And in the 1990s there's no denying that Washington generally shared the (Irish) Republican analysis of the state of play in Ulster. Indeed the Clinton administration viewed itself as a kind of backstop looking after Sinn Fein's interetss and point of view. Crucially, that's how the Republican movement saw the Americans too. They were there to provide support and ballast for the nationalist viewpoint, countering the presumed pro-Unionist bias of the British. That is to say, Dublin and Washington would, together, counter the Brits in Belfast and London. It's peace, of a sort, but it's not a result that was supposed to happen. Nor is it one that many people would have found acceptable back in, say, 1994.Sure, Clinton made plenty of phone calls and a visit or two. But when push came to shove he refused to put additional pressure on Sinn Fein and the IRA. Consequently the Good Friday Agreement was signed despite there being a crippling ambiguity on the question of decommissioning terrorist arms. The failure to resolve that problem would cripple the peae "settlement" for years, helping to hollow-out the centre of Northern Irish politics, leading us to the present happy state of play: government by bigots and murderers.
This wasn't, obviously, all Clinton's fault. Nontheless one reason Tony Blair lost faith in the american president was Clinton's habit of promising to lean on the Republican movement and then signally failing to follow his promises with, like, actual action. The State Department may have been hostile to the IRA -it opposed giving Gerry Adams visas to enter the US - but the rest of the US government, including the likes of Tony Lake at the National Security Council was entirely sympathetic to the "cause" of Irish Republicanism.
Nor does almost anyone in the United States put the IRA, or its cause in the same mental basket as that of the Northern Irish. Imagine, if you will, a blockbuster film being made about a plucky Arab terrorist leader finally winning freedom for his people by slaughtering large numbers of Israeli/British/French soldiers, along with, of course, any informers or traitors in his own organization. In Irish, it's known as Michael Collins.
Ross is wrong to think of my posts as aimed at criticizing Israeli policy. I'm aiming, for the nonce, at something which has to be resolved before one can usefully critique Israeli policy, which is best summed up by George Orwell in his Notes on Nationalism, which has been making the blog rounds lately during this debate. An excerpt:
All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts. A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of
inconsistency. Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage--torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of
civilians--which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by 'our' side. The Liberal NEWS CHRONICLE published, as an example of shocking barbarity, photographs of Russians hanged by the Germans, and then a year or two later published with warm approval almost exactly similar photographs of Germans hanged by the Russians. It is the same with historical events. History is thought of largely in nationalist terms, and such things as the Inquisition, the tortures of the Star Chamber, the exploits of the English buccaneers (Sir Francis Drake, for instance, who was given to sinking Spanish prisoners alive), the Reign of Terror, the heroes of the Mutiny blowing hundreds of Indians from the guns, or Cromwell's soldiers slashing Irishwomen's faces with razors, become morally neutral or even meritorious when it is felt that they were done in the 'right' cause. If one looks back over the past quarter of a century, one finds that there was hardly a single year when atrocity stories were not being reported from some part of the world; and yet in not one single case were these atrocities--in Spain, Russia, China, Hungary, Mexico, Amritsar, Smyrna--believed in and disapproved of by the English intelligentsia as a whole. Whether such deeds were reprehensible, or even whether they happened, was always decided according to political predilection.
[Note: The NEWS CHRONICLE advised its readers to visit the news film at which the entire execution could be witnessed, with close-ups. The STAR published with seeming approval photographs of nearly naked female collaborationists being baited by the Paris mob. These photographs had a marked resemblance to the Nazi photographs of Jews being baited by the Berlin mob.(Author's footnote)]
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. For quite six years the English admirers of Hitler contrived not to learn of the existence of Dachau and Buchenwald. And those who are loudest in denouncing the German concentration camps are often quite unaware, or only very dimly aware, that there are also concentration camps in Russia. Huge events like the Ukraine famine of 1933, involving the deaths of millions of people, have actually escaped the attention of the majority of English russophiles. Many English people have heard almost nothing about the extermination of German and Polish Jews during the present war. Their own antisemitism has caused this vast crime to bounce off their consciousness. In nationalist thought there are facts which are both true and untrue, known and unknown. A known fact may be so unbearable that it is habitually pushed aside and not allowed to enter into logical processes, or on the other hand it may enter into every calculation and yet never be admitted as a fact, even in one's own mind.
To me, the impossibility of debating Israel/Palestine is that it the argument is dominated by nationalism on both sides. There are probably more thoughtful critics of Israel than of the Palestinians, but almost no one seems to be able to hold in the middle for very long--in order to critique the one, he becomes blindly nationalistic about the other, making ludicrous excuses for their behavior that they would not tolerate for a moment were they advanced by the other side. We haven't even gotten around to having a decent debate on morality, or the sensible policy possibilities, because each side is far too busy developing their own set of facts from which it can only be proven that they are right, and blameless.
The reflexive tendency to believe in the goodness of whichever group you most identify with is probably evolutionarily necessary, and at any rate, it's there, and I much doubt that we will abolish it any time soon. But like other evolutionary heuristics, it can do us at least as much harm as good in many circumstances, and I think it needs to be acknowledged before we can even discuss right and wrong.
* Well . . . some terrorists. There were, of course, Protestant paramilitaries operating in Northern Ireland as well.
Actually, I'd say there's a fair amount of hope Fatah will evolve into a moderately respectable state (no worse than say, Syria) that accepts Israel's right to exist -- if it survives.
We haven't even gotten around to having a decent debate on morality, or the sensible policy possibilities, because each side is far too busy developing their own set of facts from which it can only be proven that they are right, and blameless.
Oh, I disagree; the morality debate is quite fervent within Israel. That's why Israel drops leaflets warning people to leave before it bombs a structure.
Peace requires two willing parties; war requires only one. Regardless of who is to blame for what, the reality is Hamas does not want peace.
"I'd say there's a fair amount of hope Fatah will evolve into a moderately respectable state (no worse than say, Syria) that accepts Israel's right to exist -- if it survives."
Syria, is not respectable. So, the hope is that Fatah will control in an autocratic manner. That commits human rights violations against its own people but won't attack israel?
Wow, Orwell!
We tend to see things from our own point of view?
We actually tend to favor policies and ideologies that benefit the group to which we belong?
We are disposed to look unfavorably at non-group members whose aims and behaviors conflict with our own?
We pursue our own selfish interests?
We tend to brand those whose views and actions conflict with our own as non-virtuous or malevolent?
Wow, I've got to take a walk. This really rocks my world.
I'm glad Orwell was around to enlighten us to something that had never occurred to anyone previously. And that may never have occurred to anyone else.
