What prompts the fantasy that you can "kill all the terrorists" without sowing the seeds of new terrorism? Partly, the fantasy comes from the idea that any civilian deaths you cause will be forgiven; but, much more, it derives from the secondary fantasy that civilian deaths will go mainly unwitnessed. They will be recorded as numbers, perhaps, but they will pass out of the awareness of the world. That is not the way things work, of course. There are people in the world -- not hundreds, not thousands, but hundreds of millions -- who feel more closely allied to the killed than they do to the killers.
"Those to whom evil is done, do evil in return." In every culture and every civilization, to kill the innocent is evil. Fifty civilians who live in a neighborhood where one terrorist has built a hidden sniper's nest are understood to be innocent. If you kill the fifty, you have done something worse than not killing the one.
Yet to put it like that brings up the revaluation of state terror that entered our language with the Sharon-Bush doctrine, first propounded in 2001-02. According to the Sharon-Bush doctrine, if you harbor a terrorist -- that is, if you live anywhere in the vicinity of a terrorist -- you are yourself as blamable as the terrorist and are as appropriate a target of destruction. This, no matter what the impediments on your freedom of movement, no matter how unconscious you may be of the existence of the terrorist, no matter how much your toleration of him may have been driven by fear.
On this reasoning, a one-ton bomb that kills a Hamas leader in an apartment complex and kills twelve other persons, half of them children -- that bomb is not guilty of the deaths of the other victims. If, because of that bomb and those deaths, a certain number of Arab teenagers in Palestine and elsewhere resolve to become suicide bombers, that is not the fault of the country that dropped the bomb. The new terrorists whom the destruction brought forth, like the old ones it disposed of, worked with too narrow a conception of necessity. The world itself is wrong, according to the Sharon-Bush doctrine, when it says that you can't literally kill all the terrorists without killing an unendurable number of others in the process. If that is the way the world thinks, Sharon and Bush and their followers maintain, there is nothing to be done about it. What if the world is full of raving anti-Semites and anti-Americans? We must get on with our work in spite of them. Strength lies in keeping to the plan with supreme resoluteness.
Such are the tracks in which the United States and Israel are trapped together when we think about Gaza. The world doesn't understand (or so we think) how wrong is the idea of proportionality. It is true, fewer Israelis have been killed by Hamas missiles than by other Israelis in friendly fire. And true, by January 15 more than a thousand Palestinians had died, half of them civilians, and thirteen Israelis had died, most of them soldiers. All that is beside the point. Despite appearances, the doctrine tells us, Israel is fighting for its life. How can you speak of "proportion" and compare the intolerable harassment of missiles coming in, endlessly, with the very temporary Palestinian burden of a counter-insurgency war that will have a clearly marked end? For Israel not to respond now and definitively --this is the trump card of Sharon-Bush--would have been to acquiesce in moral and psychological defeat. There can be only one victor in a war; the only alternative to complete resignation was to do what Israel is doing. And what is that? It is assuring that the Palestianians (in the words of Moshe Yaalon, Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces in 2002) "are made to understand, in the deepest recesses of their consciousness, that they are a defeated people." The more relentless the assault, and indeed the more civilians you legitimately kill, the deeper the recesses of consciousness that you are able to penetrate.
Such is the wisdom from A to Z of the Sharon-Bush doctrine.
And indeed, if nobody existed on earth except Israel and the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, the way would lie open now for the fulfillment of the doctrine. Israel, in the words of another pragmatist, Benny Morris, could finish the job begun in 1948: the job of expulsion, the forced transportation elsewhere of the Palestinian people as a whole. But again, the problem recurs: the world is larger than Israel and Gaza. There are witnesses. It is harder for conscience to abolish itself quietly when those witnesses are sometimes in mind and sometimes actually on the scene. What if you arrange to have the war not covered by journalists? The UN medical compound remains; will you fire on that, too? (On January 15 this was done in fact; there was a terrorist there, Ehud Olmert said with perfunctory regret.)
Probably no people are so prone as Americans and Israelis are to think admiringly of our own good intentions. We hew to a rarer and higher standard than other people, we believe. We are generous beyond all expectation; and still, other people continue to criticize and demand more of us. The trouble with such an innocent self-image is that we read the pattern of our actions forward from our supposed intentions to their effects in the world; we forgive the imperfection of the result from our certainty of the purpose. But that is not the way to interpret the character of a person, or the character of a people, accurately. The error is easy enough to recognize when we look at persons who are not ourselves. The way to make a judgment that is in some measure accurate is to read backward from the total drift and pattern of the actions to the intentions that are likely to have yielded such effects.
