How should this, and the apparently intentional strike on a consulate building, adjust our assessment of the IDFs kill-chain oversight and civilian casualty risk tolerance parameters?
Does this shift previous assements such as the "unarmed men" breakdown from last week?
I think it has to be taken on a case by case basis. I’m really not familiar with the Iranian strike, but I can only do so much. I have other things on my plate as well.
Israel claimed it waited for the consul general to get out of the building before hitting it. Regardless, it is the first time a diplomatic mission is intentionally targeted and destroyed. I really don't understand those who continue to argue that Israel respects international law.
The strike was against high ranking military personnel so it was a totally legitimate target. The list of casualties were only Iranian, Syrian and Hezbollah military personnel. Israel military spokesman claimed that technically the build that was hit was not the consulate itself, but that is just arguing whether Syrian or Iranian sovereign territory was hit.
I see. So you would be totally ok with the Iranians striking Galant and Gantz if they were in the military attaché annex to Israeli consulate in NYC. Perfectly legitimate target. You, because, technically, as you say, it is not like a diplomatic office in the Vienna Convention sense of the word.
1. "Would [you] be totally ok" is a fallacious argument. Of course I would not be totally ok with any strike on Israel, but not because it is illegal, and that is what we are arguing here.
2. There is a difference between military and political targets. A military target is a legitimate target wherever he is. Iran will fight Israel to the last drop of Arab blood but would rather not lose one drop of their own. This does not exempt their military commanders from being legitimate military targets in the ongoing war. That's what the Geneva convention says. And as regarding your question, the Minister of Defence and members of the War Cabinet may be a legitimate target as well.
3. A far as I understand, the Vienna Conventions only govern the relationship between the host country and the diplomatic mission. This is why I said that the issue here is the technicality whether Syrian or Iranian territory was attacked, not the legality of the attack vis a vis the Vienna Convention.
“Would you be ok with thenIranians striking Galant or Gantz” - do Israeli mobs chant “Death to Iran”? Does Israel plot terrorist attacks on Iranian civilians in the diaspora? Does Israel arm and train proxy militias abroad with the sole purpose to disrupt and terrorize?
The Iranian consulate strike was definitely 100% intentional and was aimed at and took out high ranking military personnel. Israel military spokesman claim that technically the build that was hit was not the consulate itself, but the targets were 100% legitimate military targets.
I can't do YT well on my phone and had to come back to your Patreon post to comment... At home it's not an issue...
Anyway I think Israel started this with revenge in mind... Never a good motivation for any military operation... It leads to mistakes that were hopefully unintentional... But they've been at this long enough now to realize it isn't working the way it was intended... The only thing they should focus on is the hostages...
UPDATED BASED ON Haaretz reporting. Unpopular and possible unwelcome opinion. I am not a smart person, never served, but I know people. As in I know how human beings act and when they are not being rational. Israel is not acting rationally right now. Which is what makes trying to rationalize what is going on incorrect. YES they were hit first. YES seeking some degree of revenge while illegal is a human response. What is going on now is beyond even that level of rationality. What will it take for you to see that? IS there anything Israel could do short of using nuclear weapons that would lead you to see that while the victims at first they are now the perpetrators?
ONE MORE THING: No, I didn't Just subscribe or something to say this. No one has said this yet but I'd wager $5 someone would've. I've supported Ryans work either by sharing and liking or by substack for quite some time. I will continue to. I just think he's way off on this issue. US Americans have certain historical biases baked into the cake. I am no different. It's hard to see past them without trying.
Whoever did this needs to be court martialed. From the sound of it that aid convoy was in constant contact with the war room that controlled the drone. While this was happening they told them they were under attack. IDF still attacked THREE TIMES. TREE TIMES is not an accident! It is not! This could not be any more brazen, and intentional. IF this is even 1/2 true this needs to lead to someone being sacked, someone being court martialed, someone going down HARD for a mistake like this.
This is a war. I’m not sure if you don’t understand wars or not but people die. Innocent people die. There’s never been a war where an innocent hasn’t died. In fact by every measure of civilian casualties, this urban war is an outlier in that the ratio of civilian to militant deaths is so even.
Your "this is a war" excuse would mean that everything done BY BOTH SIDES is fine. Which it clearly is not. right? Either your rule is a real rule and applies to everyone or it's just nonsense.
Maybe if more than 1% of Americans had ever served in the military, issues like the 'fog of war,' 'deconfliction,' and the reality of what actually happens during a war, especially during night ops, wouldn't be such foreign concepts to the majority of the American public, and media.
This statement would be great IF we didn't know that there was no fog of war here. According to Israeli media reports the very same war room that was in control of the drone was in real time communication with the convoy. Your explanation does not hold water. One does not need to have served to be able to read Haaretz.
Here's the thing. I have plenty of vets in my family. I never served myself but I learned one thing by talking to them. Sometimes ya'll get the idea that everyone else is a fool without eyes just because we haven't seen things your way. You know or may be the type.... the kind who will bring up vet status in a discussion where it is not super relevant. Maybe just maybe being hip deep in it has made your vision foggy? THAT MIGHT SOUND DISRESPECTFUL... but WITH ALL DUE RESPECT ... your entire statement was to basically tell the rest of us we are all fools who cannot read Haaretz.
It's super relevant being a vet. It's different when you're making these kind of decisions and a lot is riding on it. Haaretz is not definitive nor are their sources unimpeachable. It's just one reference point. Hontas claiming expertise because she read an article does not give her opinion anymore relevance. Thank you for your service.
No I've made plenty of mistakes. One time is a mistake. This was three strikes on three cars all while those clearly marked cars were in communication with the commander of that drone unit.
Listening to and reading news sources this morning here in Israel that based on the the initial investigation and leaks but pending the release of the complete official investigation, it appears that what happened is as follows:
Firstly it appears (surprise) that the Israeli management of foreign aid workers has been haphazard. It appears that there has not been a good channel of communication between COGAT and the guys doing the fighting. This is IMO probably a result of the Israeli attempt to support aid while pretending not to (or the opposite) and not just "yihye beseder" culture. New Hebrew phrase for you "lalekhet bli ulehargish im" = "to be without and feel with". The first step that was taken immediately after the initial investigation was to set up a central control room to improve coordination.
It also appears that the command was given on the level of the brigade which is apparently correct procedure.