The problem isn't that our morality debate about the issue has yet to be decent or satisfactorily answer questions. Its that for many in the US (and in the press, and in this magazine even), the Israel/Palestinian conflict is a simple as good vs. evil. This Manichean view is compounded by the US' view that Israel shares the same values and broad foreign policy goals, and thus criticism of Israel is equivalent to an criticism of America. Conversely, many in the press never miss a chance to deride the cause or character of the Palestinian people--or, in the case of Thom Friedman or Michael Goldfarb, advocate large-scale terrorism against their population.
There are probably more thoughtful critics of Israel than of the Palestinians
No, that's just a silly thing to say, and I think it is more reflective of the media-heavy crowd you self-select to hang out with than anything else. But that just proves that one can be "thoughtful" and still be a blooming idiot.
Hamas is the same crowd that blows up restaurants and buses and deliberately targets women and children. One can quite accurately refer to Hamas as a ghastly group of murderous thugs without applying a great deal of "thoughtfulness," for the same reason that it doesn't take great perception to perceive the sky as blue, nor does it take great hearing to perceive a thunderclap.
If it takes somewhat more subtlety and "thoughfulness" to usefully critique Israel, then I think that is a point in their favor.
Me, I think it's probably in the long term interests of peace in the region for Israel to blow Hamas fighters to smithereens by the thousands NOW, while they have the tactical initiative and the firepower to do it.
There are probably more thoughtful critics of Israel than of the Palestinians
But this is a function of the fact that no one who is even a marginally mainstream figure defends the actions of Hamas. It is taken as a given, from even the most strident critics of Israeli policy, like Greenwald or Yglesias or even Stephen Walt, that Hamas is an vile, murderous terrorist organization. Even a guy like Noam Chomsky, who has been written entirely out of "respectability" by the American media, is unwavering in his opinion that those who kill innocent Israelis don't have a leg to stand on. You argue points that are actually being argued or worth arguing. There are many reasons why we tend to talk more about Israel than Hamas; principal among them that American aid makes Israel's actions possible, but also the crucial fact that Israel is a robust, liberal democracy capable of positive change in a way Hamas just isn't. But another reason is simply that on the issue of whether Hamas deserves total criticism for their actions, there is almost total unanimity.
Jason-
The obvious rejoinder to your characterization of Hamas is that Megan was talking about Palestinians, not Hamas. Not all Palestinians are Hamas. Moreover, the IDF routinely adopts the same tactics that you just described, but it would be inaccurate to conflate the IDF with all Israelis (esp. Arab Israelis.)
a plucky Arab terrorist leader finally winning freedom for his people by slaughtering large numbers of Israeli/British/French soldiers
Lawrence of Arabia pretty nearly fits that bill, although the slaughter is of Turks; still, Lawrence attempts to arm the Arabs so they can resist European (specifically British) rule.
It is also a big stretch to call "Michael Collins" a blockbuster. According to the IMDB it was made for $28 million and grossed a whopping $11 million in the United States. Compare that to, for example, "Patriot Games", with its $45 million budget (four years before "Collins"), $180 million world gross... and IRA villains.
Megan, I have to disagree with you on a few points:
Supporting Irish Republicanism in principle - the idea of a united Ireland - is very different than supporting the terrorist acts that have been committed by Irish Republicans in the last few decades. Arguing otherwise is like saying there's no difference between ardent pro-lifers and people who murder abortion doctors.
Second, your association of Michael Collins with the modern provisional IRA is incorrect. Collins led the old IRA, which fought against the British in the Irish War of Independence from 1919 to 1921, and then was killed in the Irish Civil War which followed in 1922 after some elements of the IRA refused to support the peace treaty he signed with the British.
The IRA that is responsible for numerous heinous acts of terrorism in northern Ireland over the last few decades is the provisional IRA, which was formed in 1969. It's an entirely different organization with different aims, that co-opted the 'IRA' name and has made it synonymous with terrorism.
To associate Michael Collins in any way with the provisional IRA is simply not historically accurate.
Me, I think it's probably in the long term interests of peace in the region for Israel to blow Hamas fighters to smithereens by the thousands NOW, while they have the tactical initiative and the firepower to do it.
But, of course, you can't find any mainstream media figure, and certainly no American politicians, who don't want "Hamas fighters" captured or killed. The question is about how Israel is prosecuting that action, and whether the benefits of doing it now, and in this manner, outweigh the costs, both to human rights and to Israel itself.
Of course, arguing points not actually in contention, and avoiding the crucial ones that are, are a key part of this debate for a certain strata of debaters.
There are many reasons why we tend to talk more about Israel than Hamas; principal among them that American aid makes Israel's actions possible, but also the crucial fact that Israel is a robust, liberal democracy capable of positive change in a way Hamas just isn't.
So why are so many political and media voices -- including many of those people you claim admit that Hamas is irredeemably bad -- demanding that Israel negotiate with Hamas? If Hamas is, as you say, a gang of murderous thugs incapable of change, then what possible good can come of negotiating with them? By definition a murderer who is incapable of change is not going to make meaningful concessions towards a peace process.
The real truth is that while everyone *claims* to concede that Hamas is irredeemable, they nevertheless insist that Israel behave as if that wasn't the case. So either they don't really think Hamas is that bad (and say that it is only to avoid public condemnation), or they expect Israel to act as a sacrificial lamb for the modern Western reluctance to actually fight back against its enemies.
By the way, I'd really like it, in this "war on terror" age, if various bloggers would post about whether any internal resistance movements against autocratic or anti-democratic or oppressive governments are ever allowed to use violence. In the question of Hamas and their tactics, I personally say absolutely not. With the IRA, I feel largely the same. But, boy, we sure aren't clear, as a country or culture, about where we draw lines.
Like, say, the participants of the American Revolution, who did little things like torching the businesses and residences of loyalists, terrorized their children, tortured them, and murdered them. And if we don't think there's ever a time when violent uprising is necessary... do we still have a beer and watch the fireworks on the Fourth of July? People decided they'd just side with status quo governments no matter what after September 11th, and political violence was never okay-- except, well, if it was an anti-Saddam uprising... or maybe Iranian freedom fighters... or in the movies....
The fact of the matter is that the number of successful internal resistance movements that haven't used violence is vanishingly small; yet we're a country that says again and again that sometimes resistance against government is necessary. It is in fact one of our founding principles. But to listen to the vast numbers of bloggers and pundits, there's never a time political violence is justified. That's a pretty huge
The obvious rejoinder to your characterization of Hamas is that Megan was talking about Palestinians, not Hamas.