Thus, if Israel in 2006 destroyed large parts of Lebanon, there is a strong chance that this happened because Israel intended to reduce to rubble large parts of Lebanon; even if the Israeli claim at the time was that it sought nothing more than to weaken Hezbollah and destroy its hiding places. Again, if Israel in 2009 reduces to rubble a large portion of the Gaza Strip and leaves tens of thousands homeless, there is a strong chance that this was what it intended to do; even if the Israeli claim is merely that it wished to stop the rockets at their source.
It is the same with the good intentions of the United States. Listen to the neoconservative apologists for the Bush-Cheney policy, and you would think that America intended to liberate the enslaved people of Iraq, and in doing so, to confer an incidental benefit by planting a democracy in the region. But then read backward from the actions of the U.S. -- a country destroyed, half a million killed, four and a half million refugees, American contractors and companies and oil men prospering on the scene, and several superbases built and manned--and you would conclude the U.S. intended to plant a military force in the region and make a solid claim to the dome of oil that covers Iraq and Iran and East Africa, while also asserting its rivalry with Russia and China for control of West Asia. Notice that the second surmise has one advantage as an explanation. It bears some relation to the things that were actually accomplished.
In the case of Israel, the self-image of its leading politicians is far more crazed and split than such common-sense reminders can hope to remedy. Tzipi Livni says in 2009 that the assault was necessary, that it is going according to design, that there is no humanitarian crisis, and that the invasion will be good for the Palestinians. Yet Ehud Barak in 1999, in answer to a question from the reporter Gideon Levy about what he would have done if he had been born Palestinian, replied without pause: "Joined a fighting organization." Ehud Olmert says in a daring interview in his penultimate season in office that there will have to be a two-state solution and that Israel will have to give up a large part of the settlements it now holds. Yet Olmert devotes his final weeks in power to the merciless waging of this war, and refuses to convene his cabinet to take up the encouragement of a cease-fire that is coming at last from both Livni and Barak. The contradictions and the almost open flaunting of fantasies are themselves a kind of madness.
This deadlock in the middle of apparent victory was inevitable. You cannot bomb a people into partnership. You cannot obliterate a people into a just and lasting peace. You cannot drive deep into their consciousness the knowledge that they are a defeated people and, when you have finished your education through violence, come to treat them as moral and political equals with yourself. So Israel is now at a loss. It cannot see its beginnings in this vision of its triumph.
The creation of a Palestinian state has been postponed now for more than 40 years while the Israeli settlements have expanded. Why should any witness of the pattern be expected to follow the Israeli reasoning from good intentions to misfired actions, when the pattern of the actions, reading backward to the intentions, so plainly seems to indicate that annexation was always the stronger motive? Read backward from result to probable purpose and the assault on Gaza looks like the last postponement, the one after which nothing further need be said or done. Yet, when it is carried off in so confused a state of fevered imagining, with a queasy mixture of paternalism, perverted compassion and baffled nostalgia for resistance and solidarity, such as are audible in the above statements by Livni, Olmert, and Barak--one realizes that nothing after all has been resolved by this war.
Is it possible to look forward without illusion? For we do know what actions like Israel's lead to; we, Americans as well as Israelis, know from our recent history. From the imposition of state terror in one generation spring the soldiers of guerrilla terror in the next generation. Those to whom evil is done, do evil in return. Just as the Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza brought on the Second Intifada, and just as both of these, together with the American footprint in Saudi Arabia, were a substantial motive in the making of the September 11 attacks, so the present attacks in Gaza, enabled by America's financial and political support and America's F-16s and Apache helicopters, are nursing hatreds for a new round of terrorism to come. The assault on Gaza endangers the security of Israel, and it endangers the security of the United States.
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Israel Invades Gaza: Info, Updates, Video
SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO ***UPDATE*** January 4th, 9:38PM The Times of London reports that Israel's rain of fire on Gaza is thought to be caused...
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Israeli troops and tanks slice deep into Gaza
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Thousands of Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships surrounded Gaza's largest city and fought militants at close range...
