SlyenceWhat a weird way of saying “Israel and America are maliciously destroying civic targets with no military relevance”
https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/31/middleeast/iran-university-campus-attacks-intl
Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫@Slyence
Yeah it's not a front line if they can't shoot back, it's just a war crime.
Yeah it's not a front line if they can't shoot back, it's just a war crime.
@petealexharris I'm going to pedant for a moment, the ability to fight back has nothing to do with the validity of a target in war, rather it is a question of whether or not there is military value to the target
dual purpose infrastructure is a valid target under the laws of war, even if there are no military personnel present
however, universities are not generally considered 'dual purpose' so this is a no no (not that we live in a rules based order any more)
@Slyence
It's still not a front line.
As a completely different question, yes, there's a lot of grey area as to what's a legitimate target in defensive war, less so in an invasion or war of choice.
@petealexharris we need to differentiate jus ad bellum, or when war is just, from how war is conducted
the geneva and hague conventions focus on the HOW war is prosecuted - these are what define "war crimes"
the UN Charter is what governs just vs unjust wars, which are ultimately governed by the UNSC and individual state actions
this is a good thing! we want to encourage aggressor nations to fight within the bounds of the hague and geneva conventions
@petealexharris this is better than the alternative because the commonly accepted moral framework of war is "diplomacy by other means", using coercive military force to drive a nation state to capitulate to your demands
in a war, you ought to attack the capability of the state to wage war and to leave civilians alone as much as possible
now I realize we are getting far afield, but it's helpful to understand why ideas like a "front line" and who the aggressor/defender are don't matter here
@petealexharris it would not, broadly speaking, be a violation of the geneva or hague conventions in letter or spirit for israel or america to attack a civilian airport or its infrastructure deep in iran, since those are commonly accepted to be dual purpose military/civilian infrastructure
on the other hand, it would be against these conventions for iran to attack an israeli hospital, even one treating the war wounded
all parties of this conflict have broadly abandoned the conventions
@petealexharris and that's a shame, because the conventions like I said earlier were borne of longstanding efforts to 'tame the best' of war between states so as to minimize the number of wars of elimination that were fought
they have largely been successful across history, it's one of the great outrages of this administration that they have torched those efforts
@Slyence
Agreed. But of course none of the nations with a nuclear deterrent are abiding by this convention, as implicit within the doctrine of mutually-assured destruction is the idea that in an existential war, all bets are off.
When there's a disparity of force such that for one side it's existential, but all the more powerful aggressor needs to do to avoid more pain is go home, asymmetric escalation is inevitable.
VIVA LA MINNEAPOLÍS LIBRE@Slyence Israel destroyed Palestinian universities as part of their genocidal campaign.
It’s not enough to kill their family and friends, you need to kill their hope, their future, their chance of understanding the world around them. The Israelis and MAGAts scoff at the idea that Muslims should be allowed to improve their material conditions.
“You WILL be poor, you WILL be uneducated, you WILL be scared mentally and physically, and it’s what you deserve for not being a good white Christian “
DutchCheryl@Minnewegian @Slyence in the case of Palestine, it was about erasing their future, erasing the existence of the people of Palestine, which is playbook genocide. Let us please stop Israël asap, they cannot go on like this. 😔
@Minnewegian @Slyence and they have started the de-humanisation of the Palestinion people a long time ago. They aren't considered humans anymore, which is why appeals to common sense don't work. Again, it's playbook genocide. This is bad, so so bad.
Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)