Your correction is well-taken. But the fact remains that Hamas was elected by the people of Gaza, and the people knew their platform called for an unending war against a democratic neighbor, and arguably a policy of extermination.
Fine. They are entitled to the consideration of the people of Dresden and Tokyo and Nagasaki.
What's that? They didn't vote for Hitler and Tojo? Well, then perhaps the people of Gaza should feel entitled to even less consideration.
They should thank their lucky stars that they are fighting the disciplined, professional troops of the IDF, as opposed to almost anyone else in recorded history.
Moreover, the IDF routinely adopts the same tactics that you just described, but it would be inaccurate to conflate the IDF with all Israelis (esp. Arab Israelis.)
How many weddings have Israelis targeted with fragmentation weapons?
How many fast-food restaurants?
How many buses at rush hour?
This moral equivalency game is asinine.
a pretty huge disconnect.
Freddie,
The distinction you seek is fairly easy to make. First, your grievances and goals have to be legitimate; Hamas seeks to throw the Jews into the sea, which is an illegitimate goal. Second, you must exhaust nonviolent means of seeking redress, which Hamas has not done, probably because the Jews, being a quirky bunch, won't jump into the sea just because you asked (I am of the belief that if they really wanted a state, they could have had one by now by studying the life of Ghandi). Finally, violence must be properly directed to the extent practical. Doubtless there were war crimes and atrocities committed during the revolution, but for the most part the colonists met the British (well, the Hessians at any rate) on the field of battle (and for the most part they lost). They did not set off bombs in London aimed at school children.
These are not difficult distinctions, at least as far as I can tell.
Freddie - your question is too loaded (not necessarily in a bad way) for a quick answer, but I tend to look to the original Geneva conventions (not the last BS one). How does this group conduct operations? Who does it target? Is there at least a nominal code of conduct? What are their aims (stated and actual)? Essentially, do they try to follow the laws of war and human decency regarding civilians (while acknowledging that in any war, some civilians will be killed despite the best intentions of the combatants.
There are some liberation/resistance movements that really are not terrorists, though I may disagree with their stated aims - I think it all comes down to who their primary targets are - the army and other institutions of their "oppressor" or just random civilians?
Jason,
I don't know why "buses at rush hour" is a category of tactics (is that in a separate category from "buses after rush hour"?). The more meaningful question is, does the IDF intentional target civilians? On that, the record is pretty clear that the IDF has targeted Palestinian civilians.
Note that I'm not trying to imply an answer to my question in the question... I'm conflicted. I just think that we are pretty much conflicted in general, here in the US, but we kind of act like we have clear rules.
Dan nails it.
While all the commentators Freddie cites may condemn the actions of Hamas when pressed, they fail to incorporate that condemnation in any of their policy prescriptions. They rarely even acknowledge it. Instead, they turn around and say that that Israel ought to agree to a cease-fire with a group that routinely flouts all the international laws and standards that these commentators chastise Israel for failing to follow.
What they're really asking is that Israel pretend there's peace when Hamas and other groups in Gaza continue to fire rockets at them. This is why when people speak of a cease-fire they direct such appeals to Israel: They know Hamas et al won't listen. Why? Because they say they won't and because they haven't.
After awhile it turns surreal. I remember seeing articles in November bemoaning the impending failure of the June six month cease-fire because of fighting. That right, the "impending" failure of a cease-fire because both sides were firing at each other. In actuality, it ended just after six days when Gaza shot rockets into Israel, but yet five months later the media was still desperate to pretend it was still ongoing or had some chance at success.
So, what we have are people suggesting that Israel just ignore the same thing they do, which is continual Hamas aggression and attacks on civilians. That works really well at MIT, NYC and DC, but it doesn't work so well in Southern Israel.
Glorious,
"Instead, they turn around and say that that Israel ought to agree to a cease-fire with a group that routinely flouts all the international laws and standards that these commentators chastise Israel for failing to follow."
Well yes, for the sake of human life and peace, Israel aught to agree to a cease-fire with Hamas. Moreover, Israel should maintain that cease-fire, instead of violating the cease-fire like the did the last time. The only way that Hamas continues to be viewed as excessively violent in the US is because the plight and condition of the Palestinians, and Israel's brutality against the Palestinian population (go look up the respective death tolls), is whitewashed in the US press. Once these factors are considered, it becomes clear how restrained the Palestinians are against the Israel blockade and occupation of the land they live in.
@Freddie RE: Violence
Those who say violence is never the answer should never vote. For a vote - no matter how much you pretty it up and clothe it in patrotic pablum - is nothing more than a substitute for a bullet in a war. And for the winners, it carries just as much weight.
We use the power of the vote in this country to force people to do all sorts of things from paying more taxes to cutting their grass. Oftentimes, the penalty for resisting that force is removal of freedom - forced incarceration - in other words, enforcement at the point of a gun.
Last time I checked forcing someone to do something at the point of a gun was violence - it certainly isn't pacifistic or peaceful.
Megan McArdle writes:
To me, the impossibility of debating Israel/Palestine is that it the argument is dominated by nationalism on both sides.
I don't think this is right. The debate on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States has been dominated historically by Israeli nationalism and anyone not fully supportive of that has been tarred, almost routinely, as a supporter of Palestinian terrorism.
Whatever, Douthat and Goldberg may think of the Mearsheimer and Walt book I think the authors should be credited with opening up discussion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in America. This is a long overdue opening up that people like Goldberg would very much like to close down. Hence his mockery on his own blog of anyone whose views of the conflict diverge too far from his own.
It is in fact one of our founding principles. But to listen to the vast numbers of bloggers and pundits, there's never a time political violence is justified. That's a pretty huge
Well, I can't speak for the vague and uncited opinions of unspecified others, but the fundamentals behind the condemnation are fairly obvious.
Hamas does not envision an end to the conflict that accommodates the two state solution promoted by the folks you do cite, such as Chomsky or Greenwald. They openly say this. It is in their charter. They prove it by routinely firing rockets into Israel and openly denying any real negogiation over anything. They don't recognize Israel as a legitimate state. This is the primary distinction between them and Fatah, after all.
What Chomsky et al expect us to do is just not believe them. We're supposed to accept meaningless talks over "cease-fires" as meaningful "negogiations" despite the fact the cease-fires are routinely and immediately broken anyway and Hamas is steadfastly against any concession regarding any non-immediate tactical issue.
