Category Archives: Opinion

Protesting the Victor, not the Victims

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Brett Stephens of the Wall Street Journal wrote an editorial on August 5, 2014 about the seeming hypocrisy of parts of the world protesting against Israel in the current Israel-Hamas war but barely making a peep about wars in Pakistan, Iraq, Nigeria, Libya, etc. He doubted the sincerity of people’s stated concern about Arab victims, and considered the protestors motivation of racism, since they only show up when the counter-party is Israel.

As posted in FirstOneThrough on July 21, wars involving Israel account for a very small portion of all Muslim deaths in wars. Muslim-Muslim wars account for 90% of fatalities.

That should not come as a surprise. Most wars are between neighboring countries or are civil wars. (The United States is the exception which seems to only go to war with countries that are not neighbors). As most Muslim countries neighbor other Muslim countries, it would stand to reason that most Muslim wars and fatalities would be at the hands of other Muslim countries.

However, the expected number of fatalities in wars involving Israel is out-of-proportion. Israel’s neighbors account for 7% of the world’s Muslim population (117 million people), but the fatalities account for only 1% of the deaths in wars.

The reason that so few deaths happen in wars with Israel has a lot to do with the length of the wars.

Israel’s wars tend to be much shorter than wars between Muslim countries. The Iran-Iraq war went on for 8 years. The civil war in Angola- 27 years; Somalia- 15 years; and the wars of Sudan (which included Christians) went on for 17 and 22 years. Those Muslim wars killed millions of people. Compare that to the 6-Day War of 1967, and the Israeli wars in 2006, 2008 and 2012 which were 34, 22 and 7 days long, respectively. Those four wars plus the current 2014 war killed 20,000 people combined.

The Israeli wars were short – when they were winning/won. The longest Israeli wars had heavy casualties. The 1948 Israeli War of Independence against five invading armies lasted 300 days, when Israel fought for its very existence. The First Lebanon War lasted three years and did not have a clear victor. Each of those wars had as many fatalities as the five short wars combined. Those battles where Israel was the decisive victor were typically under one month and consequently, the death tolls much smaller.

These facts lead to some interesting questions about the protests:

  • Were the wars short because Israel achieved its near-term security objectives and did not factor in global protests?
  • Did the protests help shorten the war?

More specifically to the question raised by Brett Stephens about the motivation of the protestors during these short battles with Israel:

  • Were the protestors actually concerned that Israel would wipe the opponents off the map, as their Muslim adversaries would certainly have done if they were the winner?
  • Would they protest a quick end to the wars if Israel were losing?

The answers to those questions would demonstrate that the motivation has little to do with victims, and everything to do with the victor. As the Arabs lost the wars, the protests masked their hatred for Israel as a call for the victims. If the Arabs had been winning, the protests would have been chants of support for the Muslim armies, and the “victims” would have been hailed as “martyrs” for the cause.

These anti-Israel protests occur in places with significant Muslim immigrants. If they protest a Muslim-Muslim war in their new host countries, it could lead to local street battles between Sunnis and Shiites, essentially importing their religious war to Europe. However, protesting against a common adversary in Israel is not only easier, but serves as a way of uniting Muslims that are in the middle of a large global war with themselves.

Sources:

Brett Stephens, Palestine and Double Standards: http://online.wsj.com/articles/bret-stephens-palestine-and-double-standards-1407194971?mod=trending_now_8

FirstOneThrough, Israel and Wars: https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/07/21/israel-and-wars/

 

[xxxx..]an Zionists Stand with Israel

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[Fill in your country], and stand with Israel

 

People around the world have been upset about the fighting in Israel and have reacted in a variety of ways.

  • Many communities around the world focused on sending packages to soldiers in Gaza. Items ranged from letters, pizzas, underwear and socks.
  •  Some communities held fund-raisers, such as selling challah in support of Leket, the Israeli food bank, and the Friends of the IDF.
  •  Many people flew to Israel and volunteered to help disabled people who have difficulty getting to bomb shelters amid the constant attacks from Hamas. Others went to staging areas near Gaza to help set up food stations. Many went to funerals for people they never met.

While the global media has often repeated that the Operation Protective Edge has been fought during the Muslim holiday of Ramadan, they have neglected to discuss that the timing is also the Jewish period of mourning – the Three Weeks – that culminates on August 5th with the 9th of Av.

The Three Weeks is a period when many tragedies happened to the Jewish people throughout history. The common belief is that the various tragedies – especially the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem – happened because Jews did not treat each other with respect nor did they care for each other.

