January 5, 2009

Israel Is Exercising Its Right of Self-Defense

Opponents and enemies of Israel are in full hue and cry over Israel’s attack on the terrorist organization Hamas and its government and military installations in Gaza. The main criticism is that the Israeli response to the rocketing of southern Israel is “disproportionate.” There is little, if any, dispute that Israel’s goal of ending all rocket attacks on Israel and its civilian population, is reasonable and indeed sanctioned by international law.
It seems to me that if the goal is reasonable, then the only issue is whether the force applied to achieve that goal is reasonable. In my view, the fact that seven days of continuous bombing of Gaza by the Israeli air force did not accomplish the goal demonstrates that the amount of force used by Israel has been less than needed. Hamas could have stopped its rocket attacks but chose not to. So now Israel’s ground attack has begun with greater force.
Every day during the bombing of Gaza, Hamas proudly announced that it was keeping up its rocketing of Israel. Never did the number of rockets fall below 20 per day, and on some days it reached 70. On one day, one of the rockets landed in an Israeli classroom which, had it been occupied at the time, would have injured or killed dozens of Israeli children.
There is a difference between the injuries and deaths of Palestinian civilians and in particular, children in Gaza – which everyone, including the Israelis deplore — and the deaths of Israeli civilians and children in Israel, which apparently no one in Gaza regrets. Hamas wants to deliberately kill every Israeli Jew it can, and they say so, while the Israelis regret any Palestinian civilian casualties that occur as the Israelis direct their fire at Hamas terrorists who maintain their installations in civilian occupied areas, using those civilians as human shields.
The governments of Egypt and Jordan, as well as the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas, all acknowledge that Hamas began the latest hostilities by declaring the existing ceasefire agreed to in June 2008 at an end in mid-December 2008. The New York Times of January 3rd reported, “…government officials including Mr. Mubarak and Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit have blamed Hamas for abandoning the cease-fire with Israel and seeming to seek Israeli retaliation.” The New York Post of January 3rd reported, “The so-called moderate Arab regimes – Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, as well as the Palestinian Authority – have limited their response to what can best be called lip-service condemnations of the Israeli attack. And nothing more. ‘The one responsible for the massacres is Hamas, and not the Zionist entity, which in its own view reacted to the firing of Palestinian missiles,’ Nimr Hammad, an adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, told the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar. Similar remarks have been voiced in Cairo, Amman and Riyadh…”
Since it declared a unilateral end to the cease-fire in December, 2008, Hamas has never stopped firing rockets at Israel, which have numbered over 1,000 just in the last six months. Since Hamas gained power in Gaza seven years ago, it has fired over 10,000 rockets. Hamas has not only been raining down rockets on Israel, it also has been steadily widening the range and accuracy of its rockets. While originally Hamas used more primitive rockets which went six miles before landing and exploding, now it launches rockets that are capable of going 24 miles before exploding, bringing 750,000 Israelis living in southern Israel within the rocket danger zone. Hamas has also smuggled into Gaza from Egypt through a vast network of tunnels tremendous quantities of weapons for use against Israel.
So what is a reasonable definition of “proportionality?” Since the rockets have never stopped and are fired at Israel every day, it is clear that the force used to date has not been adequate to achieve the goal: ending the daily rocket attacks on Israel. Logic and rationality require that Israel increase the force used to achieve its goal.
The civilian residents of Gaza are not entirely innocent. They voted to make Hamas their government in a free election, just as the Germans voted for Hitler in a democratic election. The Times reports on January 5th two different responses by citizens of Gaza. In one case, a woman whose family was decimated after Israel began its ground invasion, said, “May God exterminate Hamas.” She understood who was responsible for the carnage. Another woman quoted by The Times, whose family was cowering during the invasion without electricity or water, said about Hamas, “God bless these fighters. They are throwing themselves to death to protect us.” It is those fighters who send rockets into Israel to kill civilians who are responsible for the retaliation of the Israel Defense Force doing what it can to stop the rocketing.
The goal of Hamas is to expel all Jews who came to Historic Palestine, now Israel, after 1917, and then create a single, Islamic state. They have said they will not recognize the State of Israel as a sovereign state. They will not recognize as binding on them any prior agreements that the Palestinian Authority has signed with Israel. They will continue to use violence to achieve their goals.
What the world has to do, and many do already, is understand that promises by Hamas that are not verifiable are worthless. The ultimate answer is a two-state solution which both Israel and the Palestinian Authority have accepted. In Israel there is a small minority opposed to two states. They and their policies are rejected by the Israeli government. In Gaza it is the Hamas government which has rejected the two-state solution and is actively pursuing violence to achieve its genocidal goals. Those living in Gaza are now reaping the consequences.