We're supposed to ignore that Hamas fires rockets despite major Israeli concessions. Israel gave Gaza back to the Palestinians, bulldozing numerous Israeli settlement in face of internal difficulty. This concession was heavily advocated by people like Chomsky, and now that it has happened we're supposed to just ignore that it hasn't turned out anything like they suggested it would.
For some reason that's incomprehensible to me, people like Megan refer to such this game of make-believe as "thoughtful" criticism. I'd call it delusional, maybe wishful thinking at best.
Well yes, for the sake of human life and peace, Israel aught to agree to a cease-fire with Hamas.
To RJM:
Once again, as I said, you advocate that Israel stop firing back and pretend that there is peace while rockets continue to land in Southern Israel, just as they did for years before the recent offensive.
Israel should maintain that cease-fire, instead of violating the cease-fire like the did the last time.
They didn't:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7470530.stm
The only way that Hamas continues to be viewed as excessively violent in the US is because the plight and condition of the Palestinians, and Israel's brutality against the Palestinian population (go look up the respective death tolls), is whitewashed in the US press.
Hamas is viewed as excessively violent because they frequently extra-judicially murder other Palestinians for "collaboration" and because they fought a civil war with Fatah in 2007 that killed hundreds.
Oh, and yeah, they kill Israeli civilians too.
This thread had turned into a debate about Israel and Palestine, with the viewpoints doing exactly the same as the original post said was the problem with the debate.
Orwell may have been stating the obvious, but it is obvious that many people need a refresher course. Neither of the sides in this conflict is squeaky clean, and both populations could do a lot more to recognize that all of us deserve to be treated with respect, dignity and the right to exist.
Of course, the “history written by the winners” line is often repeated and very true. In the first couple of years immediately following the Second World War, among Western leaders there was little appetite for criticism of the Soviet Union – even though the atrocities of Stalin were comparable to Hitler. Stalin was usually a little more discreet about it.
The inability to examine the faults of the group you support is not new, and there are many examples to demonstrate it. Saddam Hussein will go down as a brutal tyrant, but 20-25 years ago he was an ally of the United States against Iran. He didn’t suddenly become a tyrant when he invaded Kuwait.
In a conflict, one side’s freedom fighters are they other sides terrorists and rebels. A coup overthrowing a democratically elected (but wavering on the democracy side) socialist government was acceptable even though the replacement was a tyrant. A coup by a socialist (who had more than a few faults of his) overthrowing a dictator friendly to a large nation resulted in a 50-year plus embargo.
What would we do in the same position as Palestinians are in? It is not unreasonable, while remaining unacceptable to most people, that we might resort to violence to get attention to try and address our concerns? The Israeli’s military response to decades of violence against civilians is also understandable, even if it has not resulted in a change of tactics by their opponents.
Orwell was pointing out that people don't all look at photograph from the same view. It’s not a indictment of humans, but is something we must remember when condemning people for actions we don’t like, even if our side has used them as well. It is often a question of what means can be justified by the ends.
I think the thing to keep in mind in the IRA/Palestinian comparison is that (at least in the fairly nationalistic Irish-American circles I was moving in during the 80s and 90s) often the same people both had strong support for the goal of getting the Brits out of Northern Ireland, and at the same time contempt for the IRA and their tactics. A lot of the same people who leaned heavily Irish on the question of what a peace in Northern Ireland should look like would have had no problem with bringing to justice IRA terrorists.
Similarly, I think a lot of conservatives are reflexively pro-Israeli in the sense of wanting to see Hamas and other terrorist organizations pounded hard, but would have no problem at all with a fairly generous two state solution so long as in the process the Palestinian leadership "did a Michael Collins" and pivoted from attacking Isreal to forcing their own internal extremists to accept the negotiated peace or themselves be in the crosshairs.
No one would admire Michael Collins today if he hadn't negotiated a peace and then turned his military strength against the elements of the IRA who wanted to continue to fight the Brits rather than accept a compromise settlement -- and similarly I for one would have a lot of admiration for a Palestinian Michael Collins figure who negotiated a settlement with Israel and then made his own side abide by it.
Megan, this argument by way of Irish independence is a kind of pantomime. If you have something to say about Hamas/Israel, just say it. Charitably speaking, you're acting like an older sister who, for rather ambivalent reasons, wants to tell us that God or Santa Claus doesn't exist. Just go ahead and tell us how brilliant you are like self anointed Christopher Hitchens.
What would we do in the same position as Palestinians are in? It is not unreasonable, while remaining unacceptable to most people, that we might resort to violence to get attention to try and address our concerns? The Israeli’s military response to decades of violence against civilians is also understandable, even if it has not resulted in a change of tactics by their opponents.
The point here, continually missed and ignored, is that the "concern" of Hamas is Israel's existence, specifically, the existence of Jews in Israel.
The issue isn't just the violence, the issue is the goal of that violence.
Comparing people who target civilians and who want to exterminate their enemies to Michael Collins, who did neither, isn't likely to persuade anyone. The Irish, under Collins, were fighting for their independence from Britain (as we did, once); Hamas is fighting to destroy Israel and kill most of its people.
More basically, how is this conflict an example of "nationalism on both sides"? Refusing to grant the right of Israel to exist isn't nationalism, it's something a lot worse.
Yeah, the Clinton Administration was. The Democratic Party has always been friendlier to the IRA, due to Irish support.
Come on. Both Bush Administrations regularly denied Gerry Adams visas for fundraising events and other things. But under Clinton, he was invited to the White House for St. Patrick's Day.
And indeed in 1995, Speaker Gingrich notably sided against Clinton on inviting Gerry Adams to St. Patrick's Day events.
What would we do in the same position as Palestinians are in? It is not unreasonable, while remaining unacceptable to most people, that we might resort to violence to get attention to try and address our concerns?
It's utterly unreasonable. "We" would do a Gandhi or a Rev. Martin Luther King, use non-violent resistance, and secure our own self-governing state from the Israelis within 24 months -- because "we" didn't resort to violence to "get attention" and "we" didn't have the publicly stated goal of driving the Jews into the sea. Don't go pretending that "we" are subhuman death-worshipping barbarians just because the Palestinians are.
Didn't take long for someone to call Palestinians "subhuman", did it?
Megan,
Good post.
Didn't take long for someone to call Palestinians "subhuman", did it?
Eh. They could have had their own state on any number of occasions -- but most recently, as part of the endless pattern of never missing an opportunity to miss an opportunity, they chose instead to elect a government that called for the utter destruction of the Jewish state.
You say po-tay-to, I say subhuman death-worshipping barbarians. To each their own.
Ack, I don't know that's exactly how I recall it either.
