Posted on 01/04/2009 4:13:33 PM PST by goldstategop
Israel's attempt to wipe out Hamas is understandable, but stupid. No country in the world is going to ignore the provocation of rockets being launched from neighbouring territory day after day. If Mexico had a group of anti-imperialists bombing Texas, imagine how long it would take for America to mobilise a counterattack. Israel has every right to respond.
But the kind of response matters. Killing 500 Palestinians and wounding 2,000 others (at the time of writing) is disproportionate. Hamas can harass, but it cannot pose any threat to the existence of Israel. And just as Hamas's indiscriminate bombing of population centres is a crime against humanity, so is Israel's killing of civilians (at least 130 so far in Gaza, not to mention the thousands in the years of the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza).
Hamas had respected the previously negotiated ceasefire except when Israel used it as cover to make assassination raids. Hamas argued that these raids were hardly a manifestation of a ceasefire, and so as symbolic protest it would allow the release of rocket fire (usually hitting no targets). But when the issue of continuing the ceasefire came up, Hamas wanted a guarantee that these assassination raids would stop. And it asked for more. With hundreds of thousands of Palestinians facing acute malnutrition, Hamas insists that the borders be opened so that food can arrive unimpeded. And in return for the captured Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit, it asks for the release of 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
Thanks
St. Augustine
But the issue of proportional response is misused here. Hamas seeks the annaihilation of Jews. The fact that they are incompetent to achieve that objective as things currently stand does not mean Israel must pretend they (Israel) are no more competent than Hamas. Because Hamas seeks to destroy Israel, the destruction of Hamas is a fully proportionate response.
If proportionate means simply numerical equivalences, where are the outraged leftists complaining about the disproportionate response when Israel releases 500 Islamofascists for 1 Jew?
What “proportionate response” means is this: if your rival’s armies raid some nomads crossing into your territory, you can’t claim a moral right to destroy their capital. If they claim a small, rural valley on the borders is historically their possession, you can’t mass an army to slaughter 500,000 peasants. If they sink a merchant vessel, you can’t burn all of their port cities to the ground.
None of these represents a certain, existential threat, even though kings may suppose each is a harbinger of such a threat. Each may seem to one nation to be an act of outroght war, but the other nation may see itself as partly justified: Were the raiders chasing off what they perceived to be an invasion of their own lands? Did the navy suspect the merchant vessel was aiding pirates? Are some residents of that small valley ethnic members of the invader’s nation, who are being gravely abused?
It’s a geopolitical update of the biblical maxim, “an eye for an eye,” which means, “no more than an eye for an eye.” It’s a maxim which is intended to prevent the escalation of hostilities.
Like the issue an “imminent threat,” though, modern technology complicates the definition of “proportionate response.” If your enemy is building a nuclear weapon, is that the same as massing an army at your border?
Uh... that would annaihilate Jersualem.
And there it is! Excellent!
If so, you should publish it! It is excellent and timely.
I would be honored to publish it on my blog! Feel free to Freepmail me and tell me to whom authorship should be attributed.
Well, thank you. The response is my own wording; the ideas I was trying to express are hardly novel. But you can use it however you wish. I’m probably better keeping my monicker. (It wouldn’t change anything with me, but next time, use freepmail if you ever want to ask a guy to attach his name to something stated in FR. :^) )
the average lapsed Christian in this country understands better the position Israel finds itself in and votes accordingly in presidential elections than does the average Jew.
can’t argue with the voting stats
79% of Jews voted for Obama over McCain-Palin both of whom were completely unambiguous in their support of Israel meanwhile Obama has known links to Arab terrorist fronts and and Muzzies in his family
Jews are historically scared of nationalistic power (USSR being the exception briefly till it turned on them) and I think many worldwide see their kin in Israel being too heavyhanded and nationalistic
myself, I always admired Israelis as my favorite Jews
I fear this is God’s plan.....somehow
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