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Diplomats Converge On Israel In Push For Truce
Scroll down for video GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israel seized control of high-rise buildings and attacked houses, mosques and smuggling tunnels as it pressed...
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Diplomatic Pressure On Israel, Hamas Intensifies
UPDATE 6 pm Heavy fighting broke out in Gaza's populated streets Monday night as Israel dismissed calls for a truce, reports the Telegraph. Explosions were...
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Gaza truce proposed after Israeli shell kills 30
GAZA CITY, Gaza — France and Egypt announced an initiative to stop the fighting in Gaza late Tuesday, hours after Israeli mortar shells exploded near...
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UN Security Council calls for immediate Gaza truce
JERUSALEM — The U.N. Security Council called for an "immediate" and "durable" cease-fire in Gaza in a resolution Thursday night even as fighting between Israel...
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UN Security Council calls for Gaza cease-fire
UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. Security Council approved a resolution Thursday night calling for an immediate and durable cease-fire between Hamas militants and Israeli forces...
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Red Cross Accuses Israel Of 'Unacceptable' Delays In Providing Access To Wounded
GENEVA — The international Red Cross accused Israel on Thursday of "unacceptable" delays in letting rescue workers reach three Gaza City homes hit by shelling...
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Israeli forces advance deep into Gaza urban areas
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Israeli ground forces made their deepest foray yet Sunday into Gaza's most populated area, with tanks rolling into residential neighborhoods...
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Israel's Gaza Offensive: Updated Information
The IDF claims that rocket attacks have dropped 50% since their Gaza operation began over two weeks ago, reports Haaretz: Sixteen days into Operation Cast...
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Israeli Forces Enter Gaza City Neighborhood
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Terrified residents ran for cover Tuesday in a densely populated neighborhood of Gaza City as Israeli troops backed by tanks...
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Israeli Cabinet Divided Over Fresh Gaza Surge
Israeli reservists were sent into action for the first time in the current Gaza conflict as the fighting continued yesterday and Palestinian deaths reportedly rose...
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Photos From Israel That You Won't See on the News
Israel is not media savvy -- we have installed warning systems and bomb shelters. No casualties means no photos, which means that many incidents aren't even covered by the media.
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The CNN-NPR-NYT Middle East Conspiracy
When people complain about bias in the media, it's always bias against their own point of view, and never in favor of their side. Nowhere is this more true than in coverage of the Middle East.
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No Exit for Civilians in Gaza in the Midst of War
In similar situations around the world, civilians caught in the midst of conflict would have the option of seeking safety in neighboring countries as refugees. Gazans have no such option.
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Evidence Grows That Israel is Using White Phosphorus in Gaza
Today, at least two UN officials have flatly declared that three or more white phosphorous shells were part of the attack today that set a UN building and compound ablaze in Gaza City.
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Changing the Reality in Gaza
Counting on international pressure to bring a quick end to the Israeli onslaught may prove to be misplaced as Israel is now determined to never allow a return to the status quo ante.
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Hamas and the Death of a Better Future
To me, Gaza is personal. As an Israeli infantry officer, I served in Gaza before, during, and after the 2005 Disengagement.
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Al Jazeera English Beats Israel's Ban on Reporters in Gaza with Exclusive Coverage
Some may call it propaganda but I call it hardcore reporting. If you are not watching Al Jazeera English's coverage of the War on Gaza, you are missing much, if not, most of the story.
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Why Aren't More Americans Dancing To Israel's Tune?
The surprising trend in American opinion on Gaza may be because the same pundits who are cheerleading Israel's assault once sold the occupation of Iraq, and with a nearly identical set of arguments.
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Maybe Hamas is Not so Stupid
Judged as a piece of political theater, Hamas has succeeded in presenting Israel as the golem on the block.
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Israel as Mini-Me
We are both settler states -- the Puritans, who escaped oppression in the Old World only to mete out oppression in the New, unfolded their Zionist project in the 17th century with their "city built upon a hill" as the New Jerusalem.
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Gaza: The War On Children
Israel has accused Hamas of intentionally attacking from civilian-populated areas, driving up casualties among non-combatants to provoke anger against Israel. But do children have to pay the price?
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What Was Israel Supposed to Do?
Every day now, I hear someone saying, "What was Israel supposed to do? Hamas keeps firing rockets into their country." So, here is a quick list of the things they were supposed to do.