The State department was always solidly pro-British, 'special relationship' and all that. Certainly members of Congress were quite sympathetic to the IRA, or at least were influenced by IRA-sympathizing organizations such as NORAID and AOH. The White House, prior to the Clinton years, generally had absolutely nothing to say on Northern Irish issues and stayed out of the back and forth between State and the Hill.
In the early 1990's the Irish government got behind a peace process that wasn't always trusted by the British government. The process involved quite a bit of forgiving and forgetting of IRA atrocities, and left a bad taste in British mouths that was shared by the State Dept. Clinton's ambassador to Ireland, Jean Kennedy Smith, along with Tony Lake and Nancy Soderberg (sp?) at NSC, were able to maintain a strong channel between the White House and Dublin that bypassed State.
Republicans in Congress, notably Gingrich and McCain (although McCain no longer remembers this) would spin the anti-IRA line as a club to beat Clinton with.
I'm baffled, though, that anyone would still see Clinton as pro-IRA. He was pro the Dublin Government. If that put him closer to the IRA than some liked, it was incidental to the task at hand. Gerry Adams got to go to the White House for St. Patrick's Day on those occasions that a ceasefire was in place - it was an incentive that was turned on and off annually as the facts on the ground demanded. Everybody in Northern Ireland understood that Adams was not in control of the IRA - political legitimacy in Washington was critical to his winning the argument within the IRA. Albert Reynolds, the then Irish-PM, understood the dynamics of the internal IRA conversation very well, and worked with Kennedy Smith, Lake etc to bring the carrots of US visas and photo-ops to bear to help the process along.
rjm,
I don't know why "buses at rush hour" is a category of tactics (is that in a separate category from "buses after rush hour"?). The more meaningful question is, does the IDF intentional target civilians? On that, the record is pretty clear that the IDF has targeted Palestinian civilians.
Don't be obtuse. You'd better brush up on the difference between "civilian" and "noncombatant." They are not at all the same thing. The Israelis should target all the civilians they can get crosshairs on, if those civilians are also combatants.
Hamas is doing everything within its power to blur the difference between the two categories...and the useful idiots in the media are falling for it, and so are you. Until you grasp the distinction between "civilian " and combatant," there's not much point in engaging in discourse with you.
Well yes, for the sake of human life and peace, Israel aught to agree to a cease-fire with Hamas.
Absolutely not. Hamas couldn't even execute a cease fire even if it wanted to. They aren't disciplined enough, and don't have enough control over their yahoos. For the sake of human life and peace, Israel should continue their pursuit and kill Hamas fighters and their suppliers and those who give them succor and support in large numbers, and continue to do so until Hamas has been bled so white, its leadership dead or in prison, its logistic networks and financial networks in such a state of destruction, that it is no longer capable of continuing the fight, and possibly until another authority takes power in Gaza... another authority willing and able to keep their boots on Hamas's neck.
Whether that authority is the Israelis themselves, or Fatah, or another third party is for the Palestinians to decide.
(go look up the respective death tolls)
Not relevant. Actually, the more lopsided the ratio of Hamas dead to Israeli dead, the better.
For those true noncombatants (note I did NOT use the term "civilians," who lost their lives, their blood is entirely on the hands of those who use UN schools as mortar launch sites, and cities to launch their rockets from.
Jason Van Steenwyck writes:
News reports indicate that more than half the Palestinians killed in the carnage in Gaza are unaffiliated with Hamas. I wonder, therefore, if Jason would share with us a number of Palestinians (between 1 and 6,000,000) at which even he would agree that too many Palestinians have been killed.
Subhuman? Now there is a quality argument.
I would hope I would not resort to violence in those same circumstances, but I don't know. If you are so certain of you own actions, good for you.
Hamas is no more representative of all Palestinians than the Nazis were of all Germans. When the Second World War ended, the the people responsible for war crimes and genocide were subjected to trial. The rest of the population were not called subhuman - we left those kind of arguments about people to the Nazis.
The comparisons between middle eastern and Irish terrorism are long standing but have also altered over the years.
Unionists strongly identify with Israel as an embattled minority with historical claims to a particular bit of land also claimed by a larger, alien population. As a result Israeli flags are (or were) common in Unionist areas of Ulster. Nationalists conversely identify with the Palestinians for presumably similar reasons. Gerry Adams is a strong supporter of Hamas and the IRA trained along side the PLO in Libyan training camps in the ‘80s. Quite how American supporters of the IRA who also claim to support Israel reconcile the two is beyond me. The appalling Peter King (making him chairman of an anti terrorism committee has always seemed proof positive that, English claims to the contrary, Americans do do irony) dealt with this by refusing to be interviewed on the subject but presumably the dissonance has at least occurred to some.
But it was not always thus. In the 30s the Stern Gang and Irgun strongly identified with the IRA to the extent that Yitzhak Shamir adopted the pseudonym of “Mikahil” in homage to Michael Collins and of course both groups tried to collaborate with the Nazis in World War 2 (the Irgun, to their credit, did not).
Well yes, for the sake of human life and peace, Israel aught to agree to a cease-fire with Hamas.
Standing by impotently doing nothing while Hamas launches attack after attack against you is not "peace", nor is it respectful of human life the Israeli government is supposed to care the most about: that of Israelis.
The Israeli government isn't in charge of protecting the lives of Palestinians. It is in charge of protecting the lives of Israelis. The Palestinian authorities are in charge of protecting Palestinian civilians. Unfortunately they're too busy using them as human shields.
Hamas is no more representative of all Palestinians than the Nazis were of all Germans.
Nevertheless, Germany was only defeated, and the war ended, when its Army was nearly obliterated, its industrial base and economy destroyed, its people half-starved, and its economy in ruins.
News reports indicate that more than half the Palestinians killed in the carnage in Gaza are unaffiliated with Hamas.
1.) I don't believe that for a second.
2.) Not relevant.
3.) Entirely Hamas's responsibility.
I wonder, therefore, if Jason would share with us a number of Palestinians (between 1 and 6,000,000) at which even he would agree that too many Palestinians have been killed.
That's not a question for me to answer, but for Hamas to answer. They can say "enough" any time they choose, and the Israeli rockets will cease.
The converse is not true.
Stop trying to play the "body-count" card. It's a stupid argument, with credibility only among half-wits and hippy-dippies. Hamas doesn't even accept the argument itself, except when it's getting its ass kicked. They are perfectly willing to murder Israelis by the dozen, and they are perfecty willing to use their own children as self-propelled sandbags, then parade their corpses for the useful idiots in the media.
