by Damozel | That's what Israel says this is.
The Guardian reports 335 dead in Gaza. But there have been civilian deaths on both sides:
The number of civilians killed in the fighting continued to rise. The UN Relief and Works Agency, which supports Palestinian refugees and has large programmes in Gaza, said it believed at least 57 civilians were among the dead, but said that was a conservative estimate. The overall number of injured is thought to be as high as 1,400, although Gazan hospitals are so overcrowded and short of medicine and equipment that they are turning away all but the most seriously wounded.
The number of rockets fired from Gaza increased to at least 60 yesterday, killing three Israelis. An Israeli soldier also die in a mortar atttack. At least 19 civilians in Israel have now been killed by rockets fired from Gaza in the past eight years. "The continuing aim of the [Israeli] operation is to vastly decrease the capability of Hamas to launch rockets on Israeli civilians and to improve the long-term security situation along Israel's border with Gaza," Captain Benjamin Rutland, an Israeli military spokesman, said. (The Guardian)
The Mirror has news about some of the "collateral damage."
With many of the targets in densely-packed residential areas, many of the dead caught in the blasts were civilians, including women and children.
The first strikes had come as pupils walked home from school, leaving frantic mothers searching the blasted streets.
Mosques issued urgent appeals for people to donate blood and Hamas sources said hospitals were soon full.
Doctors Without Borders reports:
In both Kemal Edwan and Shifa Hospitals, medical personnel are overloaded by the influx of wounded and a lack space to deal with all the patients. On Sunday, December 28, MSF teams were unable to move around the Gaza Strip, but today national staff members were able to go to the MSF clinic in Gaza City, where they are trying to treat wounded people in order to help hospitals cope with the overall number of casualties. However, the current bombing of the center of Gaza may prevent them from continuing to do so. MSF teams have not yet been able to access the MSF pediatric clinic situated close to Kemal Edwan Hospital.
The UN Secretary General has called for "swift and decisive action to end the "unacceptable" violence, adding that world leaders must step up the pressure for a political solution. In his third statement on Gaza in three days, Ban said he was "deeply alarmed" by the escalation of violence. While recognising Israel's right to defend itself, he condemned its "excessive use of force"." (The Guardian)
Meanwhile, Hamas is threatening Livni and Ehud Barak with assassination.
The Bush administration apparently thinks this is a measured and proportionate response by Israel.
The Bush administration refused to call on Israel to show restraint, instead putting total blame for the conflict on Hamas, citing rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel. "Israel is going after terrorists who are firing rockets and mortars into Israel, and they are taking the steps that they feel are necessary to deal with the terrorist threat," Gordon Johndroe, a White House spokesman, said.
"In order for the violence to stop, Hamas must stop firing rockets into Israel and agree to respect a sustainable and durable ceasefire."
Israel had told the US it was not planning to retake Gaza, he added. (The Guardian)
At Informed Comment, Gershon Shafir discusses the reason why a prolonged military action is unlikely to achieve Israel's long-term goals.
Among other reasons, he cites the following:
[M]ost crucial, Israel has already attained many of its narrower military aims and is not likely to accomplish its larger political goals. Contrary to much wishful thinking that presents itself as realism, a genuinely realistic analysis has to begin by recognizing that violence against Israel is Hamas’s raison d’être....At a strategic level, Hamas is not interested in political alternatives to armed confrontation. But whether one wants to call the Hamas strategy resistance or terrorism, the lack of a serious political plan to accompany military strategies is always counterproductive, as it is has been for Hamas and for the people of Gaza....
[T]he idea that a ground invasion of Gaza could actually eliminate Hamas as a force in Palestinian politics is delusional. The Israeli approach is every bit as driven by militarism as Hamas’ strategy is. Beyond a certain point, it can serve no realistic political goals. In fact, I would offer a concise definition for militarism as not knowing when to stop. (Informed Comment)
Shafir suggests:
Olmert and Livni have both stated that they are fighting Hamas, not the Palestinians of Gaza. To show this, rather than just state it, Israel should now stop its military operation for a stated period while indicating that they are doing so to give Hamas a chance to return to a de facto cease-fire.
At the very least, that would demonstrate the alleged good will of an Israel seeking to defend its citizens, rather than harm the citizens of Gaza. If Hamas ignores or rejects that opening, the gap between Hamas and the real interests of the Palestinian civilian population would become even more visible.(Informed Comment; paragraph breaks added for emphasis)
At The Moderate Voice, Jill Miller Zimon well expresses the sense of helplessness and frustration that onlookers who are not disposed to cheer on either side.
As for the Palestinians, they plan to declare victory regardless of what happens. If the IDF withdraws rapidly, without a ground operation and without having seriously reduced the rocket fire, Hamas will boast that it survived and Israel blinked first.
But Hamas officials and analysts said Monday that the organization would actually like Israel to launch a ground operation; it hopes this would let it inflict such heavy losses on Israeli tanks and infantry that Israel would flee with its tail between its legs.
What the hell governs the moves over there?
Someone I respect mentioned to me a perspective
that should be considered: the embryonic nature of the nation building
going on for the Palestinians. But does that mean that relations too
must be characterized by immaturity - from both the Israelis and Hamas? (emphasis added)
Intelligence expert Larry Johnson of No Quarter says bluntly, "[T]he Israeli military response in Gaza is bullshit."
Sorry, but the Israeli military is acting like a bunch of pathetic thugs rather than conduct themselves with professionalism and skill. You do not just kill Palestinians because you can. You kill the assholes shooting the rockets/missiles. Israel has the means to do that but clearly prefers killing large numbers of Palestinians. Sorry folks, but thems the facts.