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Israel's Extensive PR Campaign
Last Friday, at the height of the attacks, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak announced without a hint of irony: "We are peace seekers."
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Accused of Funding Hamas, Controversial Charity Collects Money in Lebanon for Palestinians in Gaza (VIDEO)
On Beirut's waterfront road, young men dressed in green jackets with the Etelaf Al-Khair logo on their backs are handing out fliers with images of bloodied Palestinian children and holding donation boxes.
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Georgetown Newspaper Editor Reports on Sderot-Gaza, and Recording With Rockets
In a recording studio in Sderot, a few miles east of Israel's Gaza strip, Sergio Arditi felt the steady pulse of Rock and Roll give way to the sporadic vibration of bombs.
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Israel: There Has To Be A Better Way
The war between Israel and Hamas is not as two-dimensional as the United States Senate would like to believe. This is a complex and asymmetric war that will not end favorably for either side.
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Defending Condi: Olmert Shames Himself in Kick-in-the-Teeth Attack on Rice
Olmert's statements certainly send a signal to many in the incoming Obama administration that while there are convergent American and Israeli interests -- friendship and trust are eroding.
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Fanaticism and Contempt
Once the master of revolutionary war, Israel cannot seem to grasp the essential nature of asymmetrical warfare.
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Bomb A Ghetto, Raise A Cheer -- The Video
On January 11, an estimated 10,000 people rallied in front of the Israeli consulate in New York in support of Israel's attack on Gaza. The event was a festive affair that began and ended with singing and joyous dancing.
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Gaza on YouTube: Film at 11!
In lieu of actual reporting, all you have to do is log on to the Israel Defense Forces' YouTube Channel and you can see images of Israel pummeling Gaza, and sit in on "the first ever" Twitter press conference.
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NY Times Responds Weakly Today to Israel's 'Incursion' -- As Shells Kill Dozens at U.N. School
It takes until paragraph #8 for the Times, to mention that, by the way, Israel "must" allow foreign journalists access to Gaza, especially since its highest court so ordered.
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Gazans in Peril
The human tragedy that has befallen Gaza's Palestinians -- Hamas supporters or not -- warrants every American to take cognizance because of its consequences for a durable Middle East peace.
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Hold Your Fire: Children and Civilians In Gaza
If the killing of unarmed civilians by terrorist groups is wrong, Israel's killing of unarmed Palestinian civilians and our defense of Israel's conduct cannot be right.
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War Diary from Sderot
Not in my name and not for me did you go into this war. The bloodbath in Gaza is not in my name nor for my security. Behind this accursed leadership of Hamas live human beings.
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Overwhelming Force Is the Only Way to Fight Terrorists
The destruction of Hamas benefits the Palestinians far more than the Israelis. It is they that must live under the cruelty of an organization that terrorizes its citizens even more than its enemies.
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Gaza and the Obama Effect -- Ending the War
It might be pushing the envelope to call Obama the peacemaker here, but it's hard to deny that his impending entrance to the world stage has an effect.
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How Propaganda Hijacked Israeli Strategy in Gaza
While Israel's explicit goal is to cease all attacks on southern Israel, senior IDF and intelligence officials have privately signaled that this is unrealistic, even with a ground invasion.
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Obama's Silence
As January 20 approaches, Obama will have to make a lonely decision - to remember his 2007 words about Palestinian suffering and his campaign pledge to talk unconditionally with adversaries.
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Video Reveals that a Lack of Moral Center Is Central to Hamas's War Strategy
The whole world is quick to condemn Israel for civilian deaths in Gaza, but there is utter silence over Hamas's blatant disregard for the lives of its own citizens.
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Goodnight My Love, See You in Heaven -- Diary From an Aid Worker in Gaza
The situation has now reached such a critical point that doctors frequently confront dilemmas such as these -- to treat the child who is bleeding to death or the baby who has severe head injuries?
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Israel in Gaza: Three Wrong Arguments
The Reid/McConnell resolution is a perfect articulation of one voice in the American debate over Israel's actions in Gaza. Here are a few objections that should be raised.
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Israel, Gaza and Iran: Trapping Obama in Imagined Fault Lines
While there certainly is an underlying rivalry between Israel and Iran that has come to fuel many other otherwise unrelated conflicts in the region, not every war Israel fights is related to Iran.