I think that the regret being expressed in Israel is genuine. I have not seen any signs to the contrary in official or unofficial media that I read. There is absolutely no doubt that this was a tragic accident. There are extreme extra-political players (Kaplanist anti-Bibi) who are trying to make out that the accident was planned in order to "force" Israel to take full permanent military control of the Strip as all the civilian an foreign aid workers will leave. However I think that this weighs in a very unlikely. The collateral international damage to Israel is enormous and contrary to opinions I saw in the comments here, Israel is not irrational.
Rafi first I appreciate your view from the inside. Now understand the following. When one is part of a crowd doing what the crowd is doing might make total sense.
Meanwhile from the outside, from 1000 feet away a lone person can see the cliff they are headed towards.
Israel is heading towards a cliff. So many Americans have told you all this. Even Chuck Schumer senate Democrat leader and certainly not an anti-semite has told you all that.
Sure ignore everyone trying to talk sense to your country. Right now your countries best friend has been South Africa for trying to stop you from doing something that can never be undone, or lived down. The USA knows this well.
Israel is in an impossible position, squeezed between its allies and its foes - damned if it listens to its allies and damned it fights its foes. America could walk away from Afghanistan and Iraq and can pay off Iran, but we don't have that option. Yes it does look like we are headed for a cliff, but the alternative is to wait for the blazing flames to engulf us.
Very good post, Ryan, thank you. I have for some time believed that the high civilian casualty rate, the very high casualty rate of Journalists, the insistence of limiting food deliveries and other aid to Gaza, and the destruction of so much infrastructure (hospitals, schools, universities) and now this most recent event, all demonstrate what, to be kind, might be called a deliberate absence of care, or to be less kind, a racist disregard for Arab life.
Almost all Israeli’s grow up in Israel and they are subject throughout their lives to a false history regarding the 1948 war and propagandistic rhetoric about Palestinians. There is a reason that the population in general sees no problem at all with the military occupation of the West Bank or the second class citizen status of Israeli Arab citizens, or the expansion of settlements. They are generally comfortable with these things.
When you add to that the suicide bombings of the second Intifada, the fairly high representation of right-wing nationalists in the population, the cultural absorption of the Holocaust and of course the October 7th atrocities, you have a population (and a military made up of citizen soldiers) who are essentially racist (in American terms) towards Arabs in the first place, and filled with a sense of righteous revenge as a result of the traumas or October 7th in the second.
It is fairly well known that Israeli media does not show the footage of devastation and dead children in Gaza that we commonly see in the west. This is not because of censorship or government policy, but because the media executives consider in unpatriotic. They show feel good stories about the IDF, the hometown girls and boys on the front.
As for the IDF’s ability to actually investigate this kind of thing, the tragic shooting of the female journalist Abu Akleh on the West Bank never resulted in any IDF soldier being disciplined or even identified, or the death of 23 year old American activist Rachel Corrie, crushed by an IDF bulldozer in Gaza was never explained or a soldier disciplined for that. All the “investigation” determined was that the driver “never saw her” despite the fact that she was wearing day-glow clothing and yelling through a megaphone.
What all of this adds up to, in my mind, is a fairly substantial reduction in care at the professional military level, evidently at all levels. There is just too much of this going on too often for it to be well intentioned human error.
Ahh, Roberts half truths and made up reality. Still SMH. It's not that you don't like Israel that I find offensive but your fractured fairy tales and unsubstantiated fairly well knows. Most of which are just made up.
Thanks for your response to my post. What parts of my post do you feel are inaccurate or made up? Everything I wrote is substantiated in many places. And I lived in Israel with my family for some time and I have worked there many times. Can you be specific?
Not much of an answer, Craig. Can you specifically point to something in my post that you think is false or fabricated? The Al Jezeera comment says nothing but condemns by an association that does not exist. If you mean by "shaded" that I have an opinion that differs from yours, you should point out what it is you find shaded or incorrect or whatever. Saying "Pretty much all of it..." is not an answer. Have a little courage of your opinion and stand up for it. Otherwise you are just bloviating.
I see you now have gotten to the point of name calling. You just can't handle the truth. You give a fractured and obviously overtly bias opinion and instead of backing it up with sources you attack me for pointing out your propaganda. "Bloviating" coming from you I will take as a complement.
With respect, I think you have been calling me a liar based on nothing at all other than your own subjective sense of what was or was not correct. I am describing a lot of Israeli history that is hardly disputed. The racist nature of the general population is fairly well known to anyone who has spent time on the West Bank or Gaza or among Arab Israeli citizens. This racism is why so many refer to Israel as an apartheid state, it is hardly original to me. I worked in Israel as a journalist and saw most of this stuff first hand. An Israeli psychiatrist described the expulsion of the Palestinians in the 1948 war as “Israel’s original sin” because most Israeli’s were unable to own it, preferring the propaganda they heard from their own government as school children. I could go on at great length about things I witnessed first hand or things that were described to me by both Israeli Jews and Arabs. What you are clinging to is a common fantasy of an imagined Israel, not the actual place. Have you ever lived in Israel or spent time in the West Bank or Gaza? If not, you may want to take a trip and educate yourself. But be careful driving around Gaza because somebody might "accidentally" shoot at you from a drone...
A little accidental on purpose sort of thing. Nah. This was just either incompetence or malice or both. To some in the IDF feeding todays little Palestinian children is feeding tomorrows militants.
The thing is... Bibi doesn't want humanitarian aid in Gaza, right?
> high-ranking Israeli officials, including Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and Energy Minister Israel Katz have made public statements expressing their aim to deprive civilians in Gaza of food, water and fuel – statements reflecting a policy being carried out by Israeli forces.[1]
These two are from Bibi's party, Likud:
> Yoav Gallant said: “We are imposing a complete siege on [Gaza]. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel – everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we must act accordingly.”
> Israel Katz, who reported that he ordered the cuts to electricity and water, said on October 11: “For years, we have given Gaza electricity, water, and fuel. Instead of a thank you, they sent thousands of human animals to butcher, murder, rape and kidnap babies, women and elderly people. This is why we have decided to cut off the supply of water, electricity and fuel, and now, the local power plant has collapsed, and there is no electricity in Gaza. We will keep holding a tight siege until the Hamas threat is lifted from Israel and the world. What has been will be no more.”