All photos courtesy IDF Spokesperson.

An editorial in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) makes many of the same points, but emphasizes the role these operations play in fighting the extremist ideologies backed by Iran.  As long as Israel’s military is able to send a forceful and convincing message to Iran and her allies, the moderates in the Middle East–as well as Europe and the United States–will all be better off.

As this video shows, evidently, Hamas does.  Upon entering Gaza, the IDF has found tunnels and stores of weapons in some pretty strange places–many of which are in civilian areas (like the bathroom above).

You can find more videos and footage on YouTube.

Israel has been working with the International Committee of the Red Cross to conduct necessary humanitarian work in the Gaza Strip.  The ICRC reports that a war surgery team has received authorization to enter Gaza (which it has done) and that it has escorted teams of Palestinian technicians working to repair water mains and power lines in the northern Gaza Strip.  In addition, Israel and the ICRC have worked to ensure safe passage to even the most dangerous areas for ambulances and a fire brigade.

Finally, Israel has actively assisted the many non-governmental organizations working in Gaza to help the Palestinian people.  At a meeting yesterday (04 January), NGO representatives discussed some of the more pressing problems with the Israeli government including: availability of wheat and gasoline and a shortage of cash.
During the second part of the meeting, Foreign Minister Livni herself met with the NGO representatives to better understand the situation on the ground from their point of view.  The NGOs expressed their satisfaction with the level of Israeli cooperation.
At this meeting, the representative of the World Health Organization mentioned that setting up a field hospital was not necessary.  He did note, however, that the Palestinians were preventing the wounded from being evacuated to Israel, preferring that they be evacuated to Egypt.

You can also watch a video of the visit from ABC.

On January 4th, at Bethel Gospel Assembly in Harlem, over 1,200 people stood in support of Israel.

Bishop Carlton T. Brown, Senior Pastor of the Bethel Gospel Assembly, Inc. in Harlem lead his congregation in a special prayer for the State of Israel and all of the lives affected by the recent events in the region.

“Bethel’s commitment to the nation of Israel spans 20 years. If there was ever a time we needed to stand with the people of Israel in prayer, it is at this critical time when they need our urgent support the most.” said Bishop Brown.

“Seeing the support today for the people of Israel is heartwarming,” Asaf Shariv, Consul General of Israel in New York said, “The people of Israel want peace, but it is also our obligations to permit the children of Israel to sleep in peace. Israel has moved from restraint to response. There are children in Israel that do not know what it means to live without “Red Alert,” the 15 second notice that citizens in Sderot to find shelter from an incoming rocket. It is about time that they live in peace.”

Consul General also read the story written by Corporal Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier kidnapped by Hamas from Israel over two and a half years ago, and has since been held without rights in Gaza by Hamas. To see a video of children of New York reading Shalit’s book, click here.

As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other world leaders try to broker a cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas, one former member of
the militant Islamic organization said there will never be lasting peace between the two groups.

“There is no chance. Is there any chance for fire to co-exist with the water?” said Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of one of the group’s founding members.

Yousef added: “It’s not about Israel, it’s not about Hamas: it’s about both ideologies.”

Yousef, son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, one of the most influential leaders of the militant group, said the organization betrays the Palestinian cause and tortures its own members.

For the full article click here.