And you're their enabler.
News reports indicate that more than half the Palestinians killed in the carnage in Gaza are unaffiliated with Hamas.
You missed his point. Hamas uses noncombatants as shields (e.g., by launching mortar attacks from locations heavily populated by noncombatants). That is why so many Palestinian noncombatants have been killed -- they get hit when Israel attacks Hamas. That's why it is a war crime to hide your forces among noncombatants. That's why so many noncombatants have died. Not because of Israel, but because of Hamas.
I wonder, therefore, if Jason would share with us a number of Palestinians (between 1 and 6,000,000) at which even he would agree that too many Palestinians have been killed.
There is no upper limit. Israel has a moral responsibility not to target noncombatants. It does not have a moral responsibility to prevent noncombatants from being killed by legitimate attacks on military targets. THAT responsibility lies with the Palestinians, who under the laws of warfare are supposed to keep their military forces distinct and separate from their noncombatant populations.
Amplifying Dan's point, the Hague conventions are perfectly clear... you can merrily apply as much firepower as you need to accomplish your military objective, when targeting combatants.
This is true even if the combatants are occupying elementary schools and orphanages.
You may not recklessly apply MORE firepower than needed to accomplish your military objective. But you can certainly counterfire on a mortar crew, or launch a precision air strike on a mortar crew that has taken position within a schoolyard, for example.
So long as the firepower used is proportionate to the military objective (NOT the firepower of the guys being targeted), it is the guys in the schoolhouse who are committing war crimes, under the Hague treaty, and not the people taking them out.
By extension, so long as the Israelis are applying a reasonable level of firepower to neutralize the threat posed by the mortar crew, the blood of every noncombatant in the schoolhouse when it gets hit with the counterbattery fire or the CAS mission is exclusively the responsibility of the mortar crew and their command.
Period.
And the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth over disproportionate body counts are the arguments of imbiciles... and entirely Hamas's problem.
Dan writes:
This is where you end up when you start believing that the Palestinians are not people but noncombatants. You start claiming there is no upper limit to the number of Palestinian civilians Israel can kill.
There is no upper limit. This way for the gas, ladies and gentlemen.
This is where you end up when you start believing that the Palestinians are not people but noncombatants.
WTF are you talking about?
"This way for the gas" is a stupid allusion.
ndm illustrates my point precisely: Hamas and the useful idiots who defend them are doing everything they can to blur the distinction between noncombatant and civilian, and between civilian and combatant.
It's a lazy and intellectually dishonest argument.
The most recent comments by Dan and Jason Van Steenwyk more or less prove the assertion I made in my first post on this thread, namely:
Megan McArdle writes:
To me, the impossibility of debating Israel/Palestine is that it the argument is dominated by nationalism on both sides.
I don't think this is right. The debate on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States has been dominated historically by Israeli nationalism and anyone not fully supportive of that has been tarred, almost routinely, as a supporter of Palestinian terrorism.
In Dan and Jason Von Steenwyk we have two people who express a form of Israeli Nationalism which includes the right of Israel to kill ALL Palestinians. It is inconceivable that any commenter on these boards would claim the Palestinians have the right to kill ALL Israelis without being subject to mass condemnation.
The debate in the American media is not between two Nationalist movements. It is between an increasingly depraved Israeli Nationalist movement and those who understand the moral failings of Israeli policies and their dreadful consequence.
" News reports indicate that more than half the Palestinians killed in the carnage in Gaza are unaffiliated with Hamas. I wonder, therefore, if Jason would share with us a number of Palestinians (between 1 and 6,000,000) at which even he would agree that too many Palestinians have been killed.
Posted by ndm | January 14, 2009 7:43 PM"
It is not up to you, me, Jason or anyone else to make that determination. It is up to the Palestinians to make that call. Now if the Hamas scum cowards who hide behind the skirts of woman and children were to actually wear uniforms, then it would considerably easier for the Israelis to kill them and inflict less collateral damage. Since the Palestinians voted for Hamas with the full knowledge of Hamas intentions, frankly they are getting what they deserve. Neither Israel, the US or any other country is obligated to value enemy lives on the same or greater plane than that of their own. The entire responsibility for all of the deaths is entirely that of the Palestinians. If you start a war against an enemy that can annihilate your people, a war that you cannot win, the fault is entirely yours if that happens.
Lost in all this back and forth is why are the Palestinians more worthy of statehood than the Kurds? Or the other peoples subjugated by the Arabs for centuries? When the Arabs quit their illegal occupation of those lands along with that of Zion, then we can start to take them seriously.
Even if that were a desirable outcome (I'm still not convinced that it is, but that's another issue), I'm not even sure that it would be possible for Israel to achieve this, short of outright genocide. The reason that the Hamas issue is so intractable is because of Hamas fighters' willingness to sacrifice everything, even the lives of themselves and their families for the cause of the destruction of the state of Israel. Given that Hamas is quite successful at recruiting, and the Palestinian birthrate is much higher than the Israeli one (and the fact that Hamas can recruit from the massive populations of surrounding countries), is it even a realistic goal for Israel to completely destroy Hamas? I'd argue that its not, due to demographic reasons alone.
You can watch video documentation of armed Hamas fighters literally grabbing children and carrying them between themselves and Israeli bullets here:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/01/022544.php
If any of them are killed, again, it was Hamas who murdered them, not the Israelis.
" Given that Hamas is quite successful at recruiting, and the Palestinian birthrate is much higher than the Israeli one (and the fact that Hamas can recruit from the massive populations of surrounding countries), is it even a realistic goal for Israel to completely destroy Hamas? I'd argue that its not, due to demographic reasons alone.
Posted by quanticle | January 14, 2009 9:40 PM"
There is evidence of their beings hundreds of thousands of Hamas members. At best a few thousand.
Millions of sympathizers,yes. Millions of volunteers, no. After all if that were the case, there would have been a multi-million man army poised to attack and invade Israel.
However it would be foolish of those who sympathize or support Hamas to assume that Israel would commit national suicide or dismantle itself if it could avoid doing so, even if that were to require her to annihilate the Palestinians and a substantial part of the Arab world. A more likely scenario would have Israel expel the Palestinians.
Just like the Saudis and the Kuwaitis did in 1991/1992 after the first Gulf War. Numbers alone mean nothing otherwise the Arabs would have driven Israel out of existence decades ago. Until such time the Arabs offer Israel a real offer, the Israelis have nothing to gain from phony peace talks.
There is evidence of their beings hundreds of thousands of Hamas members. At best a few thousand.