The third is far right, but still a government minister:
> Ben-Gvir said in a tweet on October 17, “So long as Hamas does not release the hostages – the only thing that should enter Gaza is hundreds of tons of air force explosives – not an ounce of humanitarian aid.”
So, like Percy in The Green Mile "forgetting" to soak the sponge in water, one is led to the hypothesis that perhaps a politically-motivated IDF member "forgot" to deconflict the aid convey to scare off future aid work.
The leadership is under a lot of pressure to let some aid in. An individual soldier with similar political alignment isn't necessarily going to make the same decisions as the leadership. Edit: also, given how the case of Shireen Abu Akleh was handled, a soldier may expect his superiors to shrug it off, accepting whatever plausible deniability he offers. So to be clear, I'm not suggesting there's a conspiracy; I'm suggesting there might be a culture of impunity. The overall "thirst & hunger seige" strategy, the demand for half a million civilians to evacuate in 24 hours (without offering any homes for them to go to), and a number of other things suggest an extreme callousness that would be consistent with such a culture. I'll be watching to see whether the investigation leads to anything...
"then why not just deny WCK access into the country."
Because denying aid workers into Gaza makes Israel look really bad for public relations optics. But a missile strike on an aid convoy that the IDF can pass off as an innocent mistake accomplishes their goal to block food from getting into Gaza by aid organizations. That's another explanation.
it's like their nuclear arsenal. The neither confirm nor deny policy in order to keep things vague and therefore always open-ended. Never reaching a resolution. queue in, "the peace process"...
Ryan, doesn't Israel want to ban the UNRWA and replace it with a new aid delivery system? Surely, that is the reason Israel was so accommodating of the WCK. But a lack of discipline by the Israeli military (I know it hurts, but rip that bandaid off---it will heal) and the lack of a plan for Gaza by the Israeli government (except for the ethnic cleansing fantasies of the settler movement) have made the mess of Gaza that it is.
I'm not being harder on Israel than I have been on my own US of A. We have hurled ourselves off the deep end into neverending conflict with no goal in sight many, many times. We invented free-fire zones.
Israel is not an individual but a democratic state. So your assessment that they are not acting rationally while it has some merit needs to be tempered. There are some real hard liners in BiBi's government but it is a coalition government now. With Benny Gantz on the war cabinet a more moderate and cooler head. While your scenario is possible it doesn't sound like what I've been hearing. I think that you can find a lot of info. that will support almost any position you want to posit on the situation. While I'm sure there are some reacting as you suggest I think the vast majority are tired. Going on six months is exhausting. While in the early part of the war on Hamas there was a lot of anger that is hard to maintain over the long haul. Unfortunately, HRW is just as biased and compromised as UNRWA so maybe find a better source. It's much more to Hamas advantage and there blatant disregard of human life to have a hunger crisis. Remember, you are dealing with an entity that does nothing to protect there citizens and acts to maximize civilian casualties in all cases.
I did not suggest "they are not acting rationally" so perhaps you meant to reply to... Hontas? But an amalgamation of people isn't necessarily going to act rationally, and I don't even expect that much rationality from individuals in the first place (and to be clear, individuals are what I'm talking about)
> It's much more to Hamas advantage and there blatant disregard of human life to have a hunger crisis.
No one's denying the evils of Hamas, but you speak as if there are only two parties in Gaza, IDF vs Hamas, which is precisely the sort of thinking that might lead an individual to "forget" that an aid convoy was scheduled for this evening.
Was replying to Hontas as she replied to me earlier. I think I am reminding people that Israeli's and Hamas are fighting and Hamas is the government of Gaza elected by the population of Gaza and started the latest round of fighting. Hontas seemed to think they were some small group that diverted money for humanitarian purposes and built hundreds on miles of tunnels to protect themselves and their Army.
Saying Hamas is democratically elected is like saying Putin is democratically elected. If Hamas thought they would win re-election, why have they consistently refused to hold elections? At least Putin has enough sense to pretend to have elections. FWIW, just before the Oct 7 attacks, Gazans were asked how much they trust they had in Hamas, and it wasn't much.[1]
Even back in 2006, Hamas received only 44.45% of the popular vote despite running under the vote-grabbing name "Change and Reform".[2]
Even in a hypothetical scenario when there had been a free and fair election in 2023 with Hamas winning 51% of the vote, I would still object to any† implication that it's okay for Israel to starve everybody else who *didn't* vote for Hamas (and it would *still* be a supermajority of the population who didn't vote for Hamas in that hypothetical).
† edit: changed "the" to "any"; apologies if you agree that this is not okay.
Precisely. The fact a country is or is not a democracy does not make it good or bad. We value democracy in the USA and in the west more generally. However, democracies have done horrible things too. The US was a democracy and had millions of people treated as property for 80 years, then as second class citizens for another 100 or so. A state of affairs that only really ended 40-50 years ago now in the late 1960's to early 1970's. Millions of people, including my parents, are still alive from those times.
Israel being a democracy or even if Hamas and the PNA held regular elections would not make them better by default. IF the electorate chooses and is ok with such barbarity if anything thats worse. It means the people of a country have bought into it.
The question that I am arguing is who is responsible. In the case of what happened to the convoy Israel took responsibility. As to the over situation in Gaza and the lack of food supplies we can point fingers all over. But it seems that Hamas and other groups have been disrupting supplying food especially in the North. Where is your condemnation of them. Oh, In parliamentary governments things work a bit different. Basically, it ended up being a power sharing agreement where Fatah took the West Bank and Hamas took Gaza. Nothing is that clear cut just because it's not Democracy the way we judge it doesn't mean that they were not the government of Gaza. Despite all the finger pointing I think that Hamas holds a lot of the responsibility for the humanitarian disaster. Personally, I have not seen Hamas, Islamic Jihad or Al Quds work for the best interest of the people of Gaza.
I condemn Hamas all the time. They seem to me like a bunch of terrorist dickheads that commit lots of crimes, and the only upside to this whole situation is that some of those killers will be dead.
Responsibility, though? I believe that with great power comes great responsibility. Who has had the most power in the last couple of generations? Israel, by a wide margin. Who doesn't want a two-state solution nor a one-state solution? Bibi and friends. Just what does it mean to permanently reject both two-state and one-state solutions, hmm? What outcome was Bibi trying to achieve that way? How do you justify that? And what has Israel done in the last 17+ years to restore democracy to Gaza?
