Gaza.

0:36:28.280 --> 0:36:28.440
<v Speaker 1>Right.

0:36:28.680 --> 0:36:33.200
<v Speaker 2>This started when the former prosecutor of the ICC, Fatub

0:36:33.200 --> 0:36:37.520
<v Speaker 2>Bensuda made the call to like yes, start a formal investigation,

0:36:38.200 --> 0:36:40.920
<v Speaker 2>and that culminated a couple of weeks ago in the

0:36:41.120 --> 0:36:44.400
<v Speaker 2>ICC issuing an arrest warrant for Benjamin Nan Yahoo. And

0:36:44.480 --> 0:36:48.040
<v Speaker 2>when that process started, there is evidence that the former

0:36:48.080 --> 0:36:49.840
<v Speaker 2>head of the Massad, the guy who's running the massade

0:36:49.840 --> 0:36:54.640
<v Speaker 2>at the time, Yo C. Cohen, made contact with an

0:36:54.840 --> 0:36:58.440
<v Speaker 2>ICC prosecutor and basically threatened him. And I'm actually I'm

0:36:58.440 --> 0:37:01.080
<v Speaker 2>going to read a quote from a already an article here.

0:37:01.640 --> 0:37:04.279
<v Speaker 2>Cohen's personal involvement in the operation against the ICC took

0:37:04.320 --> 0:37:06.279
<v Speaker 2>place when he was the director of the Massad. His

0:37:06.320 --> 0:37:08.759
<v Speaker 2>activities were authorized at a high level and justified on

0:37:08.800 --> 0:37:11.600
<v Speaker 2>the basis the court posed a threat of prosecutions against

0:37:11.600 --> 0:37:15.800
<v Speaker 2>military personnel, according to a senior Israeli official. Another Israeli

0:37:15.840 --> 0:37:18.120
<v Speaker 2>source briefed on the operation against Bensuda said that the

0:37:18.120 --> 0:37:21.360
<v Speaker 2>Masad's objective was to compromise the prosecutor or enlist her

0:37:21.400 --> 0:37:24.040
<v Speaker 2>as someone who could cooperate with Israel's demands. A third

0:37:24.040 --> 0:37:26.120
<v Speaker 2>source familiar with the operation said Cohen was acting as

0:37:26.160 --> 0:37:29.920
<v Speaker 2>Netanya Who's unofficial messenger. Cohen, who was one of Netanyahu's

0:37:29.960 --> 0:37:31.719
<v Speaker 2>closest allies, at the time and is emerging as a

0:37:31.760 --> 0:37:34.399
<v Speaker 2>political force in his own right, and Israel personally led

0:37:34.400 --> 0:37:37.160
<v Speaker 2>the massault Asad's involvement in an almost decade long campaign

0:37:37.200 --> 0:37:40.360
<v Speaker 2>by the country to undermine the court. According to account

0:37:40.360 --> 0:37:42.600
<v Speaker 2>shared with ICC officials, he's alleged to have told her,

0:37:42.719 --> 0:37:44.680
<v Speaker 2>you should help us and let us take care of you.

0:37:44.680 --> 0:37:46.200
<v Speaker 2>You don't want to be getting into things that could

0:37:46.200 --> 0:37:49.080
<v Speaker 2>compromise your security or that of your family, which is

0:37:49.480 --> 0:37:53.120
<v Speaker 2>very much mob shit, right like, it couldn't be more

0:37:53.200 --> 0:37:56.279
<v Speaker 2>mob shit. And it's like, I don't actually think that

0:37:56.400 --> 0:37:59.520
<v Speaker 2>is a war crime. I don't even know, because I

0:37:59.520 --> 0:38:01.640
<v Speaker 2>guess they didn't even think anyone would do that, right

0:38:01.680 --> 0:38:04.319
<v Speaker 2>like that, you would just like, hey, you know, we

0:38:04.360 --> 0:38:09.279
<v Speaker 2>could break your fucking legs, you know, misprosecutor lady, like

0:38:09.400 --> 0:38:11.880
<v Speaker 2>we the Masad. I don't even know that that because

0:38:12.120 --> 0:38:14.960
<v Speaker 2>at least from my reading over of the Rome statutes,

0:38:15.000 --> 0:38:17.280
<v Speaker 2>that's not listed. Maybe they should add that one in there.

0:38:17.880 --> 0:38:20.680
<v Speaker 2>But yeah, this has been a brief overview of what

0:38:20.760 --> 0:38:23.400
<v Speaker 2>be a war crime. I hope you find this helpful

0:38:23.520 --> 0:38:25.560
<v Speaker 2>in your discussions of what be a war crime. But

0:38:25.600 --> 0:38:27.560
<v Speaker 2>I do kind of want to end on the note again,

0:38:28.239 --> 0:38:30.120
<v Speaker 2>does any of this matter. What's going to Well, no,

0:38:30.520 --> 0:38:32.759
<v Speaker 2>do I think that, like Benjamin that and Yahoo's going

0:38:32.800 --> 0:38:35.800
<v Speaker 2>to actually be taken to den Haag and fucking chains.

0:38:36.239 --> 0:38:39.239
<v Speaker 2>I mean maybe someday. Actually, I don't think that that's impossible.