In 2014, the tremendous support within Israel for the Israeli government, and the global Jewish communities’ constructive responses to the attacks from Gaza may lead one to believe that these three weeks may lead to the building of the Third Temple.

 

Source:

http://jpupdates.com/2014/07/30/survey-israelis-overwhelmingly-support-idf-gaza-attack/

 

The End of Together

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Over July 24-6, 2014, a chapter of religious pluralism ended in the city of Mosul, Iraq and its sister city across the Tigris, the ancient city of Ninveh. The Islamic militants of ISIS forced out all of the Christians, and blew up the Tombs of Seth (son of Adam and Eve) and of the Prophet Jonah.

Jonah

Jonah was the last prophet considered holy to each of the monotheistic religions. His story was unusual in several respects which enabled him to capture the imagination and dreams of Christians, Muslims and Jews.

Thousands of years ago, Judaism was the only monotheistic religion. The people in the Middle East practiced a variety of religions and worshiped many gods. The non-Jews were not particularly interested in the Hebrew Bible, and the Bible – seemingly – did not address them. The prophets in the Old Testament almost universally addressed the Jews: the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

That held true until Jonah. Jonah was given an unusual task by God: leave the land of Israel and go to a far away land because the people there did not behave properly:

“Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim against it;
for their wickedness is come up before Me.”

The story of what comes next is famous. Jonah fled from God and boarded a ship that was tossed in a storm. The sailors reluctantly threw Jonah overboard to appease his angry God whereupon Jonah was swallowed by a big fish. After three days, the fish vomited him onto land to fulfill his task of admonishing the people of Ninveh. The people of Ninveh – including the king- took Jonah’s words to heart, repented, and all was forgiven.

The story of Jonah has many messages. The Jewish rabbis consider them so important that the only time the story is read in synagogue is on the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur. The lessons of Jonah include that:

  • Repentance through prayer and action can save a great city (Ninveh) and a lone individual (Jonah in the fish);
  • It is not sufficient for Jews to only be concerned with the welfare of their people, but must work to help others as well;
  • A person should not run from a divine mission;
  • God is everywhere, and you cannot hide from Him

For Christians, the story of Jonah is not just about prayer and repentance, but about rebirth. They consider the story of Jonah’s reemergence from the great fish after three days as a precursor to the resurrection of Jesus.

For Muslims, Jonah was the only one of the twelve minor prophets mentioned in the Koran. Mohammed was said to recognize the holiness of Jonah and referred to Ninveh as “the city of Jonah”.

Three monotheistic religions embraced the mission of a man who (perhaps reluctantly) tried to help other people change their ways, while not trying to make them change their religion.

Religions in Modern Iraq

When Iraq became an independent state in 1932, roughly 120,000 Jews lived in the country comfortably. However, when the UN voted to partition Palestine in 1947, the Iraqi government and people turned on the Jews. Pogroms and public hangings became celebrated events. Operation Ezra & Nechemia from 1949 to 1951 got most of the Jews out of the country, with the balance leaving over the 1960s and 1970s. Almost no Jews remain today.

The Christian community in Iraq extends back roughly 1600 years, before the founding of Islam. As recently as 2003, the number of Christians in the country numbered about 1.5 million. However, the numbers declined rapidly during the US-Iraq war. In 2014, ISIS took over much of the country and actively pushed to remove Christians. In Mosul, the Christian community was given a choice that had historically been put before Jews in various countries over the past 1000 years: convert; pay a huge tax; or be killed. There may only be 100,000 Christians left in the country by the end of 2014.

ISIS belongs to the Salafi movement of Islam which is against the worship of the dead, and therefore opposes the use of tombs as shrines. They have destroyed many tombs of Muslim leaders, in addition to those that are important to Jews and Christians. They razed the tomb of Seth, the fifth person created in the Bible (not as famous as his siblings Cain and Abel) for the same reason. They are also slaying fellow Muslims who practice differently by the thousands.

Religions- God and Practice

During the time of Jonah, most people believed in many Gods. When Jonah addressed the sailors on the ship and the king of Ninveh, they readily accepted the words of the Jewish God – not exclusively- but alongside the other Gods they worshiped. Their openness to various Gods let them listen and pray openly together. Such receptiveness to a new God was not universal as demonstrated by the Greeks and Romans who defiled the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem centuries later.

As new monotheistic religions emerged – first Christianity and then Islam – that openness was further challenged. As each religion accepted a single God, the uniqueness of each religion became based on either: 1) unique Gods; or 2) the same God, but with a different set of practices. If the Gods were different, then only one religion could be correct. If the religions had the same God, then distinction between them was based on the method of worship and priorities.

