Comment by shprd

Comment by shprd 2 days ago

20 replies

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> but the combatants holding those devices were at war, no?

The attack wasn't as targeted as you seem to think. It also hit health workers and bystanders. Approx half the casualties are civilians (including children).

According to Humans rights watch: https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/09/18/lebanon-exploding-pagers...

> Thousands of pagers simultaneously exploded across Lebanon and parts of Syria on September 17, 2024, resulting in at least 12 deaths, including at least two children and two health workers, and at least 2,800 injuries, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Health.

lelanthran 2 days ago

> Approx half the casualties are civilians

Citation needed for that. None of the news reports, even the heavily biased ones, have reported mass civilian casualties.

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  • shprd 2 days ago

    The citation, as requested:

      "two children and four health workers in a hospital in southern Beirut were among the 12 people who were killed on Tuesday."

  - Public Health Minister Firas Abiad in a press conference
    So that's 50% of those killed, right? and that's just health workers and children (who were 8 and 11 years old, btw). Also, there were multiple footage of the devices exploding among civilians in dense markets and grocery stores, so the percentage of civilians injured might be even higher.

    I expect more detailed reports will be shared over the next few days about the total casualty.

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    • lelanthran a day ago

      > So that's 50% of those killed, right?

      Wrong. You claimed:

      >>> Approx half the casualties are civilians

      Casualties doesn't mean "those who died", it means "Injured or killed".

      If you have to use a definition for a word that differs from the dictionary for your argument to work, it's your argument that is broken, not the dictionary.

      Your entire argument in this thread is based on not knowing what "casualty" means.

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      • shprd a day ago

        > Your entire argument in this thread is based on not knowing what "casualty" means.

        First let's acknowledge that at least 50% of those killed are civilians and many were also injured. That's a fact, you aren't debating that, right? When you mention `my entire argument` you just mean this part "Approx half the casualties are civilians" in my original comment, correct?

        What is the criteria for the evidence to satisfy your doubts? If you're demanding the government of Lebanon (or any other party) to classify Lebanese citizens who were admitted to hospitals based on their political agenda, then making such judgment is not possible even if they wanted to. To be frank, in the eyes of the government, they are all civilians, since many other political parties have arms too, if that's what you want. But of course, you don't agree with that classification and at the same time you've no counter-argument.

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    • dsauerbrun 2 days ago

      casualties refers to injuries as well as deaths. I think the citation they were looking for was for the ~2800 number. I don't think it's reasonable to say that 6/12 killed were civilians, so half of all casualties were civilian.

      We dont know until we get more reports, like you said, it could be higher... but it could also be lower.

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      • zeroimpl 11 hours ago

        This is a dumb position though because all logic would suggest the two ratios are proportional. Civilians are not significantly more likely to die of their injuries than non-civilians. While 12 is a bit of a small sample, it's not unreasonably small to make extrapolations.

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    • TwentyPosts a day ago

      Apart from the issue where this ignores how many people got injured (a much larger number), there's a very simple "survival bias" reason (ironically) why this argument doesn't work.

      Children (and potentially health workers, as opposed to men of fighting age) are much more likely to die of such an explosion than men of fighting age. In other words, children will be significantly overrepresented here.

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      • tga_d a day ago

        To just back up for a moment, your argument is that an attack that turned enemy combatants into unwitting suicide bombers in civilian areas with children doesn't qualify as terrorism, because children are easy to kill?

        Would you hold this opinion if it was an operation by Taliban fighters on US soldiers at home on leave?

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      • shprd a day ago

        Sorry to burst you theory:

        1. Hezbollah only mourned 10 out of the 26 killed so far, claiming them as members (one of them being a medic). So the 50% seems to still hold, even leaving some room for malice and mistakes.

        2. Most of the explosion incidents and injuries are coming from residential areas in Beirut so statistically the percentage of civilians injured as "collateral damage" is likely high considering many of those carrying these devices were going about their life, either with family or in public places at the time.

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        • jhanschoo 19 hours ago

          My opinion of Israel inclines me to distrust reporting based on its claims, and believe your statements. But I still would require a source for these claims, if you would kindly provide them.

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