The fire next time
Posted on December 27th, 2008
by Scott McConnell |
|
Of the websites I see regularly, only Phil Weiss and his colleague Adam Horowitz seem the least bit troubled by the Israeli assault on Gaza. But the world is smaller now, and the use of this much American made air power against defenseless civilian targets will have some blowback, probably in this direction.
Last week at a talk on the prospects for peace at the New America Foundation, one participant recalled President Clinton’s visit to Gaza in 1999. Palestinians stood hundreds deep for miles along his route and grown men wept on hearing Clinton’s graceful and powerful acknowledgement of Palestinian displacement and suffering. Obama is now silent as the American choppers and F-16’s, under Israeli command, go into action. It’s not a change for the better.
Filed under: Foreign policy
“defenseless civilian targets”
1)Hamas targets only civilian targets with its rockets, if you haven’t noticed, and they’ve been quite a lot of that lately.
2)The targets are Hamas installations, and the people who are targeted are all murderers and thugs. If civilians are killed, they are people who have failed to do the first thing that is required of civilized people–stop the murders and thugs who live among them. In fact, they do the opposite–they actively support them.
3) If you insist that Israel should not defend itself from Hamas, then you are insisting that Israel uniquely in the world should not defend itself.
The bottom line: 200 murderers and would be murderers have been killed so far, and if any criticism is to be made, it should be that not enough of them were killed.
Yeah, but Israel has been running a blockade for more than a year now on a population with an average yearly income of US$1000. It is a form of group punishment and has effectively made the region one large concentration camp.
It is not a good policy.
For comparision, the Catalan in Spain regularly bomb civilian targets. They have killed many, either on purpose on on accident.
Would it be prudent for Spain to wall off Catalan and try to starve them? Eliminate their right to vote?
It that likely to increase or decrease violence?
The ceasefire between Hamas and Israel lapsed without any in-depth analysis by the media. Israel then killed a couple of Hamas operators in what they claimed was an attack. Once again this was never investigated by the media. It was this incident that triggered the Hamas missle attacks.
There is a pattern here. The Israelis maneuver the Arabs into making aggressive blunders which serve to excuse well planned Israeli aggressions. Barak and other Israeli spokespersons hardly try to hide their premeditation anymore.
Let’s see if tomorrows news shows address who’s fault it is that the ceasefire broke down and just how real was the Hamas incursion that prompted Hamas to begin firing missiles. I don’t doubt that both sides are in some measure to blame. But it is a disgrace that the side that gains from escalations is doing so with such deadly efficiency with our hardware. We need to stop funding this grotesque Punch and Judy show.
daveg, the Catalan do not have an armed struggle with the Spanish central government, but the Basque do. The Basque separatist terror group ETA these days tend to call authorities before bombings, though.
(Many Catalans do want independence, and this was apparent when some Catalan players on the national spanish soccer team had folded their socks so as not to show the embroidered Spanish coat of arms. Shocking, I know!)
Do agree with your point, though. The Israeli get away with a lot that others wouldn’t.
Israel in Gaza does bring to mind the British in Northern Ireland during IRA’s heyday. That resembles Israel’s occupation of palestinian territories, but even then without airstrikes or artillery shellings of predominantly civilian areas.
Sorry, got my regions confused.
Israel has never cared about Arab civilians - not now, not 60 years ago.
Witness what Israel did in Lebanon of 2006. Most of the (1000+) dead were civilians (fleeing civilians were deliberately targeted), and Israel deliberately fired millions of cluster bomblets into civilian areas three days before a ceasefire - which they knew was forthcoming. Since then, Israel has refused to provide the UN with maps describing the locations into which they fired these bomblets. Why? Because it would most likely prove the fact that they targeted civilian areas.
Just one example of Israel’s ‘concern’ for Arab civilians..
Illegal settlers are not exactly mere “civilian population”. In any case, maybe Hamas should have precision guided missiles, tanks, helos and jets so that they too can target only military targets.