Antisemitism is the "goto" tactic by pro-Israel groups to shut any discussion on Israel that is not 100% aligned with the Israeli extreme right. Hence my rhetorical mention as I noticed that the overwhelming majority of subscribers are pretty right wing. As to the Israeli organizations, I thought it was evident that I was referring to Israeli rights organizations since the topic was about violation of rights during war.
I'm not right wing at all. I also see much more open Antisemitism on the left these days, though there has always been an undercurrent. I didn't see anything here you said that I would construe that way. I listened to 2 of your YouTube interviews. Found the one with Peter Beinart interesting. There is a lot passion and a lot of propaganda that is meant to be triggering. I try not the be triggered and understand how upsetting this conflict can be. Not always successful.
Being a democractic country does not mean acting rationally. A large crowd is not necessarily a rational crowd. Israels people have been under threat for a long time. Then a FACTION....just a faction that's a fraction of Gaza invades and ... had they wanted to could've cut Israel in half. They must be terrified of what would happen if the Palestinians and Israeli Arabs decided to take over. MUCH as the US was a democracy before 1860 YET did not act rationally due to fear of a "servile uprising".
Didn't say that being Democratic means you react rationally. But it generally does moderate the action. The rest of your reply is not very clear. Hamas is the government of Gaza. So it isn't a Faction that's a Fraction. It was popularly elected at one point. Cut in half not likely and not even close to happening. I will concede that what Hamas the acting government of Gaza did was to plan an incursion that used rape, torture and murder of civilians to spark a reaction. There is no doubt that Hamas wanted to incite a severe reaction and they got it. Which was popular supported by the Palestinian public. https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-palestinians-opinion-poll-wartime-views-a0baade915619cd070b5393844bc4514 Can't make this stuff up.
This is a bit too conspiratorial but then also not enough. The idea would be to make it look like Hammas attacked the convoy. Then say see these awful people did this. Better not allow you in... for your safety. Then that would be too rational, brutal, but also rational, and I don't think Israel is a rational actor right now.
Did you not watch the video? FYI, night is dark, and markings on vehicles are not visible in the dark. And mis- and breakdown in communications are not uncommon, Also, if you are targeting what you think, even mistakenly, is an enemy 'convoy,' with limited aerial resources, you pick them off one by one (preferably the tail first, then the lead, & then the middle ones). Will be interesting to find out what the details of the communications between the convoy & the drone unit really were. And by the way, even if the vehicle markings had been visible, that's not dispositive since terrorists organizations, like Hamas, frequently masquerade themselves as humanitarian operations.
I don't think it is fair to call the IDF conduct stupid. Wars and militaries are extremely complex and there are literally millions of things happening at any one moment. Anyone who has served knows that coordination is never perfect and can never be perfect.
Let's compare the WCK strike with Kunduz 2015
WCK: pitch dark, convoy travelling in active war zone, Hamas documented use of civilian transport for military reasons, three missiles launched over a period of about a minute by an NCO drone operator.
Kunduz 2015: partial moonlight, fixed hospital at known location, 211 shells fired over a period of 1 hour under command of a USAF officer (I believe Major or Lt. Col).
The US failure was orders of magnitudes worse than the IDF. Since the US had no interest in attacking a random hospital, we can see that even the world's best soldiers under command of smart people under no pressure make mistakes.
What probably happened in WCK was that the deconfliction message did not reach the drone unit. Considering that there were likely hundreds, maybe thousands, messages that night and that there were multiple soldiers involved (some trainees, some or all exhausted), one failed message delivery is reasonable.
The idea of an IR strobe is great but Hamas will steal them. Best would be that each vehicle have an Israeli with radio beacon to ascertain that no Hamas guys are in the vehicle and a US marine whose presence will prevent the Israeli from being kidnapped or murdered.
This event is tragic and like Ryan says Israel needs to do better. I await more info. before I judge. The real shame is that World Central Kitchen has been making a difference and as the news reports on the building of the jetty Israel was assisting. Thanks Ryan for your assessment.
This morning, April 5, 2024, the New York Times printed a story headlined "String of Israeli Errors Led to Fatal Attack on Aid Convoy, Military” (Saysthttps://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/05/world/middleeast/israel-military-world-central-kitchen-strike.html). According to the Times, your analysis of what may have happened is right on. Great job Ryan, keep up the good work.
Read Lord Acton's letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, the famous "Power corrupts" letter.
Then read, "Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will" by Robert M. Sapolsky, Ph.D. and pay attention to the neurophysiology and genetics of decision making.
Since there wasn't any consequences for the decision makers of our drone attack on August 29, 2021 drone strike in Kabul that killed 10 Afghan civilians, including seven children. I don't see where we can demand Israel to do much for their "mistake."
Since, I have read (not fact checked yet) that there were actually three vehicles of employees of this group. All three were attacked and the other two vehicles were armored. Persons in the armored vehicles survived. All were clearly marked. I have not had a chance to confirm this from any other sources yet. So much misinformation out there. Can anyone confirm or refute these facts?
How should this, and the apparently intentional strike on a consulate building, adjust our assessment of the IDFs kill-chain oversight and civilian casualty risk tolerance parameters?
Does this shift previous assements such as the "unarmed men" breakdown from last week?
I think it has to be taken on a case by case basis. I’m really not familiar with the Iranian strike, but I can only do so much. I have other things on my plate as well.
Rgr. Good luck with what I'm sure are multiple additional taskings! I'll stand by and hope to hear your take on the issue if time permits.
And thanks for linking the WCK donation page.
Israel claimed it waited for the consul general to get out of the building before hitting it. Regardless, it is the first time a diplomatic mission is intentionally targeted and destroyed. I really don't understand those who continue to argue that Israel respects international law.
The strike was against high ranking military personnel so it was a totally legitimate target. The list of casualties were only Iranian, Syrian and Hezbollah military personnel. Israel military spokesman claimed that technically the build that was hit was not the consulate itself, but that is just arguing whether Syrian or Iranian sovereign territory was hit.
I see. So you would be totally ok with the Iranians striking Galant and Gantz if they were in the military attaché annex to Israeli consulate in NYC. Perfectly legitimate target. You, because, technically, as you say, it is not like a diplomatic office in the Vienna Convention sense of the word.