Correction: there is no evidence of there being hundreds of thousands of Hamas members. At best a few thousand. PIMF
Hahahahaha, so by wingnut definitions and probably beyond, the US was a terrorist supporting state. Should some superpower come and bomb the hell out America's infrastructure while killing tons of women and children in the process? Should American men be incarcerated for prolonged periods without evidence and strapped face down and naked with their anuses stretched open with speculums while twisted guards stand around urinating and ejaculating into the gaping holes? Then should any objects the guards find like potatoes and flashlights be wedged into the frothy mix of blood, urine, shit and semen already sloshing around in the prisoners rectums?
I can hear the wingnuts now saying: but... but... but... we are americans... and... and... but...
Douchebags.
"There is no upper limit. Israel has a moral responsibility not to target noncombatants. It does not have a moral responsibility to prevent noncombatants from being killed by legitimate attacks on military targets."
The World Trade Center had several military intelligence offices and the Pentagon was...The Pentagon. So the 9/11 attacks were perfectly legitimate military targets?
If a terrorist is using a kid as a human shield, and you go ahead and kill the kid and him regardless, you still killed the kid! You consciously made the decision that the death of terrorist was more important than the life of the kid.
And that is what is objectionable to me. It's not right to engage in any action that will predictably result in the death of over a hundred children, just to stop a stream of rockets that was likely to kill less than 3 Israelis over the course of a year.
It doesn't matter if they were killed because Hamas fighers are embedded in the population. The children died, and if Israel had acted differently, they would be alive. No amount of moral gymnastics can avoid that fact.
Ok, here is what I want to hear:
Is anyone going to defend Israel's actions in this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beit_Sahour#Tax_resistance .
During the 88 intifada, there was a large push toward non-violence resistance, and that was one of the more prominent examples. To quote:
"In 1989, during the first Intifada, the Palestinian resistance (Unified National Leadership of the Uprising, UNLU) and Ghassan Andoni, urged people to stop paying taxes to Israel, which inherited and modified the previous Jordanian tax-collection regime in the West Bank. “No taxation without representation,” said a statement from the organizers. “The military authorities do not represent us, and we did not invite them to come to our land. Must we pay for the bullets that kill our children or for the expenses of the occupying army?” The people of Beit Sahour responded to this call with an organized citywide tax strike that included refusal to pay and file tax returns.
Israeli defense minister Yitzhak Rabin responded: “We will teach them there is a price for refusing the laws of Israel.” The Israeli military authorities placed the town under curfew for 42 days, blocked food shipments into the town, cut telephone lines to the town, tried to bar reporters from the town, imprisoned forty residents (among them Fuad Kokaley and Rifat Odeh Kassis) and seized in house-to-house raids millions of dollars in money and property belonging to 350 families. The Israeli military stopped the consuls-general of Belgium, Britain, France, Greece, Italy, Spain and Sweden when they attempted to go to Beit Sahour and investigate the conditions there during the tax strike."
Let's be honest. If the US government had shut down food shipments and seized houses in Birmingham after Rosa Parks, shit would have gotten violent really quickly.
I hate to say it, but judging by Israeli past behavior, non-violence wouldn't work. Israel would simply arrest all the agitators and continue building settlements. And while I'm sure that most of the Israeli population would be opposed to such a thing, bizarre parliamentary dynamics would keep the status-quo in place, just like 1988.
The focus should be then, on ensuring that Palestinians have legitimate ways to air their grievances without violence.
And the best way to do that, would be for the US to act strongly when Israel misbehaves. ("If you go ahead and expand that settlement, we're cutting off military aid and sending Egypt some shiny new fighter jets").
I have no particular beef with the Israeli actions here. Certainly no more of a beef than I have with the assertion of Federal authority over Tom the Tinker and the Whiskey Rebellion, under the personal command of no less a figure than George Washington.
Did you have a problem with Lincoln's use of force to assert Federal authority over, say, Virginia in 1861-1865?
I think the Pentagon was a legitimate military target. However, the plane used to attack it was not, nor were the means used to attack the plane.
The WTC was also not a legitimate military target. A similar military-related office could have been targeted elsewhere, with a similar military effect, but far lower loss of noncombatant life. And the WTC could have been attacked at night, or on a weekend, when far fewer noncombatants would have been in the building.
Al Qaeda therefore violated the Jus in Bello rule of proportionality. The killing was out of all proportion to the force required to meet any reasonable military objective there.
Further, Al Qaeda's aim was not to attack the military office that just happened to be in the WTC. Their deliberate aim in targeting the WTC was to cause as much loss of life and terror as possible.
Unless you're a total retard, Dave, somehow, I suspect deep down, you know this.
This is where you end up when you start believing that the Palestinians are not people but noncombatants.
In your rush to be profound you forgot to have your post make sense. "Noncombatants" are people who may not be directly targeted in war. "People" in general enjoy no such protection; there are all sorts of people you're allowed to deliberately kill during a war (e.g, soldiers, spies, insurgents, and war industry employees in factories and shipyards).
For example, the answer to the question "is Country X allowed to deliberately kill people during a war" is "yes, absolutely". The answer to the question "is Country X allowed to deliberately kill noncombatants during a war" is "absolutely not". This illustrates why your "they're not noncombatants, they're people!!!" posturing is both silly and counterproductive.
This way for the gas, ladies and gentlemen.
Like I said above, "Israel has a moral responsibility not to target noncombatants". Either you weren't quite bright enough to get that distinction, or you think the Jews who died in the Holocaust were accidental collateral damage of WW2. Either way, back to the history books for you.
If a terrorist is using a kid as a human shield, and you go ahead and kill the kid and him regardless, you still killed the kid! You consciously made the decision that the death of terrorist was more important than the life of the kid.
No. The terrorist bears the entire responsibility.
Jason Van Steenwyk,
The residents of Beit Sehur can't vote. Tom the Tinker and the US Southerners could.
If you grant Israeli citizenship to Palestinians, I'll drop my objection.
Mind you, there isn't anything like a universal right to vote in this world. But I fail to see why the US should support a non-democracy when it isn't in our direct strategic interest to do so.
But my general point, that Palestinians currently have no means of expression outside of violence, seems unaddressed.
As for your other point:
Sure, you raise a lot of reasons toward the obvious conclusion that the WTC attacks were unacceptable. Put some of that creativity to use and figure out why some people might not support all of Israel's strikes.
Of course, I'm surprised that nobody has taken the WW2-ish Total War perspective, which casts a wide enough net to give both Palestinian terrorism and Israel a clean bill of moral health.
