The Right Gesture

Tonight, the Arch of Titus, in Rome.

We stand with #Israel. 🇮🇹 🇮🇱 pic.twitter.com/9TqxrayhXd

— Italy in Israel (@ItalyinIsrael) October 10, 2023

Eight days ago I wrote a post discussing the Arch of Titus (see Journey's End?).  Now we see this magnificent gesture by Italy, 1,953 years after the events commemorated by the arch, a triumph for Rome, a tragedy for the Jewish people.

I applaud the statement of President Biden regarding Hamas and its assault on the citizens of Israel.

Now what is needed is for Israel to have the time to eradicate Hamas operatives and its infrastructure in Gaza.  If it requires a reoccupation of the territory so be it.  Will those who support Israel now continue to do so as it moves towards this goal?

Too often over the past fifty years we've seen, in Israel and elsewhere, drawn out and punctuated violence, interrupted by cease fires or the presence of UN Peacekeepers.  The net result is more violence, more suffering, and more death than if the response to incidents of terror and aggression had been allowed to  conclude.

The pressures will grow greater as Israel responds. (1) As an example here's an article from the Associated Press (AP), "Under heavy bombing, Palestinians in Gaza move from place to place, only to find no place is safe".  As we know, AP employs Hamas sympathizers and co-locates its operations in Gaza with Hamas.  It is effectively a Hamas operative.  Another example of a once respected Western institution with its substance hollowed out and replaced by horror.

Notice the carefully sculpted language of the AP:

But residents say there is no real escape in Gaza, which has been under a suffocating 16-year blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt. When war breaks out, as it has four times since the Hamas militant group seized power in 2007, even U.N. facilities that are supposed to be safe zones risk becoming engulfed in the fighting.

War just breaks out!  It's magic!  Somehow a war just started! No mention that the four times it has broken out it because Hamas initiated attacks on Israel.  And Gaza is not under a blockade.  Gaza, and Hamas which governs the area has received billions in foreign aid, including from the United States, since Israel voluntarily withdrew from Gaza in 2005.  Since then Gaza has been the largest per capita recipient of foreign aid of any country or territory in the world.  Those monies were supposed to be spent on improving the infrastructure, education, and economy of the people of Gaza.  Instead, Hamas has diverted it towards arms and terrorism.  Israel provides free electricity and water and, apart from the periods during and immediately after Hamas attacks Israel, Gazans are able to enter Israel to work (it now turns out that some of those granted work permits were actually Hamas operatives casing potential targets for slaughter).  There is no blockade, except when imposed by Hamas' own actions.  Nonetheless, expect more of this garbage to be spewed by the media.

What Hamas is about has nothing to do with a two-state solution or the present government of Israel.  I've no use for Netanyahu, wish he had not come back into power, think much of Israel's settlements policy is misguided, and am appalled by what appear to be recent murderous criminal acts by settlers, but this attack would have happened whatever Israeli coalition was governing.(2)  Hamas is an Islamist Supremacy organization.  It is opposed to the existence of Israel and to the presence of living Jews in the area.  Its charter is clear on that and everything you hear to the contrary is just hand waving by Hamas sympathizers designed to obscure that truth.  

UPDATE:  Well, what have we here?  Just to show you that my statements about AP were not hyperbole, here is an article on the background of the writer of the AP story linked above.  Turns out he's called for the destruction of Israel, compared Israelis to Nazis.  He joined AP recently after working for Al Jazeera and two anti-Israel NGOs. 

FURTHER UPDATE:  From yesterday's Tablet an article by Armin Rosen on "How Hamas Fooled The Experts", to whom:

Hamas remained a semi-legitimate player, treated as just one unremarkable thread in the Middle East’s rich tapestry of mildly threatening, gun-toting political dreamers. Even to the most hardened Israeli security officials they were a Muslim Brotherhood offshoot whose extreme rhetoric and regrettably unshakable habit of murdering Jewish civilians could be understood within the normative politics of “resistance movements.” Their behavior could therefore be modulated and controlled through a proper combination of sticks and carrots.

Rosen says he was one of those people who bought into the expert opinion. His conclusion:

The moral being that to predict this week’s attack, you simply had to ignore the policy world’s access and credential-fueled orgy of confidence in its own superior understanding of human motives, and instead study an abundant and in retrospect unambiguous public record of what Hamas has tried to do and says it wants to do. Then you had to make the not unreasonable analytical leap of actually believing them.

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(1) UPDATE, Nov 2 - We are already seeing wavering from politicians in the U.S., including the President.  Here's a recent example from the callow youth serving as the junior senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy:

What does this porridge of words actually mean?  Hamas terrorists, but just those responsible for the recent attacks, must be "held accountable" and "the ability of Hamas to carry out similar attacks in the future must be eliminated".  Senator Murphy wants Israel to shift to a "more deliberate and proportionate" campaign that is "surgically targeting" the bad guy "leaders", but apparently not the rank and file Hamas.  He also implies Israel is not following the law of armed conflict, but I've seen no evidence of that.  How does Murphy not know that is what Israel is doing now?  If it is not, we will need the Senator's expertise as to how better to be surgical when the "terrorist infrastructure" is underneath and intertwined with civilians, a deliberate strategy by Hamas, and itself an actual violation of the law of armed conflict.  

Also note, Murphy sanctimoniously conveying the wisdom from America's counterterrorism campaign that "terrorists groups feed off of the grievances caused by civilian harm".  Duh.  Just think how bad the October 7 attacks would have been if Israel had been attacking Gaza at the time!!  By the way, terrorist groups also feed off of great successes.  October 7 was a propaganda coupe for Hamas in that respect.  Moreover, even without Israeli action, Hamas with the assistance of the United Nations (and U.S. taxpayers) has been very successfully instilling a sense of grievance and hatred of Jews in Gazan schoolchildren.

Murphy has the luxury of being able to offer useless advice from his perch in DC.  The Israelis have to deal with the reality on the ground.  I think what is really happening is that Democrats like Murphy are seeing the polling of young Democrats who do not support Israel and are now trying to reposition themselves politically.  The truth is that Murphy's expertise is in his ability to keep getting elected, which is he very skilled at.  Other than that he knows nothing.

(2) Nov 11 - Just realized I fell myself into one of the Equity Gang language traps.  When I refer to settlements, I am referring to those on the West Bank, outside of the Jerusalem area.  When the Equity Gang refers to settlements they mean all of Israel, and every Jew residing there.