Several points here:
1. "Would [you] be totally ok" is a fallacious argument. Of course I would not be totally ok with any strike on Israel, but not because it is illegal, and that is what we are arguing here.
2. There is a difference between military and political targets. A military target is a legitimate target wherever he is. Iran will fight Israel to the last drop of Arab blood but would rather not lose one drop of their own. This does not exempt their military commanders from being legitimate military targets in the ongoing war. That's what the Geneva convention says. And as regarding your question, the Minister of Defence and members of the War Cabinet may be a legitimate target as well.
3. A far as I understand, the Vienna Conventions only govern the relationship between the host country and the diplomatic mission. This is why I said that the issue here is the technicality whether Syrian or Iranian territory was attacked, not the legality of the attack vis a vis the Vienna Convention.
“Would you be ok with thenIranians striking Galant or Gantz” - do Israeli mobs chant “Death to Iran”? Does Israel plot terrorist attacks on Iranian civilians in the diaspora? Does Israel arm and train proxy militias abroad with the sole purpose to disrupt and terrorize?
I don’t know why anyone cares if they do. International law is bullshit, has no teeth, and never prevents anything.
The Iranian consulate strike was definitely 100% intentional and was aimed at and took out high ranking military personnel. Israel military spokesman claim that technically the build that was hit was not the consulate itself, but the targets were 100% legitimate military targets.
When you say "intentional" do you mean: "IDF launched missiles to destroy the vehicles" or "IDF wanted to kill UK civilians working for WCK"?
Intentional targeting of a diplomatic building at the consulate. At the time of my comment Israel had not clarified that this was a deliberate strike.
I can't do YT well on my phone and had to come back to your Patreon post to comment... At home it's not an issue...
Anyway I think Israel started this with revenge in mind... Never a good motivation for any military operation... It leads to mistakes that were hopefully unintentional... But they've been at this long enough now to realize it isn't working the way it was intended... The only thing they should focus on is the hostages...
UPDATED BASED ON Haaretz reporting. Unpopular and possible unwelcome opinion. I am not a smart person, never served, but I know people. As in I know how human beings act and when they are not being rational. Israel is not acting rationally right now. Which is what makes trying to rationalize what is going on incorrect. YES they were hit first. YES seeking some degree of revenge while illegal is a human response. What is going on now is beyond even that level of rationality. What will it take for you to see that? IS there anything Israel could do short of using nuclear weapons that would lead you to see that while the victims at first they are now the perpetrators?
ONE MORE THING: No, I didn't Just subscribe or something to say this. No one has said this yet but I'd wager $5 someone would've. I've supported Ryans work either by sharing and liking or by substack for quite some time. I will continue to. I just think he's way off on this issue. US Americans have certain historical biases baked into the cake. I am no different. It's hard to see past them without trying.
UPDATE. https://www.msn.com/he-il/news/other/idf-drone-bombed-world-central-kitchen-aid-convoy-three-times-targeting-armed-hamas-member-who-wasn-t-there/ar-BB1kW95F
Whoever did this needs to be court martialed. From the sound of it that aid convoy was in constant contact with the war room that controlled the drone. While this was happening they told them they were under attack. IDF still attacked THREE TIMES. TREE TIMES is not an accident! It is not! This could not be any more brazen, and intentional. IF this is even 1/2 true this needs to lead to someone being sacked, someone being court martialed, someone going down HARD for a mistake like this.
This is a war. I’m not sure if you don’t understand wars or not but people die. Innocent people die. There’s never been a war where an innocent hasn’t died. In fact by every measure of civilian casualties, this urban war is an outlier in that the ratio of civilian to militant deaths is so even.
I reject that because by that logic every atrocity ever was actually just fine. That is not true , therefore what you just said is not true.
Well there’s no atrocity currently taking place by any measure of the standard so your entire premise is faulty.
Your "this is a war" excuse would mean that everything done BY BOTH SIDES is fine. Which it clearly is not. right? Either your rule is a real rule and applies to everyone or it's just nonsense.
Maybe if more than 1% of Americans had ever served in the military, issues like the 'fog of war,' 'deconfliction,' and the reality of what actually happens during a war, especially during night ops, wouldn't be such foreign concepts to the majority of the American public, and media.
This statement would be great IF we didn't know that there was no fog of war here. According to Israeli media reports the very same war room that was in control of the drone was in real time communication with the convoy. Your explanation does not hold water. One does not need to have served to be able to read Haaretz.
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-04-02/ty-article/.premium/idf-bombed-wck-aid-convoy-3-times-targeting-armed-hamas-member-who-wasnt-there/0000018e-9e75-d764-adff-9eff29360000
Here's the thing. I have plenty of vets in my family. I never served myself but I learned one thing by talking to them. Sometimes ya'll get the idea that everyone else is a fool without eyes just because we haven't seen things your way. You know or may be the type.... the kind who will bring up vet status in a discussion where it is not super relevant. Maybe just maybe being hip deep in it has made your vision foggy? THAT MIGHT SOUND DISRESPECTFUL... but WITH ALL DUE RESPECT ... your entire statement was to basically tell the rest of us we are all fools who cannot read Haaretz.
So congratulations to you and your family for never have miscommunicated, misread things, or made mistakes. You are truly exceptional.
It's super relevant being a vet. It's different when you're making these kind of decisions and a lot is riding on it. Haaretz is not definitive nor are their sources unimpeachable. It's just one reference point. Hontas claiming expertise because she read an article does not give her opinion anymore relevance. Thank you for your service.
No I've made plenty of mistakes. One time is a mistake. This was three strikes on three cars all while those clearly marked cars were in communication with the commander of that drone unit.
Listening to and reading news sources this morning here in Israel that based on the the initial investigation and leaks but pending the release of the complete official investigation, it appears that what happened is as follows:
Firstly it appears (surprise) that the Israeli management of foreign aid workers has been haphazard. It appears that there has not been a good channel of communication between COGAT and the guys doing the fighting. This is IMO probably a result of the Israeli attempt to support aid while pretending not to (or the opposite) and not just "yihye beseder" culture. New Hebrew phrase for you "lalekhet bli ulehargish im" = "to be without and feel with". The first step that was taken immediately after the initial investigation was to set up a central control room to improve coordination.
It also appears that the command was given on the level of the brigade which is apparently correct procedure.
