 |
| Hamas won election for a 4-year term... 16 years ago. They cancelled recently scheduled elections because they thought they'd lose. It's Hamas that's the problem. They've ruined Gaza |
ADDED (21/5): You can be left wing and pro-Israel, anti-Hamas. As shown in Discussion: The Israel v Palestine Crisis, by Jerry Coyne. Much discussion, mostly people of the left.And there are Palestinians who don't much like Hamas: "Hamas, not Israel, is to blame for the latest bloodshed" by Bassem Eid
And then there's "What's the real reason so many people hate Israel?"
I was listening to ABC Radio Canberra this morning, the midday news bulletin, talking about the rockets and bombs in Gaza, and Tel Aviv. To give them their due, they were trying to be even-handed, dear old Auntie. They had the requisite number of Palestinian children killed by Israeli bombs, and of course these are tragic; how could they not be? Even as we find they are children killed by collapsing tunnels: tunnels Hamas has spent the last decades building -- instead of, say, schools and hospitals -- to hide and move the rockets they rain down on Israel....
The report noted that Biden was pressing Israel to "scale back" towards a cease-fire. No mention that Biden had not demanded the same restraint from Hamas, but there you have it, that's par for this course.
Then for balance, the ABC turned to some young Israelis who pointed out that Hamas always wants a cease-fire, after a week or so of shooting rockets at Israeli civilians. They welcome a cease-fire because they want to re-arm. Good point, and well made by these young Israelis; though no doubt there will be some who will lambast them for "smearing" Hamas with false accusations. Still, there is indeed a pattern there.
The ironic bit? The very next story was how the US had just sent a representative to a meeting on the "Iran deal". That is, how to revive it after Trump pulled the US out of it. And what's part of the renewed deal? The US removing sanctions on Iran. Those sanctions involve a lot of money. And where does that money go? To buying rockets, to ship them to Gaza, so they can find another excuse to funnel them through the tunnels and loose them on Israeli citizens.
Please do let us recall that that aim of Hamas is the complete destruction of Israel. Not co-existence, not a two-state solution, not "land for peace", none of that nonsense. Nothing but complete destruction of Israel is their aim ("from the River to the Sea"). And, by the way, killing as many Jews as possible along the way (check out the Hamas Charter, Ch7). That's why they target rockets at civilian centres, whey they deliberately aim at civilians and why they deliberately aim to kill children. Hamas have said this openly: that they get their rockets from Iran. Great, isn't it? Cease-fire, to load up with more Iranian rockets.
Israel then reacts to the rockets -- entirely in self-defence -- and the world is in shock. How dare Israel? (sometimes, more sinisterly, "how dare the Jews?"). Bibi remains unmoved, the wily fox. He's got domestic political concerns, of course. But while he remains the boss, he must try to protect his citizens. How can he not? Which the IDF does by trying to destroy infrastructure, avoiding civilian deaths as much as possible.
So, it's surely an irony, is it not, that we have pressure for peace, or at lest a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. While at the same time, the same Biden people, are engaged in giving more money to Iran, the main provider of the very missiles that Hamas use to break cease fire after cease fire.
ADDED: I've seen in various Palestinian-leaning places, sneering reference to Israel "defending" its citizens. As if that's somehow illegitimate, somehow wrong, somehow just "the jews" making excuses. This so nasty, so ill-intentioned, but it's also very effective, as it gives that side of the fence the right tone and the right rebuttal to wield against those of us who take the Israeli side. It's the equivalent to a "talking point". Oh, yeah, that "self defence" thing?! Of course, you'd say that, you oppressor...