At The Washington Note, a guest post by Mustafa Barghouti, Secretary General of the Palestinian Liberation Inititiative, challenges what he calls "the myth of Israel victimhood." (Barghouti is "a former secular candidate for President of Palestine and has been a strong advocate of non-violent responses to Israeli occupation. Barghouti is thought by many to be a leading contender in the next Palestinian presidential election." (WN)) One need not ascribe to his view of the circumstances to benefit from hearing the other side's view of the circumstances in Gaza.
Anger is rising in the Arab world, but other governments so far are
keeping pretty quiet about it. Even so, citizens round the world have
taken to the street to the streets to protest Israel's actions: in
London, Germany, Denmark, France, Italy, Spain, and Venezuela, as well
as in the Muslim world. (CNN) In Israel as in the rest of the world some citizens are taking a stand against their government's actions.
Many people are keen to exonerate Israel from anything it chooses to do, even if the innocent die along with the guilty..
Right wing ranter Pam Geller of Atlas Shrugs bellows that no one should shed a tear for all those dead, injured, orphaned, and homeless "annihilationists," including---one can only suppose---all those baby annihilationists under the age of 10 who count as "collateral damage."
While I have not the briefest brief for Hamas, every rational person on the planet who has Irael's as well as the Palestinians' best interests at heart, thinks what Israel is doing is not only wrong, but that it can only lead in the long-term to even more of what it claims to be trying to stop.
"Every rational person on the planet" by definition excludes Geller and her ilk, all of whom consider the natural human desire for vengeance and/or self-defense---the line between the two so often blurs--- a justification for any excess. Any view that doesn't support the massive collateral damage that is certain to result from this massacre is, according to Geller, "depraved."
We all have the right to defend ourselves and those who belong to us from harm; of course we do. But the law draws the line at using "excessive force"---as in force disproportionate to the circumstances.
BTW in re: "proportionality" and the Geneva Conventions, D-Squared writes:
[T]he word "proportionate" doesn't appear in the conventions; they talk about collateral damage to civilians being "reasonable". And in context, it's clear that there's no requirement of tit for tat, just that unintended but inevitable risk to noncombatants has to be proportionate to the military aim which is being carried out....
[A]ny military action at all can be disproportionate if it has no point to it at all; no sensible or realistic objective other than shoring up political support for the people who ordered it. And as a further corollorary, it is entirely possible (and indeed, not even unusual) for both sides in a conflict to be guilty of disproportionate use of violence.
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Car Bomb Kills Dozens in Pakistan
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Israel Gearing Up for Long-Term Action Against Hamas (UPDATED: News Round-Up & Commentary)
You are very hypocritical. Name calling and labeling the opposition as ranters does not make their arguments less persuasive. Hamas puts their rockets behind women and 10 year old children and shells Israel for 6 months. Then you blame Israel for the death of the 10 year old when Israel finally bombs the rocket launcher. You ARE supporting Hamas and thug rule. Why be so hypocritical? Do you think you are successfully disguising the fact that you support misogynist patriarchies in their attempt to commit genocide on Jews? You blame Israel for not being as incompetent as the Palestinian instigators and then say you are not on the side of the instigators. When there are no rockets launched into Israel there will be no collateral damage. You know it and the Arab dominated UN knows it but that never matters to those who choose to support Jew genocide.
Throughout this long post no call for Egypt or Jordon to open its' boarders to the gentle Palestinians who they refuse to allow into their countries. I wonder why?
Posted by: Greenconsciousness | December 30, 2008 at 09:52 AM
FROM DAMOZEL:
It's BECAUSE I oppose genocide---or, say, "collateral damage" in the form of the death of young children---that I wrote what I wrote. It seems to me that you are arguing that the Palestinians deserve this. That's a bit of hypocrisy on your part I'd argue, if I wished to make the same sort of snap judgment you applied to me based on my post.
It's true that I think what Israel is doing is misguided and wrong. It does not follow that I think what Hamas has done is right. I think Israel is going about "solving" the problem in the worst possible way, one that is virtually certain to cause more trouble for it in the long run. To say Israel's response is wrong is not to say that Hamas or the Palestinians are right.
The choice is not between approving of every action by Israel and wishing for the "genocide of the Israeli people," as you wish to pretend. I think they are wrong to do what they are doing and I said so.
Speaking as a taxpayer and a supporter of Israel, I am quite tired of being told that being pro-Israel means never criticizing anything Israel does in its defense even when anyone can see that the long-term consequences of an action will be directly contrary to that goal.
I don't consider my OWN government beyond criticism---quite the contrary. Opposing the Iraq war and wishing to look at the root causes of terrorism does not mean that those who opposed it wanted "the genocide of the American people," though the Bush administration and the right wing made a brave attempt to frame it that way. You're mounting the same argument, which is neither rational nor fair.
I reject your reasoning and the inferences that you have chosen to draw.
Posted by: Buck Naked Politics | December 30, 2008 at 03:04 PM
Barack Obama, last summer:
If someone was sending rockets on my house where my daughters were sleeping at night, I would do everything to stop it, and I would expect Israelis to do the same thing.
Posted by: Flowerplough | January 01, 2009 at 05:30 AM
Thank you very much for the link, Damozel. I have many problems w/violence as a way to deal with pretty much anything but in this case in particular, between these entities? It's just like going into the toy box to see what's around to lob at the other, with nothing but distraction from the reality that none of them will ever get all of what they want without making sacrifices they're refusing to make boldly and upfront - so instead, they engage like they are now. Seriously - if you saw children do this, as a responsible adult, what would you do when the kids don't stop?
It's for attention and deflection - but no one forgets, and we need to look forward - that doesn't requiring forgetting but it does requiring letting history just be history - and they don't seem able to do that - any of the participants.
Posted by: Jill | January 09, 2009 at 04:29 PM