Religious scholars debate whether the monotheistic religions all believe in the same God, just with different names and observances. In practice, the religions have battled each with the fervor of unique Gods for centuries: Muslim invasions; Christian Crusades; enforced Inquisitions. Religious wars scar most of mankind’s history.

For Muslims, it has been intra-religious battles that have been the bloodiest. Since 1948, 90% of all deaths in wars involving Muslim countries have been at the hands of other Muslim countries. In 2014, ISIS killed many more Muslims than other religious groups, and Syrian President Assad killed many more Muslims than people of other faiths. The peculiarities of practice position the battle lines.

The Demise of the Shared

July 2014 yielded a sad watershed moment. The Tomb of Jonah, whom Jews, Christians and Muslims all revered as a religious leader, was demolished. The Tomb of Seth, for whom Bible believers consider a common forbear, was destroyed. In a single week, religious fanatics dismantled physical and metaphysical symbols that united the three monotheistic faiths. If the religions shared a common God, they had a common prophet. If they had different Gods, they still had the same forbears. The tombs were not just shrines to the ancients; they were opportunities for Jews, Christians and Muslims to meet and re-establish their common bonds today. No longer.

Thousands of years ago, a Jew left his homeland to help non-Jews. He did not seek to convert or change their methods of worship, just to pass along a message from God to end evil behavior. He became a celebrated hero to billions of people of different faiths and different practices. As recently as 70 years ago, Jews, Christians and a variety of Muslims (including Sunni and Shiites) prayed together at the tomb of this common hero. But the advance of bigotry consumed them: first they got rid of the Jews, then the Christians. Now they are ridding fellow Muslims.  God’s message through Jonah of reaching out to “others” has been replaced by man’s effort to destroy the “others”.  Perhaps that was the original wickedness of Ninveh 2600 years ago.

Part of the magic of the story of Jonah was that there were no casualties: Jonah; the city of Ninveh and all of its inhabitants; the sailors; and even the fish, all escaped harm.

In today’s dark reality, we may marvel more at that part of the legend and forget what we all have lost.

Sources:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/07/25/after-leveling-iraqs-tomb-of-jonah-the-islamic-state-could-destroy-anything-in-the-bible/

http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt1701.htm

http://www.newsweek.com/isis-destroys-shiite-mosques-and-shrines-iraq-257683

http://www.jewsnews.co.il/2014/07/25/muslims-just-made-history-in-mosul-killing-and-exiling-every-last-christian/

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/07/26/ISIS-destroy-Prophet-Sheth-shrine-in-Mosul-.html

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/iraqijews.html

http://nypost.com/2014/07/27/iraqs-abandoned-christians/

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/isis-militants-destroy-tomb-jonah-mosul-1458469

“Tinge” Two. Idioms for Idiots

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Do you have friends that use the same expressions over and again?

Some are cultural phenomena, such as “Oh my God!”, “Get real” or “Could you believe it?” Entire groups of friends or communities may be heard using the same sayings. You can be confident that the familiar phrase will be punctuated throughout a conversation.

Sometimes, an expression is an original. A person (or organization) develops a catch-phrase that captures their current thinking. The first time you hear it, you might think nothing of it or just consider the comment a strange choice of words. But when you hear the same bizarre expression used again by different people in the same organization, you can be sure that it reflects a conscious cultural mindset.

On July 24, Helene Cooper and Somini Sengupta wrote an article in the New York Times about what they considered the unusual support Americans give to Israel relative to the rest of the world. In describing the pro-Palestinian protests in various cities in Europe, they stated that the protests had “an anti-Semitic tinge.” As detailed in FirstOneThrough that day (link below), the phrase ignored the riots specifically against Jews. The choice of the word “tinge” was highly offensive to any civilized person who objects to racism.

Europe being Europe and the Times being the Times, the next few days saw more of the same.

  • Israeli soccer players from Maccabi Haifa were attacked in Austria.
  • In Paris, 4000 people – many with weapons – staged a protest in Place de la Republique; 70 were arrested.
  • A Facebook page was created with the faces of French Jews with an encouragement to attack them; one of the Jews was subsequently attacked by a mob.

But the New York Times continued to be unruffled and unperturbed. So much so, that the incendiary phrase “an anti-Semitic tinge” was used again in a July 27 article by Jodi Rudoren.  Not only did she repeat the phrase verbatim, but she led that only Israelis were offended by these slight expressions of hatred (ignoring the strong condemnations of political leaders throughout the continent).