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Weighing Proportionality in Gaza
The losses on both sides will be all in vain if the final outcome of the war does not substantially improve both the prospects for an eventual Israeli-Palestinian peace.
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Reportage from Israel/Gaza
We can't ignore this fact: Gaza is becoming not the embryo of the so-desired Palestinian State, but the advance base of a total war against the Jewish State.
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Proportionality and Disproportionality: A Guide to Arguments about Gaza
Even if the guns fall silent the charges and counter-charges of violations of international law will continue. Already the airwaves are full of talk that Israel's "disproportionate" response is a violation of international law.
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Obama -- Please Say Something!
In just over two weeks Obama will be unable to avoid saying something and the world will be looking to him and demanding to hear his opinion on the crisis in Gaza.
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Israel's Risk
What we're watching in Gaza is not so much low-intensity warfare as the continued fracture of the post-Soviet international order.
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Why Do So Few Speak Up for Gaza?
Why is it that there is such widespread acceptance, beginning with the apologetic arguments of George Bush, that whatever Israel does is always justified as necessary to the survival of the Jewish state?
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Why Israel Was Right to Invade Gaza
How should Israel attempt to protect its people, long-term, if it merely acts defensively in a tit-for-tat manner? That would be a horribly naïve response given its history.
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Gaza, Qaddafi, And Starbucks
Along with the images of bloodied children, scenes of destruction and carnage in Gaza, debates on Arab disunity have increased in the Arab media.
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Israel, Hamas, Gaza: Plenty of Us in America Just Need to Shut Up
Something labeled "Subject: Fwd: Some Differences Between Hamas and the Nazi Party" showed up in my inbox Monday night.
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Obama Camp "Prepared To Talk To Hamas," Says the Guardian
The Obama administration's emphasis on "talk" with Hamas will bring a significant moral shift in U.S. policy -- but it will not do away with some of the core grievances vis-a-vis U.S.-Israel relations.
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Protesters in Beirut Demand Action from Arab Leaders on Gaza, Focusing on Egypt as Demonstrations Rise (VIDEO)
Millions across the Arab world are demonstrating, demanding that Arab governments do more to support Palestinians trapped in Gaza.
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Eyeless in Gaza
I wish I didn't believe that the events now unfolding in the Middle East are too complicated for unalloyed outrage. I wish the arguments of only one side rang wholly true to me.
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AP Reporter Watches Own Home Destroyed, via YouTube, in Gaza
In one of the most moving accounts of the war in Gaza, Ibrahim Barzak, the AP's chief correspondent there for 17 years, today wrote of watching his own home destroyed on YouTube.
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Mitchell Bard is Wrong On Israel
Hamas did not start this conflict. Here's an extensive time line of events, making clear that Israel broke the ceasefire, not Hamas.
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Ceasefire
The first reason for a ceasefire now is to stop the killing. The second is to ensure that a year or two from now we are not all wishing that Hamas was still in charge.
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Livni and Barak's Gaza Calculus
If hundreds of innocent deaths helps secure a real security mandate for the moderate-to-dovish Kadima/Labor and Israeli-Palestinian peace, that's political calculus Livni and Barak were willing to take.
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Was Israel Punked by Hamas? Are Progressives Attacking Israel Being Punked too?
The only way the Israeli and Palestinian people have a shot at peace is for outsiders to put pressure on both sides to make it happen and to stop the violence. It can be done.
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Israel and Hamas: Two to Tango
What is going on in Gaza is that it is not the result of a sudden decision or an immediate and intolerable provocation by one side or the other -- this thing has been in the planning by both sides for months.
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Hamas Is Responsible for the Civilian Casualties in Gaza
By choosing tactical advantages over the safety of its citizens, the terrorist organization chose its military goals over the safety of its fellow Palestinians in Gaza.
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How to Defeat Hamas -- Face Up to the Truth
Making Hamas into a unique demon is pure propaganda. But no form of Islamic extremism will end until moderate Muslims stand up for their religion.
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Letter From Beersheva
I am here in Beersheva -- on the "almost" frontlines of the conflict with Hamas -- to tell you the first thing to go when missiles start to fall nearby, is your diet.
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It's Time for a Sustained Focus on a Lasting Middle East Peace
What we continue to lack is the kind of real political solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict that could finally make a "ceasefire" endure.
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Gaza: Fight at the End of the Tunnel?