0:38:39.239 --> 0:38:40.719
<v Speaker 2>I don't think we should give up hope for that,

0:38:41.280 --> 0:38:44.080
<v Speaker 2>and this is a necessary precursor to that. And I

0:38:44.080 --> 0:38:46.360
<v Speaker 2>think it's good. I think the evidence that this is valuable.

0:38:46.400 --> 0:38:48.239
<v Speaker 2>If you actually, if you want my best case for

0:38:48.360 --> 0:38:53.560
<v Speaker 2>why this matters, Israel spent ten years previous to the

0:38:53.600 --> 0:38:58.600
<v Speaker 2>announcement of this warrant running devoting MASAD resources to an

0:38:58.680 --> 0:39:03.200
<v Speaker 2>undergrand campaign to aboutage and threaten the ICC. That means

0:39:03.239 --> 0:39:07.000
<v Speaker 2>they see this as a threat. They consider prosecutions like

0:39:07.040 --> 0:39:10.880
<v Speaker 2>this to be dangerous to them, and that means you

0:39:10.880 --> 0:39:15.120
<v Speaker 2>should at least passively support what the ICC is doing here,

0:39:15.440 --> 0:39:21.080
<v Speaker 2>right Netan, Yahoo's regime considers this a threat to their operations,

0:39:21.200 --> 0:39:23.200
<v Speaker 2>to what they're doing in Gaza, and I think that's

0:39:23.320 --> 0:39:24.880
<v Speaker 2>enough of a reason to think that it's good.

0:39:25.640 --> 0:39:29.200
<v Speaker 3>Yeah. Yeah, they think it's going to stop them murdering civilians,

0:39:29.400 --> 0:39:31.680
<v Speaker 3>then yeah, it's good that we don't need to be

0:39:31.840 --> 0:39:35.120
<v Speaker 3>around the bush too much like anyway, Yeah, it would

0:39:35.120 --> 0:39:37.719
<v Speaker 3>be nice to see someone who wasn't from Africa prosecuted

0:39:37.760 --> 0:39:38.160
<v Speaker 3>at the Hague.

0:39:38.160 --> 0:39:40.040
<v Speaker 2>That would be hey, yeah, they got those Serbians, right,

0:39:40.080 --> 0:39:44.520
<v Speaker 2>they did get they got a couple of Yeah, yeah,

0:39:44.560 --> 0:39:47.680
<v Speaker 2>it's true. Uh yeah, yeah, let's throw an Israeli or too,

0:39:47.680 --> 0:39:49.680
<v Speaker 2>and they're and yeah, some of those some oscarys. I'm like,

0:39:49.719 --> 0:39:53.080
<v Speaker 2>look something, let's try to do something.

0:39:53.160 --> 0:39:53.319
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.

0:39:53.400 --> 0:39:56.160
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, maybe maybe let's let's make a statement that it's

0:39:56.160 --> 0:39:58.680
<v Speaker 3>bad to murder and kidnapped civilians.

0:39:58.719 --> 0:40:03.400
<v Speaker 2>It's bad to Yeah, I don't know. We're very critical

0:40:03.440 --> 0:40:05.160
<v Speaker 2>of the idea that there ever was a rules based

0:40:05.200 --> 0:40:07.680
<v Speaker 2>international order, but I think we should try that sometime.

0:40:08.520 --> 0:40:09.960
<v Speaker 3>It's pretty nice to have some rules.

0:40:10.200 --> 0:40:13.279
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Anyway, James, anything else to add before we cut

0:40:13.320 --> 0:40:13.680
<v Speaker 2>out here.

0:40:13.960 --> 0:40:15.280
<v Speaker 3>Don't engage in warar crimes.

0:40:15.800 --> 0:40:18.120
<v Speaker 2>Don't commit a war crime. Yeah, don't commit a war crime.

0:40:18.200 --> 0:40:19.160
<v Speaker 2>Avoid that if you can.

0:40:19.560 --> 0:40:22.320
<v Speaker 3>Don't engage in war if you don't have to, really.

0:40:22.200 --> 0:40:25.320
<v Speaker 2>Try to avoid war. Because one of the things reading

0:40:25.360 --> 0:40:27.759
<v Speaker 2>through this just I think about all the things I've

0:40:27.800 --> 0:40:30.040
<v Speaker 2>seen that I'm like, well, I could argue that that

0:40:30.160 --> 0:40:33.359
<v Speaker 2>was a war crime. You know, they happen a lot,

0:40:33.400 --> 0:40:36.239
<v Speaker 2>it turns out, or at least edge cases are most

0:40:36.280 --> 0:40:44.440
<v Speaker 2>of the things you see in war. Yes, anyway, We're done.

0:40:45.160 --> 0:40:47.520
<v Speaker 1>It could Happen here as a production of pool Zone Media.

0:40:47.760 --> 0:40:50.440
<v Speaker 1>For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website

0:40:50.480 --> 0:40:52.680
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0:40:52.719 --> 0:40:56.160
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0:40:56.560 --> 0:40:58.640
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0:41:01.960 --> 0:41:02.720
<v Speaker 1>Thanks for listening.