Ron Rosenbaum says don’t compare them with Hamas.
[Update a while later]
The reaction among the left to Gaza seems passing strange to me, given that so-called liberals tend to elevate intentions over actual results when evaluating policies.
Raising the minimum wage increases lower-class unemployment? Who cares, our hearts were in the right place in wanting them to have a living wage.
Raising capital gains taxes reduces government revenue? That’s all right, it’s what’s necessary for “fairness.”
Welfare creates dependency on the government? Hey, we’re just trying to help the poor. Who are you to criticize us, you cold-hearted right wingers?
Disarming people leaves them defenseless? You gun nuts are just trying to stop us from trying to reduce needless slaughter with guns.
Green policies are helping bankrupt California? How can you complain about us when we’re trying to save the planet?
But somehow, all this gets turned on its head when it comes to their analysis of the Middle East. What are the Israeli intentions? To live in peace, without a threat to their lives and nation, and to minimize casualties, on both sides, in any war waged against them.
What are Hamas’ intentions? Their intentions (and not secret ones, but stated openly and proudly, as Ron Rosenbaum points out) are the most evil imaginable (other than the extinction of the human race itself). Their explicit goal is the extinction of all Jews in creation. They are prevented from achieving this goal only by their lack of military weapons with which to do so. If their capabilities matched their intentions, Israel would be no more, as would Jewry (and other infidels, eventually) everywhere.
But somehow, their vile intentions, which should be condemned, by the traditional values of these “liberals,” become irrelevant to the discussion. No matter that their intentions (to create as many casualties on both sides as possible) are often partially achieved — they are completely ignored. The focus is not on intentions at all, of either party, but only on outcomes. And since, by Hamas’ design, the vast number of casualties occur in Gaza, by Israeli weapons, and despite the life and treasure they expend to minimize them, the Israelis are viewed as the problem, and their intentions be damned.
It is a “liberal” Bizarro world.
[Update a few minutes later]
Some thoughts from Caroline Glick:
Q: Is the media here in the U.S. or internationally remotely fair?
A: When the media are only interested in what is going on when Israel defends itself, the answer is no, they aren’t fair. They don’t pay any attention when hundreds of thousands of Israelis are relegated to bomb shelters for weeks and months on end. They don’t care that Israeli children can’t go to school or day care because Hamas is targeting schools and day-care centers. They only cover the story when Israel finally decides to put an end to this crazy situation where our children are growing up underground. And this is appalling.
From CNN’s coverage of events here, for instance, you could easily come away from the news thinking that Israel is attacking Gaza for no reason. The European media, and much of the U.S. media dismiss the significance of Hamas’s missile, rocket, and mortar campaign against Israel by noting that these projectiles are relatively primitive and have no guidance systems. But this misses and indeed distorts the entire point. Hamas doesn’t need advanced weapons. Its goal is not to attack specific military targets. Its goal is to attack Israeli society as a whole and terrorize our citizens. That’s what makes it such an outlaw.
In fact, this random bombing of civilian targets is the very definition of war crimes. Due to their random nature, every projectile launched against Israel by Hamas is a separate war crime. And that’s the real story. But again, outside of publications like National Review and the like, the Western media have ignored this basic truth and worse, they have turned the criminal nature of Hamas’s campaign into a justification for it.
…Q: A lot of critics say that Israel is just going too far in its attacks. What do you make of the charge?
A: The interesting aspect of this claim is what it tells us about the success of anti-Israel propaganda. For instance, Richard Falk, the Jewish anti-Semite who the U.N.’s Human Rights Council appointed to act as its rapporteur against Israel began accusing Israel of committing war crimes against the Palestinians in Gaza the moment Israel began its campaign. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch systematically fabricate international “law” backed by “eyewitness” reports from Hamas supporters in order to accuse Israel of breaking it every single time it takes any steps to defend itself, no matter how restrained.
Israel has done nothing in its campaign against Hamas that could be considered going “too far.” It has done nothing in its campaign that could be considered “disproportionate.” It has targeted military targets and terror operatives.
The fact of the matter is that Israel is held to standards that are discriminatory while its enemy — an illegal, openly genocidal terrorist organization — is defended and shielded from attack by the media, by self-proclaimed human-rights activists and by hostile foreign leaders like British Foreign Minister David Miliband and Turkish Prime Minister Recip Erdogan.