I think that the regret being expressed in Israel is genuine. I have not seen any signs to the contrary in official or unofficial media that I read. There is absolutely no doubt that this was a tragic accident. There are extreme extra-political players (Kaplanist anti-Bibi) who are trying to make out that the accident was planned in order to "force" Israel to take full permanent military control of the Strip as all the civilian an foreign aid workers will leave. However I think that this weighs in a very unlikely. The collateral international damage to Israel is enormous and contrary to opinions I saw in the comments here, Israel is not irrational.
Rafi first I appreciate your view from the inside. Now understand the following. When one is part of a crowd doing what the crowd is doing might make total sense.
Meanwhile from the outside, from 1000 feet away a lone person can see the cliff they are headed towards.
Israel is heading towards a cliff. So many Americans have told you all this. Even Chuck Schumer senate Democrat leader and certainly not an anti-semite has told you all that.
Sure ignore everyone trying to talk sense to your country. Right now your countries best friend has been South Africa for trying to stop you from doing something that can never be undone, or lived down. The USA knows this well.
Israel is in an impossible position, squeezed between its allies and its foes - damned if it listens to its allies and damned it fights its foes. America could walk away from Afghanistan and Iraq and can pay off Iran, but we don't have that option. Yes it does look like we are headed for a cliff, but the alternative is to wait for the blazing flames to engulf us.
Very good post, Ryan, thank you. I have for some time believed that the high civilian casualty rate, the very high casualty rate of Journalists, the insistence of limiting food deliveries and other aid to Gaza, and the destruction of so much infrastructure (hospitals, schools, universities) and now this most recent event, all demonstrate what, to be kind, might be called a deliberate absence of care, or to be less kind, a racist disregard for Arab life.
Almost all Israeli’s grow up in Israel and they are subject throughout their lives to a false history regarding the 1948 war and propagandistic rhetoric about Palestinians. There is a reason that the population in general sees no problem at all with the military occupation of the West Bank or the second class citizen status of Israeli Arab citizens, or the expansion of settlements. They are generally comfortable with these things.
When you add to that the suicide bombings of the second Intifada, the fairly high representation of right-wing nationalists in the population, the cultural absorption of the Holocaust and of course the October 7th atrocities, you have a population (and a military made up of citizen soldiers) who are essentially racist (in American terms) towards Arabs in the first place, and filled with a sense of righteous revenge as a result of the traumas or October 7th in the second.
It is fairly well known that Israeli media does not show the footage of devastation and dead children in Gaza that we commonly see in the west. This is not because of censorship or government policy, but because the media executives consider in unpatriotic. They show feel good stories about the IDF, the hometown girls and boys on the front.
As for the IDF’s ability to actually investigate this kind of thing, the tragic shooting of the female journalist Abu Akleh on the West Bank never resulted in any IDF soldier being disciplined or even identified, or the death of 23 year old American activist Rachel Corrie, crushed by an IDF bulldozer in Gaza was never explained or a soldier disciplined for that. All the “investigation” determined was that the driver “never saw her” despite the fact that she was wearing day-glow clothing and yelling through a megaphone.
What all of this adds up to, in my mind, is a fairly substantial reduction in care at the professional military level, evidently at all levels. There is just too much of this going on too often for it to be well intentioned human error.
Ahh, Roberts half truths and made up reality. Still SMH. It's not that you don't like Israel that I find offensive but your fractured fairy tales and unsubstantiated fairly well knows. Most of which are just made up.
Thanks for your response to my post. What parts of my post do you feel are inaccurate or made up? Everything I wrote is substantiated in many places. And I lived in Israel with my family for some time and I have worked there many times. Can you be specific?
Pretty much all of it is shaded or half truths or outright fabrication. Sounds like you just copy Al Jezeera talking points. Just saying.......
Not much of an answer, Craig. Can you specifically point to something in my post that you think is false or fabricated? The Al Jezeera comment says nothing but condemns by an association that does not exist. If you mean by "shaded" that I have an opinion that differs from yours, you should point out what it is you find shaded or incorrect or whatever. Saying "Pretty much all of it..." is not an answer. Have a little courage of your opinion and stand up for it. Otherwise you are just bloviating.
I see you now have gotten to the point of name calling. You just can't handle the truth. You give a fractured and obviously overtly bias opinion and instead of backing it up with sources you attack me for pointing out your propaganda. "Bloviating" coming from you I will take as a complement.
With respect, I think you have been calling me a liar based on nothing at all other than your own subjective sense of what was or was not correct. I am describing a lot of Israeli history that is hardly disputed. The racist nature of the general population is fairly well known to anyone who has spent time on the West Bank or Gaza or among Arab Israeli citizens. This racism is why so many refer to Israel as an apartheid state, it is hardly original to me. I worked in Israel as a journalist and saw most of this stuff first hand. An Israeli psychiatrist described the expulsion of the Palestinians in the 1948 war as “Israel’s original sin” because most Israeli’s were unable to own it, preferring the propaganda they heard from their own government as school children. I could go on at great length about things I witnessed first hand or things that were described to me by both Israeli Jews and Arabs. What you are clinging to is a common fantasy of an imagined Israel, not the actual place. Have you ever lived in Israel or spent time in the West Bank or Gaza? If not, you may want to take a trip and educate yourself. But be careful driving around Gaza because somebody might "accidentally" shoot at you from a drone...
In my mind, that was an intentional mistake. "Oop, so sorry." They want to disrupt all aid to Gaza.
A little accidental on purpose sort of thing. Nah. This was just either incompetence or malice or both. To some in the IDF feeding todays little Palestinian children is feeding tomorrows militants.
The thing is... Bibi doesn't want humanitarian aid in Gaza, right?
> high-ranking Israeli officials, including Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and Energy Minister Israel Katz have made public statements expressing their aim to deprive civilians in Gaza of food, water and fuel – statements reflecting a policy being carried out by Israeli forces.[1]
These two are from Bibi's party, Likud:
> Yoav Gallant said: “We are imposing a complete siege on [Gaza]. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel – everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we must act accordingly.”
> Israel Katz, who reported that he ordered the cuts to electricity and water, said on October 11: “For years, we have given Gaza electricity, water, and fuel. Instead of a thank you, they sent thousands of human animals to butcher, murder, rape and kidnap babies, women and elderly people. This is why we have decided to cut off the supply of water, electricity and fuel, and now, the local power plant has collapsed, and there is no electricity in Gaza. We will keep holding a tight siege until the Hamas threat is lifted from Israel and the world. What has been will be no more.”