Any ceasefire must include an ironclad commitment by Egypt to cooperate fully with Israel to shut Hamas' tunnel network once and for all whatever Hamas' political or military wings decide tomorrow in Cairo.
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You have told us many times over on this blog that because of Israel's superior moral center and political system, that she will sutrvive.
You also show huge contempt fo America, and any form of criticism if the IDF.
Do you seriously think that Israel will survive without the minimum annual support of 3 billion dollars in cash, and the same in weapons from America, the country which you endlessly criticize and claim to be superior of?
You think that without such financial and military support that Israel can continue behaving toward not only it's neighbors, but most of the western world the way it does now - and survive?
One-sided propaganda does nothing for your cause, Luni.
It's rather easy to see through.
It gives me that warm, fuzzy feeling inside.
Right before I throw up.
You have no shame.
Especially when combined with utter contempt for facts.
from the time of Ben Gurion,
has treated the Palestinian people with
brutality and I wonder why.
What did the Palestinian people do to the
Jewish people to deserve massacres,
starvation, military occupation from them?
The Palestinian people were not responsible for the Nazi Holocaust,
so why have they been force to pay the price.
We, in the United States, are just as guilty as the Israelis for the atrocities committed by
the Jewish state against the Palestinian people, because we finance the slaughter.
Those are American bombs being dropped on Palestinian civilians.
How can anyone, in good conscience, blame the Palestinian people for anything,
they do to combat the unjust, brutal, USA backed, Israeli Military occupation that they
have been forced to live under?
Ok, now historical fact:
Palestinain leader's meeting with Adolf Hitler. Transcripts:
Hitler:Germany stood for uncompromising war against the Jews. Germany would furnish positive and practical aid to the Arabs involved in the same struggle....Germany's objective [is]...solely the destruction of the Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere....In that hour the Mufti would be the most authoritative spokesman for the Arab world. The Mufti thanks Hitler profusely."
Conversations, 1964)
Reference:
Record of the Conversation Between the Fuhrer and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem on November 28, 1941, in the Presence of Reich Foreign Minister and Minister Grobba in Berlin, Documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1945, Series D, Vol. XIII, London, 1964,
You continue to insult Israel by defending it with absolute nonsense, whilst attacking Palestinians with little more than weak links, false allegations, bigotry and quite an obvious attitude that Palestinians have less of a right to live in safety, if at all, compared to Israelis.
You're beginning to appear to be no better than the likes of Anne Coulter and Bill O'Reilly.
As with the IDF, Israel deserves better.
Remember, Israel loses the war if it loses a single battle. It is not a big country with areas to drop back to.
Also, the continuing prosperity of Israel depends on its access to water which is partly why it has to control southern Lebanon, the Golan Heights and the Jordan valley. Drip irrigation is a bad joke since it "salts" the fields. Without water, Israel will be either more poor or be depopulated. This is the systemic reason that Israel ultimately endures by the courtesy of its neighbors.
The Palestinians have reasons of their own humanity to strike back at Israel, and the Israeli have the sound human instinct to destroy what endangers their women and children. Wolves, lions, and bears have gone extinct in Palestine since the days of king David for just this reason. Humanity is a different order of being and (particularly since both are the children of Jacob) should be accommodated.
So, what Israel has done in Gaza is profoundly evil; but worse, it is stupid. In the eyes of many, they have passed beyond mercy and generated implacable enemies. The blowback will be not proportionate but an escalation. Israel hangs in fire waiting to suffer for any weaknesses.
And I dislike people who make moral arguments while insisting they are not.
I think the proper term for is "a hypocrite."
Hamas.
American evangelicals and the powerful Israel lobby in America
and, yes, Hamas AND Israel would oppose this.
Unfortunately, in my opinion.
Master Luni seems to think Israel is totally blameless for the mess there. Un-bloomin'-believable.
Tell that to the doctor sitting in his home in an enclave outside of Gaza City when a tank shell tore through their home, killing his children. There couldn't have any mistaking that home as a weapons cache for Hamas, nor as a hiding place for Hamas. Tell that to the teachers and parents of children killed in a UNITED NATIONS school, fired on by tanks. There were refugees around the house, women, children; they thought a building with the UN flag displayed, known as a UN school would be safe. The propaganda that many of you on HuffPo are swallowing whole from Israelis is NOT applicable in these cases; probably many more. These were TANK strikes, nearby, not overhead in planes. What have Israeli soldiers become.?.....; killers, blind robots for an election campaign????
