1. As you may know, there were two warring factions in Northern Ireland who were busy planting bombs and shooting each other so our army had to try to keep the peace between the two groups. Totally differenrt from Gaza where one terrorist group is attacking Israel: the Palestinians are not fighting amongs themselves.

It is known that the majority of the population of Nortern Ireland at that time were Protestant. Protestants in general not disposed towards Republicanism and mainly loyal to the British crown. There was a Loyalist paramilitary group but clearly it is not possible to say if the the entire population of Protestants were peaceful or not. The key problem was that that the Protestants wanted to remain as part of the UK so I guess one could speculate they were mainly well disposed towards Britain and its peacekeeping troops.The republican Norther Irish were generally less well disposed towards Britain werent they? But of course many of them may have been peaceful because as you say, no survey was carried out. I do recall the women of Northern Ireland tried to stop the warring factions but the paramilitaries persuaded them that the gun was the only way so they had to keep quiet.

It is irritating to constantly hear the apologists for Hamas (The BBC, Mainstream media in general ) bang on about peaceful palestinians purely to demonize the Israelis for attempting to deal with an implacable enemy. There is no parallell between Northern Ireland and the Gaza strip: Zero.

2. It does not matter what Israel wish to negotiate on does it? You cant negotiate with a group who want you and your people destroyed or maybe you believe you can. Hamas supported by Iran want the complete destruction of the Jewish state nothing to talk about. Israel faces an existential threat: either it destroys Hamas or Hamas will continue its attacks foever more and October 7th demonstrates the attacks are becoming more deadly. Who knows what weapons Hamas might procure in the future?

the West lies through its teeth about what goes on (as do Hamas I know)

What really helped open my eyes was when US pulled out of Afghanistan...in response to US Soldiers being killed the US just droned a normal family minding their own business....only came out as it was filmed....they then tried to Lie about it claiming the explosion proves they were carrying weapons....only for that to be exposed as the houses gas heater blowing up....only when they couldn't lie their way out of it did they admit what happened

So indiscriminate killing based on false evidence that they tried to lie about.....makes you wonder how many times that happens without the advantage of a cell phone and photographic evidence proving the lie

I used to think the West were doing difficult things after a great deal of research and thought...now I suspect that there isn't the thought that goes into it (especially with drones) and they are killing people on tenuous evidence as they dont value their lives.....and I can only imagine the hate that must stir up

Ey up. Its tin foil hats time.

the West lies through its teeth about what goes on (as do Hamas I know)

What really helped open my eyes was when US pulled out of Afghanistan...in response to US Soldiers being killed the US just droned a normal family minding their own business....only came out as it was filmed....they then tried to Lie about it claiming the explosion proves they were carrying weapons....only for that to be exposed as the houses gas heater blowing up....only when they couldn't lie their way out of it did they admit what happened

So indiscriminate killing based on false evidence that they tried to lie about.....makes you wonder how many times that happens without the advantage of a cell phone and photographic evidence proving the lie

I used to think the West were doing difficult things after a great deal of research and thought...now I suspect that there isn't the thought that goes into it (especially with drones) and they are killing people on tenuous evidence as they dont value their lives.....and I can only imagine the hate that must stir up

I have never been in the armed forces but it is my understanding that it is well nigh impossible to fight a war without innocent people being killed or injured. Although Western forces try to use precision munititions, satellites and on the ground intelligence, civilians still get killed. Of couse people should not lie about it. The difference between Western forces and say Iraqi, ISIS, Hamas etc is that they dont care who they kill because they are not accountable to anyone, Western forces are accountable to their democratically elected governments and free press so do their best not to harm civilians withinin reason. Hamas and the like are well aware of this accountability agenda and use it to their advantage by emphazizing and indeed exagerrating civilian deaths. Not only that Hamas maximize civilian casualties by using them as human shields: they dont give a toss about their own people but seem to expect Israel to.

1. I'm very well aware of the troubles which is why I mention Ireland not NI. The IRA were very much on the side of the Irish and the Catholic citizens of NI hence the comparisons asking if they supported them.
I think the thing you fail to realise is that this is the Israeli's vs Hamas who are a terrorist organisation. This isn't the Israeli's vs Palestine/Gaza, although Israel have very much have made it about this. The comparison, as many others have made, with NI is probably the closest we can get as the IRA (a terrorist organisation) were fighting the Brits in NI.

2. So if you think they can't be negotiated with that's it isn't it. Israel have free license to raze Gaza to the ground because they can't be negotiated with? I think as many others have stated that using ground troops to root out Hamas would've been the way 99% of other countries would've gone about this rather than bombing the general populace and claiming that everything hit was a stronghold for Hamas.

I dont see how this justifies what happened on Oct 7th and the cynical use of innocent civilians as a human shield while gleefully reporting grossly exagerrated casualty figures.

I think the difference here is that some people give teh Israels/West the benefit of teh doubt, and believe what they say is true until proved otherwise....I used to do that also, but recent evidence has meant I approach anything they say with cynicism now (I am talking about numbers etc not saying on a binary basis that things didnt happen etc)

I read an interesting quote once.....something along the lines of 'I used to think people who thought the moon landings were fake were crackpots....I still dont believe the moon landing was fake, but i can appreciate more why people who have those thoughts dont trust anything the government tells them'

I think the difference here is that some people give teh Israels/West the benefit of teh doubt, and believe what they say is true until proved otherwise....I used to do that also, but recent evidence has meant I approach anything they say with cynicism now (I am talking about numbers etc not saying on a binary basis that things didnt happen etc)

I read an interesting quote once.....something along the lines of 'I used to think people who thought the moon landings were fake were crackpots....I still dont believe the moon landing was fake, but i can appreciate more why people who have those thoughts dont trust anything the government tells them'

You are entitled to hold your opinion and to express it. I hope I can be allowed the same leeway.

Absolutely !--we can agree to disagree on things civilly I hope!

Yes massive conspiracy theory that the West is less than honest in its assessment of terrorist vs civilian ratios of killing in its drone attacks ...easier to believe we are the unambiguous good guys in all things

Link 1 US lying about it
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/u-s- ... 6-children

Link 2 US admitting they lied after they were found out.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-58604655