The third is far right, but still a government minister:
> Ben-Gvir said in a tweet on October 17, “So long as Hamas does not release the hostages – the only thing that should enter Gaza is hundreds of tons of air force explosives – not an ounce of humanitarian aid.”
So, like Percy in The Green Mile "forgetting" to soak the sponge in water, one is led to the hypothesis that perhaps a politically-motivated IDF member "forgot" to deconflict the aid convey to scare off future aid work.
[1] https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/12/18/israel-starvation-used-weapon-war-gaza
Yeah, but then why not just deny WCK access into the country. Save a lot of time. Good analogy of Percy and the sponge, though.
The leadership is under a lot of pressure to let some aid in. An individual soldier with similar political alignment isn't necessarily going to make the same decisions as the leadership. Edit: also, given how the case of Shireen Abu Akleh was handled, a soldier may expect his superiors to shrug it off, accepting whatever plausible deniability he offers. So to be clear, I'm not suggesting there's a conspiracy; I'm suggesting there might be a culture of impunity. The overall "thirst & hunger seige" strategy, the demand for half a million civilians to evacuate in 24 hours (without offering any homes for them to go to), and a number of other things suggest an extreme callousness that would be consistent with such a culture. I'll be watching to see whether the investigation leads to anything...
"then why not just deny WCK access into the country."
Because denying aid workers into Gaza makes Israel look really bad for public relations optics. But a missile strike on an aid convoy that the IDF can pass off as an innocent mistake accomplishes their goal to block food from getting into Gaza by aid organizations. That's another explanation.
Yea that makes sense. Denying access looks worse than killing the aid workers. You’re a genius.
That would make sense if Israel was under the belief people were inclined to believe it could be a mistake
it's like their nuclear arsenal. The neither confirm nor deny policy in order to keep things vague and therefore always open-ended. Never reaching a resolution. queue in, "the peace process"...
Ryan, doesn't Israel want to ban the UNRWA and replace it with a new aid delivery system? Surely, that is the reason Israel was so accommodating of the WCK. But a lack of discipline by the Israeli military (I know it hurts, but rip that bandaid off---it will heal) and the lack of a plan for Gaza by the Israeli government (except for the ethnic cleansing fantasies of the settler movement) have made the mess of Gaza that it is.
I'm not being harder on Israel than I have been on my own US of A. We have hurled ourselves off the deep end into neverending conflict with no goal in sight many, many times. We invented free-fire zones.
Israel is not an individual but a democratic state. So your assessment that they are not acting rationally while it has some merit needs to be tempered. There are some real hard liners in BiBi's government but it is a coalition government now. With Benny Gantz on the war cabinet a more moderate and cooler head. While your scenario is possible it doesn't sound like what I've been hearing. I think that you can find a lot of info. that will support almost any position you want to posit on the situation. While I'm sure there are some reacting as you suggest I think the vast majority are tired. Going on six months is exhausting. While in the early part of the war on Hamas there was a lot of anger that is hard to maintain over the long haul. Unfortunately, HRW is just as biased and compromised as UNRWA so maybe find a better source. It's much more to Hamas advantage and there blatant disregard of human life to have a hunger crisis. Remember, you are dealing with an entity that does nothing to protect there citizens and acts to maximize civilian casualties in all cases.
I did not suggest "they are not acting rationally" so perhaps you meant to reply to... Hontas? But an amalgamation of people isn't necessarily going to act rationally, and I don't even expect that much rationality from individuals in the first place (and to be clear, individuals are what I'm talking about)
> It's much more to Hamas advantage and there blatant disregard of human life to have a hunger crisis.
No one's denying the evils of Hamas, but you speak as if there are only two parties in Gaza, IDF vs Hamas, which is precisely the sort of thinking that might lead an individual to "forget" that an aid convoy was scheduled for this evening.
Was replying to Hontas as she replied to me earlier. I think I am reminding people that Israeli's and Hamas are fighting and Hamas is the government of Gaza elected by the population of Gaza and started the latest round of fighting. Hontas seemed to think they were some small group that diverted money for humanitarian purposes and built hundreds on miles of tunnels to protect themselves and their Army.
In fact, you were replying to me.
Saying Hamas is democratically elected is like saying Putin is democratically elected. If Hamas thought they would win re-election, why have they consistently refused to hold elections? At least Putin has enough sense to pretend to have elections. FWIW, just before the Oct 7 attacks, Gazans were asked how much they trust they had in Hamas, and it wasn't much.[1]
Even back in 2006, Hamas received only 44.45% of the popular vote despite running under the vote-grabbing name "Change and Reform".[2]
Even in a hypothetical scenario when there had been a free and fair election in 2023 with Hamas winning 51% of the vote, I would still object to any† implication that it's okay for Israel to starve everybody else who *didn't* vote for Hamas (and it would *still* be a supermajority of the population who didn't vote for Hamas in that hypothetical).
† edit: changed "the" to "any"; apologies if you agree that this is not okay.
[1] https://twitter.com/ForeignAffairs/status/1720056260001767472
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Palestinian_legislative_election
Precisely. The fact a country is or is not a democracy does not make it good or bad. We value democracy in the USA and in the west more generally. However, democracies have done horrible things too. The US was a democracy and had millions of people treated as property for 80 years, then as second class citizens for another 100 or so. A state of affairs that only really ended 40-50 years ago now in the late 1960's to early 1970's. Millions of people, including my parents, are still alive from those times.
Israel being a democracy or even if Hamas and the PNA held regular elections would not make them better by default. IF the electorate chooses and is ok with such barbarity if anything thats worse. It means the people of a country have bought into it.
The question that I am arguing is who is responsible. In the case of what happened to the convoy Israel took responsibility. As to the over situation in Gaza and the lack of food supplies we can point fingers all over. But it seems that Hamas and other groups have been disrupting supplying food especially in the North. Where is your condemnation of them. Oh, In parliamentary governments things work a bit different. Basically, it ended up being a power sharing agreement where Fatah took the West Bank and Hamas took Gaza. Nothing is that clear cut just because it's not Democracy the way we judge it doesn't mean that they were not the government of Gaza. Despite all the finger pointing I think that Hamas holds a lot of the responsibility for the humanitarian disaster. Personally, I have not seen Hamas, Islamic Jihad or Al Quds work for the best interest of the people of Gaza.