And the reporters who are brave enough to try to get these and other stories out to the world are shot and killed.
Speaking strictly as a liberal and with private reservations, you cannot solve all of your problems by throwing money at them.
You'd think, from reading the pro-israel posts on here, that they would have graciously declined the hundreds of billions in cash and weapons America provides Israel annually.
Regis Philbin? Iz dat you?
And even if that were true, how does that compare to ramming humanitarian aid ships? Or setting fire to the entire stock of UNWRA humanitarian supplies? Israel has a lot to answer for to the ICC.
1. that our enemies will start responding to violence with peace
2. that we are that powerful and mighty
In 1948-- 7 Arab states attacked.
1973-- 3 Arab states attacked.
Now ---2 of them are at peace with Israel. Not out of love, but in full knowledge that they have zero chance of defeating Israel.
This is Middle East.
Arab states still talk big for the benefit of the "street." But none would dare to attack.
Regardless of religion, the weak states suffer( Lebanon, Iraq, Kuwait) the strong survive ( Egypt, Iran, Israel).
This is Middle East.
One shouldn't bring narrow suburban American perspective to the world affairs... really.
Really.
Then we'll see how righteously superior you are.
You are essentially saying "might makes right" and dismissing as "narrow suburban American perspective" the concept of "rule of law"
Now you are entering an age when nations in your region are becoming nuclear powers.
We know israel has them-- and Iran seems to be making an effort-- certainly Pakistan and India, just to the East of you have them.
And let's face it, the science behind it isn't exactly a big secret, and we're not going to be able to stop the proliferation forever.
So, one way or another, I'd say you will soon have several states in your region that will be nuclear.
Now, how good will "might makes right" work then?
One way or another, your wars are coming to an end--what you WILL be able to choose is HOW they come to an end --and whether there is anybody left standing.
Maybe you all could use come of what we call old fashioned American Common Sense.
My advice (and I'm borrowing from JFK ) to ALL of you is to wake up, because either we are going to make an end of war--or war is going to make an end of us.
Although in US certainly the system is "the best oligarchy money can buy."
Proof? Who won the election in 2008?-- the guy with most money.
Human civilization is mostly at peace right now. Enjoy the moment, indeed.
As the Benigni character said in _Down by Law," It is a sad and beautiful world."
In addition, you fail to acknowledge that the "sniper" in your analogy is not just one individual in a single circumstance. Israel is dealing with a sophisticated, well-funded theocratic military organization -- Hamas -- that has a growing lethal arsenal which has actively attracked thousands of Israeli citizens on a daily basis. As long as Hamas exists in its current incarnation, its threat to Israel is without limits. All it requires is better aim with more lethal warheads
To take an extreme, but not implausible example of your own analogy, would you advocate sacrificing 50 civilians to take out a terrorist who was about to trigger a nuclear device that would certainly kill thousands? The situation in Gaza lies somewhere in between your extreme example and the one I just posited. Of course, I don't believe my analogy to be appropriate. Unfortunately, you actually believe in yours.
here's the question. Would you be willing to kill ONE innocent civilian if you could assassinate a terrorist (or whatever label you like)?
If you ranswer is yes, then would you be willing to kill two, three, five ten, twenty, thirty? Do you see where this is going?
If your answer to ANY of these is yes, then you are putting yourself on the same moral plane as the terrorist, where humaan lives are just part of an equation in achieving your geopolitical goal.
To take it to its logical conclusion, you could wipe out Hams simply by using the bomb--you would get Hamas, and "those who harbor them"-- Are you prepared to live in such a world?
Of course we can't use nuclear weapons, becaue then we might kill some of OUR guys, or ruin "OUR" land
Sorry to use such an absurd example, but that is simply taking the Bush-Sharon Doctrine to its logical conclusion.
then don't, it doesn't no do justice to the point you're trying to carry.
It reminds me of the argument Austrian policeman once tried on me:" here you are drinking the milk on the street, then before we know, it'll be beer, then wine, vodka and in a few years you'd be swilling moonshine in the gutter.
If you believe that Hamas will not continue to attack Israel, and do so with increasingly lethal weaponry, that is your own foolish choice. But I don't think the average Israeli who lives within rocket range of Gaza will agree with you.