Perhaps other sections of the Times (which unlike the rest of the paper, still has a few remaining fans) will notice and react: the travel editor might highlight a nice tour of Mississippi that had “a sprinkle of lynchings”; a real estate article might describe a flat in Berlin as “airy, with a nice view of the genocide”; and the food and wine critic might describe a French liquor as “smoky, with a hint of Holocaust.”

One can expect to see other offensive and idiotic idioms in the Times in the weeks ahead.

Sources:

Recent European anti-semitism:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/10992886/Anti-Semitism-on-the-march-Europe-braces-for-violence.html

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4549072,00.html

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/183377#.U9Tm66NeLi8

http://www.algemeiner.com/2014/07/25/facebook-page-publishing-identities-of-french-jews-to-encourage-attackers-15-men-reportedly-assault-1-jew-in-paris-suburb-after-confirming-photo/

“An anti-Semitic Tinge” by FirstOneThrough:
https://firstonethrough.wordpress.com/2014/07/25/an-anti-semitic-tinge/

20140727_071838

Pray for a Lack of “Proportionately” in Numbers. There will never be an Equivalence of Intent.

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Israel is blessed with many creative minds. It has used this gift to cure diseases and win Nobel prizes in various fields of science and economics. Because of the vicious neighborhood in which it resides, it also uses its creativity to build sophisticated offensive and defensive weapon systems.
Israel has a vastly superior military capability than the Palestinian terrorists. The country’s defensive technological edge has helped to greatly reduce their casualty figures in the latest wave of terrorist attacks. In particular, the “Iron Dome” has shielded Israeli civilians from well over 1000 rockets launched from Gaza towards dense population centers. Had the Israeli technology not been in place, the casualty figures would certainly be high.
Would more Israeli deaths somehow make this combat “fair”? Do an “even” number of casualties make each side comparable? Those are distorted views of proportionality.
Would the world somehow be happier with more dead Israeli teenagers on their way home from school? Happy with dead Israelis who were sent to root out evil by foot rather than through an air campaign? Are drones attacks strictly within the purview of President Obama’s legal and military team?
Remarkably, in an effort to minimize the loss of life of the enemy, Israel continues to put its own young soldiers in harms way.
In the spring of 2002, roughly 50 Israelis and 50 Palestinians were killed over a three week period. To a casual observer, that tragedy might appear “proportionate” because the number of dead were the same for each side. However, the intent was not remotely the same: the Palestinians attacked and killed civilians and then Israeli soldiers who tried to prevent other attacks on civilians while minimizing Arab deaths. (see the video below).
In these past weeks, Hamas already committed hundreds of war crimes by deliberately attacking civilians. It continues to do so while putting its own civilian population in harms way. Yet, the world looks away.
The principle of self-defense in the case of Operation Protective Edge is unquestioned. An enemy that is dedicated to the annihilation of a people and the destruction of a country, launched over 10,000 rockets at civilians over the past six years. Hamas has thousands of additional missiles and is actively using them. The Israeli military goal is clear, although difficult to achieve in a densely populated area like Gaza.
Israel must continue to use care in rooting out the terrorists and their weapons. It will, unfortunately, use ground troops to minimize the loss of life to Arab civilians, which will greatly increase the risk of their own lives.
Now, Israeli soldiers will try to avoid the hornet’s nest of Gaza while eliminating the terrorists and their weapons of terror. Civilized people around the world should pray for a continued lack of proportionality in casualty figures, as Israel places its technological superiority on hold and attempts to protect innocent lives on both sides.

Sources:
http://www.crimesofwar.org/a-z-guide/proportionality-principle-of/
http://www.icrc.org/customary-ihl/eng/docs/v2_cha_chapter4_rule14

Opinion: Remove the Causefire before a Ceasefire

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Egypt, one of two Israeli allies in the Arab world, has suggested a ceasefire in the current hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza. US President Obama was encouraged about the development and said: “We are encouraged that Egypt has made a proposal to accomplish this goal that we hope can restore the calm that we are seeking.”

A ceasefire at this time would be a mistake.

Israel has already had two engagements in Gaza since it left the area in 2005: Operation Cast Lead in 2008 and Operation Pillar of Defense in 2012. Both of those ceasefires failed to grant any long-term peace to Israeli citizens because they did not address the fundamental cause of the Hamas rocket fire.

Hamas wants Israel destroyed. All ceasefires that Hamas agrees to are simply hiatuses between battles.