It’s what they do. Read the whole thing.
Just to be clear: I was addressing why there are refugees in the first place, not why Arab countries won’t let them immigrate.
Have you ever wondered why there are refugees?
No Bob, because the answer is simple and as old as time.
What is interesting is that between the wars and the uprisings, the Palestinians have been on the losing end every time since 1948. Their leadership hasn’t ever done them any favors. Throughout history going back literally thousands of years, when a group of people lose a war, there are consequences including losing land and/or forced migration. Too bad that some of these Arab countries that are partially responsible aren’t willing to help out by letting them immigrate. Unfortunately Israel is almost always in a lose-lose position even though they have every right to defend themselves. What a mess. It irks me when I keeping hearing about how Israel started this current ‘war’ when every news broadcast should start by saying that it was Hamas that forced this – who were elected by the majority of Gaza thus making them all bear responsibility. Note that this is coming from a ‘liberal’, suprise, suprise.
Bob: What?! Hey now. I’m certainly not defending Hamas.
Again, I find your words disingenuous. First, you make a claim Hamas can transform themselves. Then you point to the fact Hamas once offered health care. Now, you are going back to 60 year old literature to make an argument that Israel is culpable of ethnic cleansing, and thus no different from Hamas desire to destroy all of Israel today.
If any of the Segev’s comments are true, then the fact is Israel has made the transformation that you claim Hamas could make. More recent than 60 years ago, Israel has provided land for Palestinians, something that neighboring Arab countries have never done. Apparently that’s not relevant to you.
What seems relevant to you is the wrongs of Israel 60 years ago. The fact that a month ago Hamas also fired rockets into Israel on a daily basis is not to be found in your discussion. Yet you claim not to be defending Hamas.
Leland, I’ve read your last comment with dumbfounded amazement. The first three sentences of your last comment are accurate, although you were already heading off a cliff. The last sentence you wrote is accurate. Everything else you wrote was profoundly wrong. I don’t have the patience to address each and every way you are wrong.
I’m only interested in addressing one issue: There was never any moral equivalence between Israel and the Arabs. Any misdeeds undertaken by Israelis in the first half of the 20th century pale compared to the misdeeds committed by the Arabs. You can google Tom Segev 1949 to read more, keeping in mind, of course, that you can find a wide range of opinion on the internet. And as for Hamas, there is no equivalence whatsoever between Hamas and Israel, whether it is the Israel of 60 years ago or today.
If I’m incorrect about you not finding Tom Segev relevant; then why are you insisting that people still read him? Hamas was founded in 1987. Perhaps you can explain the insight that Tom Segev had in 1949 about Hamas creation 40 years later?
Until you do, I find your assertions irrelevant and will question why you continue to make them.
Ugh, excess “not”… I miss preview.
Alas, point was either Bob thinks Tom Segev’s tome from 1949 is relevant to Hamas (founded in 1987) action in 2008 (which means my comment was thoroughly correctly), or Bob needs to explain why he keeps bringing up Tom Segev’s 1949 tome.
Perhaps Bob is catching up on his Walter Duranty?
“If a one state solution couldn’t work in peaceful post-communist Czechoslovakia, it probably shouldn’t be attempted any time soon in Israel & Palestine.”
I’ll see your Czechoslovakia with India and raise you one Canada.
Here is an excellent paper explaining the situation in Gaza as it exists today. Of course Caroline Glick did a good job as well.
Leland, I was talking about the past because I was answering Rand who asked whether the refugees were Israel’s fault.
For much of my life, I believed that the Arabs could have freely stayed in Israel and lived better lives. For the most part, I still think that’s true. Segev’s book explains why it wasn’t true in every case, and that the Israeli founding fathers were demonstrably aware of this fact, and were sometimes disturbed by it.
But the above is part of a nuanced answer. Leland, based on our previous interactions here, I think you can’t do nuance. For you, I would suggest that we agree to forget the complicated past and focus on present situation. For you, my answer is: Israel good, Hamas bad. I firmly believe that.
