What crime could be so great that entire populations of cities were designated for destruction? God told Moses that the nations that the Hebrew were replacing were wicked. How "wicked" were these people? The text tells us that they were burning their own sons and daughters in sacrifices to their gods. So we see that these people were not really innocent. For these reasons (and others), God ordered the destruction of the peoples whom the Israelites dispossessed.
I thought you said you were NOT justifying the killing of children. That's a lot of justification!
Do I justify the killing of children? Of course not.
So, the canaanites were extremely wicked because they killed their children, but the israelites were NOT wicked whey THEY killed canaanite children. So, god's response to humans killing their children was to actually order the killing of said children. But we are not justifying the killing of children. No, not at all. And yet, those children have wicked parents and so the children clearly are not innocent, so it is right to kill them. Not that we justify killing children. Some children will become suicide bombers, but MOST will not. But that is okay, kill them all because of who their parents are, but not justifying it, just saying.
I'll stop now. I'm just so grateful that I don't have to harbor that kind of hate in order to justify, (i mean NOT justify) the actions of a hateful god that doesn't exist but validates my intolerance.
I wish I could break through the cognitive dissonance, but I can't. I know that because I lived under that veil for many years myself. Unfortunately, it is hard to make my point without being a bit insulting. I understand why you need this, and I'm going to work on being more understanding.