I originally started out writing a post titled “Questions That People Aren’t Asking” but as I did my reading this morning I learned, somewhat to my surprise, that the editors of the Wall Street Journal are asking at least some of those questions:
If Hamas cared about Palestinian civilians, it would encourage them to leave Gaza. But instead it is demanding that they remain. The terror group intends to use its own people and the hostages it abducted from Israel as human shields. Their hope is that either Israeli concern about causing collateral damage or global opprobrium will force Israel to scale back its counter-invasion.
Egypt is the only place to which Gaza’s civilians can flee for now. Yet Cairo insists on maintaining its strict quota for entries from Gaza via the Rafah crossing—with only 800 able to leave on Monday, and the crossing reportedly closed in recent days.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi bears no warm feelings toward Hamas, which is allied with the Muslim Brotherhood that tried to impose an Islamist regime in his country not too long ago. He’s concerned that Hamas terrorists might slip across the border into Egypt with a tide of civilians.
That’s two of the questions:
- Is Hamas organizing evacuations from the northern part of Gaza?
- Are the Egyptians allowing Gazans to seek refuge in Egypt?
So much for Arab solidarity, even Gazan solidarity. Hamas is the government of Gaza. As far as I’ve been able to discover they’re doing the opposite of organizing evacuation of civilians from the northern part of Gaza. They’re encouraging them to stay presumably so they will function as human shields against an Israeli ground invasion. That should exhaust any sympathy you might have for Hamas.
And the Egyptians aren’t even allowing foreigners (like Americans) to exit Gaza into Egypt let alone Gazans. To my eye Gazans would be legitimate refugees and Egypt has a legal obligation to accept them. They aren’t. The reasons for that include the political, security, and just plain bigotry. Palestinians don’t seem to be particularly popular in the Arab world. Or, possibly more precisely, they’re popular as a cause to beat the Israelis, Europeans, and Americans over the head with but not otherwise.
Here’s another question. If you don’t think the Israelis should be bombing and invading Gaza, what do you think they should do? IMO if you disagree with what the Israelis are doing you have an intellectual and moral obligation to say outright what you think they should be doing. As a regular commenter here said in a thread at OTB:
The asymmetry between the standard for Israeli conduct and Hamas’ conduct is very revealing – Israel is held to an impossible standard where any killed civilians are immediately counted as war crimes and condemned. Hamas is held to no standard at all despite it being one long string of continuous and intentional war crimes and having an explicit goal is to murder Jews.
I’ll rise to my own challenge. I think the Israelis are doing pretty much what I would expect them to do. I don’t fully agree with the full set of objectives of any of the parties and in particular I disagree with how the United States has been managing its relationship with Israel. I think the United States should be anti-murder of civilians, anti-kidnapping, anti-beheading of babies, and anti-raping of women but I also do not believe that we support the goal of displacing all Arabs from the West Bank and Gaza. None of the Israeli settlements on the West Bank is self-supporting. Without the support of the Israeli government life would be even harder for the settlers than it already is. We should exert whatever influence we have on the Israeli government to discourage them from providing financial support for West Bank settlements.
In terms of Gaza I don’t believe there are any good options. Of the bad options creating a buffer zone of the northern, say, five miles of Gaza that is left as a no-go zone is probably the best but it’s pretty awful. The Israelis have told Gazans to evacuate. I don’t know if 24 hours is enough; honestly, I think they’d be condemned regardless of what they did. I think that a house-to-house, block-by-block search of Gaza is an error.
“That should exhaust any sympathy you might have for Hamas.”
I haven’t seen anyone express sympathy for Hamas. Its a big world so maybe you can find someone but if they are there its a tiny group.
” If you don’t think the Israelis should be bombing and invading Gaza”
I am told some people have said that but it’s not what i have been reading. The question has been more about how much bombing is OK and if there are any limits. There has been the occasional debate about whether a dead baby with its throat cut is worse than a dead baby blown to tiny bits with a bomb.
“In terms of Gaza I don’t believe there are any good options.”
It’s a matter of when and not if they have to leave. Absent this attack they might have outlasted the Palestinian in the West Bank but that seems unlikely now.
Steve
Is intentional murder worse than “collateral damage”? Dead is dead. Isn’t the question the degree to which intentions matter? To believe the two situations are equivalent is to believe that they don’t matter at all.
In our legal system there is a distinction between first degree murder and manslaughter. Is that a foolish distinction?
It has been expressed, loudly, on Chicago television. There have been demonstrations all over the United States (in big cities) in which some of the participants have expressed support for Hamas. Some have not as well. Those who have not do not redeem those who have.
I looked and arent seeing much. I see a lot of “Free Palestine” and some signs about resistance and River to the Sea. I am not seeing Yea rah go Hamas or Hamas needs to kill more Israelis. Do you have anything more? Or do you think that supporting Palestinians is the same as supporting Hamas?
“o believe the two situations are equivalent is to believe that they don’t matter at all.”
Sure, but then that brings up two issues. First, what were the reasons the Jewish babies were killed? Clearly Hamas is a jihadi group and they should be directly blamed and be held responsible (Hamas is evil and they should all be killed) , but does that mean Israel never did anything that made people want to join the jihadi group or made people angry? Given that it’s forbidden to criticize Israel I guess not. That then leads to how much collateral damage is ok. Beats me, but to even suggest you think about it gets you attacked. Looking at past responses it looks like 20:1 is the usual ratio.
It also depends upon how you look at it. None of the babies are guilty of anything. Does killing them for the sins of their parents make sense? Does it matter whether or not their parents were guilty? The reality of war means a lot of babies will be killed so guilt is irrelevant. I can say from having done trauma for so long that mothers mostly dont care why their kids were killed, they just care that they are dead.
Steve
No it doesn’t. But two wrongs still don’t make a right.
I believe the word you are looking for and should be searching under is “justified”. Having a reason is not the same as justified. If you say the attacks are justified, you are siding with Hamas.
And you persist in ignoring intent.
Uhh, I keep saying Hamas is evil and they should all be killed. I keep saying the attacks were not justified and Hamas owns the murders. Since it’s beyond the pale to suggest Israel contributed in any way to the conditions that made this more likely I guess we will leave that alone. I am sure we will abide by that same standard when discussing American criminals.
I actually acknowledged that intent matters. I said “sureâ€. It’s so obvious I didn’t think it deserved more so let me clarify. Intent matters hugely in most situations and in particular this one. It’s why I keep saying all of Hamas should die and if Israel kills a bunch of civilians in the process I am ok with that. But, apparently asking how many deaths isn’t acceptable. Or asking if those deaths will achieve anything beyond revenge. To be clear, revenge is totally justified.
Finally , to even suggest that some people think babies are innocent and shouldn’t bear the costs of sins by others is not justifying Hamas killings. Feeling sorry for innocents is a pretty normal reaction, except when n this case.
Steve