===
Ed, I think that that if the Arab countries hadn’t kept attacking Israel, Israel would have grown into a truly multi-ethnic democracy like the one you are envisioning, and that would have been great. (And even in the real world, Arab Israelis do get a better deal than any other Arabs.)
If France regularly attacked Canada, the Quebecois and the rest of Canada wouldn’t get along nearly so well. And in India, peace with Pakistan would make it harder for aberrations like the Bharatiya Janata party (the Hindu nationalist party) to get support. Ed, I think you’re suggesting a one state multi-ethnic solution to stop the violence. I’d say that the violence has to stop first, and the countries that emerge from a two state solution will have to learn to live together and eventually become friends. Look at how well France and Germany are doing. At the end of WWII, I wouldn’t have suggested a one state merger of Germany and France, but today you aren’t stopped at the border when you cross it.
I am not suggesting a one state solution to end the violence. I am suggesting it to make the violence a police problem instead of an army problem, using olice methods and tools rather than army methods and tools..
Look at it this way: there were 6.1 deaths per 1000 population in L.A. county in 2003, out of a population of around ten million.
http://www.laalmanac.com/vitals/vi11.htm
http://tinyurl.com/7pkxxs
There were 304 murders in L.A. County in 2008.
http://lacountymurders.com/
Israel has a population of around 7 million, and including the West Bank and Gaza the total population is around ten million.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel#Demographics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank#Demographics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaza#Demographics
The death rate in Israel in 2008 was 5.41 deaths per 1000 population.
http://www.indexmundi.com/israel/death_rate.html
So for a comparable population size and density, there is a higher death rate in Los Angeles county than there is in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. However, the death rate in L.A. County isn’t international news, because violent death there is a police problem being approached with police tools and methods.
However, when an army uses its tools and methods to solve an army problem you get 300 people dying in one attack. An army is a blunt instrument, a police force is a surgical instrument – and an army fighting against terrorism is a reactive response, whereas a police system fighting terrorism is a proactive effort. As a police problem, terrorism can be thwarted before it occurs (as has occurred many times in the U.S. before and after 9/11).
If one’s goal is to get terroism to stop in Israel, then using the same approach that has been used for decades with no solution any closer is not the way to go about solving the problem. A new approach must be taken. A one-state solution is such an approach.
I miss preview.
Leland, I was talking about the past because I was answering Rand who asked whether the refugees were Israel’s fault.
Perhaps you were. You do have the consistent habit of going on tangents, but Rand’s question was about the current situation.
Nice response Ed… Bob and I can learn from you.
Ed, I don’t think any change in the legal status of the occupied territories, including a one state solution, would make it more possible to do police work there. Israel can (and perhaps does) try use police methods there now.
I’m not against using police methods, to the extent that they work. But keep in mind how Hamas is armed. Just today, an Israeli solider by Hamas “militants” who were using an anti-tank weapon. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1053805.html
Of course, liberals have come in for a lot of criticism on this blog for thinking that terrorism is a matter that can be left to law enforcement….
Hey Rand,
Above you said “Well, it would be great if we all got a pony, too, Bob”, and since then I’ve been wondering if there is a way we all could get a pony. I was thinking about how much land that would take, given the requirements of horses, and so on. I think I’ve got it! If you define “we” in “we all got a pony” as the English-speaking world (the people who could read this blog, in theory) rather than all 6 billion human beings, I think we all could get this kind of pony: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miniature_horse – or at least, we all could have a pony to the extent that we all could have dog, as the requirements look quite similar.
Ok, ok, so since you endured reading this comment, here’s a gift: http://scienceblogs.com/culturedish/2009/01/dojs_rationale_behind_banning.php?utm_source=networkbanner&utm_medium=link
I found this story interesting, and I thought you might as well, because it is an example of either a) the government being intrusive and limiting rights or b) the government refraining from being intrusive and limiting rights. I would assume you’d pick “b”, but in the comments, people are picking “a”, which seems like fodder for you.
Bob, Ed: my understanding was that Israel *did* use “police” methods in Gaza while they occupied it, and after almost forty years of frustration finally gave up.
Hamas has put all their effort into militarizing themselves and killing Israelis inside Israel proper (not “settlers”), and so now Israel has properly (and “legally”, FWIW) responded by waging war.
I say no end save victory. Let there be a cease-fire when Hamas surrenders.