There are two basic actions that must occur that world bodies can help facilitate that will ensure a long-term cessation of hostilities:

  1. the destruction of all missiles in Gaza;
  2. the dismantling of Hamas

Removing and Destroying all Missiles in Gaza

Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu and Acting Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas spent much of the past year in a fruitless exercise of “Peace Negotiations” which had no chance of success. Much of the reason that talks were D.O.A. when they began, was because Abbas had no control (and still has no control) of Gaza. For Netanyahu, negotiating with a party who could not deliver the peace he sought was a fool’s errand – as the world witnessed.

All of the two-state peace negotiations over the years discussed a demilitarized Palestinian state. The action of removing all of the missiles now, would advance a major goal (and remove a major stumbling block) in moving towards a two-state solution. The removal itself would serve as the impetus for bringing the parties back to negotiations.

President Obama recently touted his accomplishment in ridding Syria of all chemical weapons in a peaceful manner. He said: “The fact that we didn’t have to fire a missile to get that accomplished is not a failure to uphold international norms, it’s a success.” Now would be the ideal time to follow that format and identify, remove and destroy all of the missiles in Gaza. It would save the people of Gaza and the soldiers in the Israeli Defense Forces many casualties.

Dismantling Hamas

Hamas is not simply a political party. It is a rabidly anti-Semitic terrorist organization. It should not be allowed to exist in its current form under any circumstances. It cannot solely give up its weapons nor can it merely modify its charter. The entire entity is a cancer and must be dismantled.

The Hamas charter is beyond an obstacle to peace; it is an instrument of war. While former President Jimmy Carter may have tried to overlook a passing phrase of animosity towards Israel and Jews, the basic fact is that the founding document is an unambiguous call to kill Jews and to destroy the Jewish State again and again.

As echoed by its leaders, the essence of the Hamas philosophy is to kill Jews and destroy Israel. No peace will ever come between the Palestinians and Israel as long as the party exists. The time is now for all world bodies to effectively terminate this vile entity.

Sources:

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/world/obama-welcomes-egypt-s/1264372.html

http://time.com/75043/obama-syria-chemical-weapons-removed/

http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/4300.htm

 

Around the Country in 80 Miles

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In 1873, the science fiction writer Jules Verne imagined a world where a person could circumnavigate the globe in just 80 days. He understood that technology had developed to a point where the assumed correlation between distance and time was no longer part of the here and now.

In 2014, the civil war in Israel-Palestine entered its 78th year. The Arab riots that began in 1936 that sought an end to Jewish immigration, neighbors and nation, entered a new stage. The Arabs’ means of attempting to enforce their xenophobic demand moved from rocks to rockets; from stabbings to missiles.

The Palestinians have launched crude rockets against Israeli towns since 2006. While the Qassam rockets were not very accurate and did not have a particularly long range, Arab terrorists rejoiced as they fired thousands of these rockets at Israeli cities and towns.

In 2006, 2007 and 2008 Arabs from Gaza fired 1777, 2807 and 3716 rockets into Israel, killing 34 people and injuring over 1500. In retaliation, Israel launched Operation Cast Lead in December 2008 to stop the rocket fire. “Relative” calm was restored with “only” 858 and 365 rockets launched against Israel in 2009 and 2010, respectively. But the attacks ramped up again in the following years with 680 and 2273 rockets against Israel in 2011 and 2012. In response, in November 2012, Israel needed to launch Operation Pillar of Defense to protect its citizens. In 2013, rocket fired dropped 95%.

Most of the rockets were the rudimentary Gazan-made Qassam rockets. In recent years, both Syria and Iran have supplied Hamas, which runs Gaza, more sophisticated and longer-range weaponry. The Iranian-made Fajr-5 has a range up to 47 miles and the recent Gazan arrival of the Syria-made M-302s have a range of 93 miles. In just the past few days, the Palestinians have used these new rockets to fire as far north as Haifa, a city of 260,000 about 80 miles north of the Gaza Strip.

Israel’s action to stop the latest rocket fire, Operation Protective Edge, uses advanced technology to both destroy the Palestinians’ ability to fire missiles, and to intercept and destroy incoming missiles with its Iron Dome defense system. In the skies, technology’s reach and technology’s shield clash, while on the ground, Israel considers whether to deploy troops to root out the threat.

While technology has enabled Arab terrorists to claw further into the clouds, it has done nothing to help them modify their positions. Their hatred, xenophobia and goals remain fixed.