I condemn Hamas all the time. They seem to me like a bunch of terrorist dickheads that commit lots of crimes, and the only upside to this whole situation is that some of those killers will be dead.
Responsibility, though? I believe that with great power comes great responsibility. Who has had the most power in the last couple of generations? Israel, by a wide margin. Who doesn't want a two-state solution nor a one-state solution? Bibi and friends. Just what does it mean to permanently reject both two-state and one-state solutions, hmm? What outcome was Bibi trying to achieve that way? How do you justify that? And what has Israel done in the last 17+ years to restore democracy to Gaza?
Israeli organizations have said as much. Or are these anti-Semitic too?
Where was antisemitism brought up? Missed that! "Israeli organizations have said as much" what are you referring too? I'm missing the context.
Antisemitism is the "goto" tactic by pro-Israel groups to shut any discussion on Israel that is not 100% aligned with the Israeli extreme right. Hence my rhetorical mention as I noticed that the overwhelming majority of subscribers are pretty right wing. As to the Israeli organizations, I thought it was evident that I was referring to Israeli rights organizations since the topic was about violation of rights during war.
I'm not right wing at all. I also see much more open Antisemitism on the left these days, though there has always been an undercurrent. I didn't see anything here you said that I would construe that way. I listened to 2 of your YouTube interviews. Found the one with Peter Beinart interesting. There is a lot passion and a lot of propaganda that is meant to be triggering. I try not the be triggered and understand how upsetting this conflict can be. Not always successful.
Being a democractic country does not mean acting rationally. A large crowd is not necessarily a rational crowd. Israels people have been under threat for a long time. Then a FACTION....just a faction that's a fraction of Gaza invades and ... had they wanted to could've cut Israel in half. They must be terrified of what would happen if the Palestinians and Israeli Arabs decided to take over. MUCH as the US was a democracy before 1860 YET did not act rationally due to fear of a "servile uprising".
Didn't say that being Democratic means you react rationally. But it generally does moderate the action. The rest of your reply is not very clear. Hamas is the government of Gaza. So it isn't a Faction that's a Fraction. It was popularly elected at one point. Cut in half not likely and not even close to happening. I will concede that what Hamas the acting government of Gaza did was to plan an incursion that used rape, torture and murder of civilians to spark a reaction. There is no doubt that Hamas wanted to incite a severe reaction and they got it. Which was popular supported by the Palestinian public. https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-palestinians-opinion-poll-wartime-views-a0baade915619cd070b5393844bc4514 Can't make this stuff up.
This is a bit too conspiratorial but then also not enough. The idea would be to make it look like Hammas attacked the convoy. Then say see these awful people did this. Better not allow you in... for your safety. Then that would be too rational, brutal, but also rational, and I don't think Israel is a rational actor right now.
Did you not watch the video? FYI, night is dark, and markings on vehicles are not visible in the dark. And mis- and breakdown in communications are not uncommon, Also, if you are targeting what you think, even mistakenly, is an enemy 'convoy,' with limited aerial resources, you pick them off one by one (preferably the tail first, then the lead, & then the middle ones). Will be interesting to find out what the details of the communications between the convoy & the drone unit really were. And by the way, even if the vehicle markings had been visible, that's not dispositive since terrorists organizations, like Hamas, frequently masquerade themselves as humanitarian operations.
I don't think it is fair to call the IDF conduct stupid. Wars and militaries are extremely complex and there are literally millions of things happening at any one moment. Anyone who has served knows that coordination is never perfect and can never be perfect.
Let's compare the WCK strike with Kunduz 2015
WCK: pitch dark, convoy travelling in active war zone, Hamas documented use of civilian transport for military reasons, three missiles launched over a period of about a minute by an NCO drone operator.
Kunduz 2015: partial moonlight, fixed hospital at known location, 211 shells fired over a period of 1 hour under command of a USAF officer (I believe Major or Lt. Col).
The US failure was orders of magnitudes worse than the IDF. Since the US had no interest in attacking a random hospital, we can see that even the world's best soldiers under command of smart people under no pressure make mistakes.
What probably happened in WCK was that the deconfliction message did not reach the drone unit. Considering that there were likely hundreds, maybe thousands, messages that night and that there were multiple soldiers involved (some trainees, some or all exhausted), one failed message delivery is reasonable.
The idea of an IR strobe is great but Hamas will steal them. Best would be that each vehicle have an Israeli with radio beacon to ascertain that no Hamas guys are in the vehicle and a US marine whose presence will prevent the Israeli from being kidnapped or murdered.
If you need help on your Hebrew let me know, cause your accent is killing me
Well, to be fair, he did say his Hebrew was not as good as his Arabic. I guess it is all relative, but I do agree he should stick to English... :-)
This event is tragic and like Ryan says Israel needs to do better. I await more info. before I judge. The real shame is that World Central Kitchen has been making a difference and as the news reports on the building of the jetty Israel was assisting. Thanks Ryan for your assessment.
Ryan question: is it conceivable that Hamas if it wanted to use then WCK vans it could force the personnel at gun point to divulge the strobe pattern?
This morning, April 5, 2024, the New York Times printed a story headlined "String of Israeli Errors Led to Fatal Attack on Aid Convoy, Military” (Saysthttps://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/05/world/middleeast/israel-military-world-central-kitchen-strike.html). According to the Times, your analysis of what may have happened is right on. Great job Ryan, keep up the good work.
Who gave the approval?
Will there be consequences for that person?
Read Lord Acton's letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, the famous "Power corrupts" letter.
Then read, "Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will" by Robert M. Sapolsky, Ph.D. and pay attention to the neurophysiology and genetics of decision making.
Since there wasn't any consequences for the decision makers of our drone attack on August 29, 2021 drone strike in Kabul that killed 10 Afghan civilians, including seven children. I don't see where we can demand Israel to do much for their "mistake."
I am glad I don't have to make those decisions.
“Will there be consequences?”
Yes, already are: two high rank officers were fired.
Since, I have read (not fact checked yet) that there were actually three vehicles of employees of this group. All three were attacked and the other two vehicles were armored. Persons in the armored vehicles survived. All were clearly marked. I have not had a chance to confirm this from any other sources yet. So much misinformation out there. Can anyone confirm or refute these facts?