As a practical matter, the advance of technology and time without progress towards peace leads to a few conclusion for Israelis:

  1. Control of Borders is Essential. The Gaza blockade has minimized the influx of advanced weaponry.  Israel must similarly always enforce border control over Judea & Samaria.  This new Palestinian weaponry in both J&S and Gaza could cover the entire country.
  2. Intelligence in addition to technology.  While technology is essential to protect citizens, intelligence enables it to be used effectively with reduced collateral damage.
  3. Hamas must be dismantled. No terrorist entity may be permitted to exist, let alone participate in elections and govern.  Destructive ideology must be destroyed.

Today, just as in 1873, technology can be used to arrive at places once considered out-of-reach, and one can get there faster than ever imagined.  However, it cannot always modify primitive human emotions and reach places within our psyches.  Until a people can conquer primeval aggression, it cannot be allowed to control advanced technologies.

Source:

WSJ: http://online.wsj.com/articles/israel-and-palestinian-militants-exchange-fire-as-confrontation-continues-1404908708

 

US Hypocrisy – “Reasonableness and Restraint”

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Thirteen years ago, on 9/11/01, 2,977 innocent civilians were murdered in the United States by terrorists armed with nothing more than pilot licenses. Since that time, the US has deployed over 1 million troops and waged two wars in countries thousands of miles from its shores. Over 100,000 Iraqi civilians were estimated to have been killed in the US-led war in Iraq, over 30 times the number of civilians killed on 9/11.

President Obama was critical of that war and pulled the US out of Iraq as he thought the US went to war with the wrong enemy. But when it came to Afghanistan, he engaged fully.

By the time Obama became president in 2009, an estimated 8,500 civilians had been killed in Afghanistan. Under his watch, from January 2009 until June 30, 2014, an additional 15,487 civilians were murdered, including 1,995 children. These totals were a fraction of the number of militants killed over those years.

Why has the Obama administration waged a war for so long? Why has it continued to fight – even though it knows of the terrible collateral damage – years after Osama bin Laden was killed?

The US continues to fight because the enemy still exists and intends to do harm.

President Obama was clear that the destruction of the terrorist infrastructure was one of the goals of his war. In November 2012 he said: “Thanks to sacrifice and service of our brave men and women in uniform, the war in Iraq is over, the war in Afghanistan is winding down, al Qaeda has been decimated, Osama bin Laden is dead.”

Obama clearly articulated his war goals: to get the US out of a war which did not have an enemy threat; destroy the enemy (al Qaeda); and take revenge on the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.

However, Obama seemingly does not feel that such priorities relate to Israel. For him, the goal in the region is limited to one thing – stability (which is laughable considering the total instability of Syria, Iraq, Egypt…). Israel, in his mind, is strong enough to take a few murdered teenagers and qassam rockets. Israel’s stability is secondary to that of the region generally.

Witness Secretary of State John Kerry’s prepared remarks towards Israel after the murder of three Israeli teenagers coming home from school: “the perpetrators must be brought to justice. This is a time for all to work towards that goal without destabilizing the situation.”

Obama himself added: “At this dangerous moment, all parties must protect the innocent and act with reasonableness and restraint, not vengeance and retribution,”

America has been fighting with “vengeance and retribution” for 13 years (and counting), even when the collateral damage meant thousands of civilians murdered. Obama is actively seeking to defeat an enemy, even one thousands of miles away, that poses no existential threat to the USA.

So, how can Obama chide Israel, which has an enemy on its borders that is sworn to the country’s destruction, which fires missiles that can attack 80% of the population? How can he not understand Israel’s need to “decimate” its enemy?

The appropriate “reasonableness and restraint” may be limited to a polite response from the civilized world to Obama’s comment, while Israel actively engages Hamas and protects its citizens.

Sources:

http://www.unama.unmissions.org/Portals/UNAMA/human%20rights/PoC-Civilian-Casualties-report-2007.pdf

http://unama.unmissions.org/Portals/UNAMA/human%20rights/Protection%20of%20Civilian%202009%20report%20English.pdf

http://unama.unmissions.org/Portals/UNAMA/Documents/UNAMA%20POC%202011%20Report_Final_Feb%202012.pdf

http://unama.unmissions.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=K0B5RL2XYcU%3D

http://www.unama.unmissions.org/Default.aspx?tabid=12254&ctl=Details&mid=15756&ItemID=37692&language=en-US

http://unama.unmissions.org/Default.aspx?tabid=12254&ctl=Details&mid=15756&ItemID=38134&language=en-US