But I hold a much stronger moral test on strikes: The benefits of a military strike must outweigh the predictable costs of the strike.
Some strikes meet that definition. Killing some civilians in order to blow up a suspected meeting of Al-Qaeda is worth it, since Al-Qaeda attacks can kill hundreds or thousands of people.
The direct assassination of a Hamas hardliner could meet this definition, depending on the likely successor.
But killing hundreds of civilians and keeping 1.4 million civilians under a permanent blockade, in order to save about 2 Israelis a year, does not.
"If a terrorist is using a kid as a human shield, and you go ahead and kill the kid and him regardless, you still killed the kid! You consciously made the decision that the death of terrorist was more important than the life of the kid.
No. The terrorist bears the entire responsibility."
The terrorist isn't blameless, putting the child in danger. But the option not to kill the child was entirely yours!
The moral system you described is actually quite a bit dangerous.
When a person has two options, one that leads to the death of innocent people, and the other that does not, we should want a system of morality where the person has a moral incentive to save lives.
The strength of this incentive can be debated, but by shifting all responsibility to the terrorist, you've eliminated the incentive entirely.
And if you carry this thought through, it has quite disastrous consequences elsewhere...
Wasn't Kahane Chai listed as a terrorist group?
Where'd you come up with all that crap, moelarryandjesus? Certainly wasn't reported in the news anywhere.
Which means that there's only one place it could've come from: your personal fantasies.
I am bi-polar, please ask the other writers from your magazine and any other news organization to not discuss my internet activity in public.
Massie takes his analysis from this article:
http://www.ria.ie/cgi-bin/ria/papers/100688.pdf
Just a general question, but civilian deaths be called collateral damage if you know in advance that your actions would cause those deaths? At that point it's not an accident, just an acceptable consequence. How does that differ with terrorist acts that kill civilians.
Also, would Hamas be considered terrorists if they only ever targeted the Israeli military?
Just trying to understand underlying beliefs on which the more detailed arguments in the comments are based.
If you grant Israeli citizenship to Palestinians, I'll drop my objection.
Obviously Israel would cease to exist with the first election. Hamas would become the leading Israeli party and promptly declare all Jews enemies of the Islamic state.
Why not give them Jordanian citizenship, or Egyptian, or Saudi? I'll tell you why: those countries don't want them either. They don't like them any better than Israel does. Their plan is to destory Israel and give that territory to the Palis.
Mind you, there isn't anything like a universal right to vote in this world. But I fail to see why the US should support a non-democracy when it isn't in our direct strategic interest to do so
By this definition, the U.S. is a nondemocracy because Cubans can't vote in Rhode Island.
Just a general question, but civilian deaths be called collateral damage if you know in advance that your actions would cause those deaths? At that point it's not an accident, just an acceptable consequence. How does that differ with terrorist acts that kill civilians.
The same way that accidentally shooting a hostage in the process of arresting a murderer is different than being a murderer.
Also, would Hamas be considered terrorists if they only ever targeted the Israeli military?
No, they would then be considered an attacking foreign power.
To me, the impossibility of debating Israel/Palestine is that it the argument is dominated by nationalism on both sides.
Absolutely. To take that point further, each of them maintains ideas about nationalism that are incompatible with long-term co-existence.
The Palestinian leadership really doesn't want Israel to exist, while Israel wants to control key pieces of real estate, such as Jerusalem, that are sure to perpetuate the animosity. There is no two-state solution with long-term viability, given these competing agendas.
Northern Ireland is another matter. The UK doesn't particularly gain much from keeping it, and it can eventually walk away from it without losing much or losing vital territory (read: England.) The IRA will not escalate the conflict by attempting to conquer Britain if and when the Northern Ireland situation is resolved in its favor. That conflict will sort itself out over time, and third parties such as the US can maintain friendly relationships with both parties without compromising its own policy needs.
This moral equivalency game is asinine.
Hamas attacks cafes and buses because it lacks the conventional military forces that it would need to wage a conventional war against its opponent. If it had top quality military equipment, along with an open battlefield and sufficient manpower for conventional combat, it would surely use them.
The bottom-line challenge is whether Palestine and Israel can cut a deal and coexist. I'd say that over the long run that they can't. Either one of them has to destroy the other, or else someone from outside of the region has to impose the rules and enforce them, with both parties disliking the outcome.
Since both of those alternatives are politically unacceptable, you end up with this slow burn, interrupted by occasional outbursts of optimism and smiley negotiations, but with no truly workable solution.
Short of a devastating conflict that determines a clear winner (one that could easily spill across borders), Israel will ultimately lose because demography ensures that they will eventually be outnumbered. It could take a century or more for this to happen, but the path seems inevitable.
Even demographics can change dramatically, over a timescale of a century.
A lot of French Canadian nationalist politicans used to talk about "the revenge of the cradle", before their birthrate dropped off a cliff in the 60's.
Hamas attacks cafes and buses because it lacks the conventional military forces that it would need to wage a conventional war against its opponent. If it had top quality military equipment, along with an open battlefield and sufficient manpower for conventional combat, it would surely use them.
Oh. I guess that makes it ok, then. (rolling eyes).
Yes, Hamas would use them. To rape Jewish women and to line up Jewish women and children against berms and machine gun them to death.
I guess that makes it ok, then.
Thanks for the straw man argument, but that isn't at all what I said.
You may enjoy standing atop a moral soapbox because it makes you feel good. As a neutral third-party with no dog in the fight, I am trying to understand it because I would prefer that someone else's conflict doesn't hurt me.
A discussion of right and wrong doesn't lead to a workable solution that creates genuine peace or at least some form of stability. All it does is cause both sides to justify their preferred forms of violence.
If we could build a wall around the region and let them kill each other without worrying about broader ramifications, then perhaps that would be best for us. But since that isn't possible, we all have some stake in figuring out how to keep this thing from escalating. You've offered no solutions to our problem, nor for that matter have you even provided a solution for yours. Once you've enjoyed the rush from standing on the moral high ground, feel free to offer an alternative that might actually work.
But the fact remains that Hamas was elected by the people of Gaza, and the people knew their platform called for an unending war against a democratic neighbor, and arguably a policy of extermination.
Fine. They are entitled to the consideration of the people of Dresden and Tokyo and Nagasaki.
What's that? They didn't vote for Hitler and Tojo? Well, then perhaps the people of Gaza should feel entitled to even less consideration.
I suppose your ridiculous argument might hold some water if you could prove that everyone in Gaza actually voted for Hamas and therefore deserves to die.
Oh, but at least the IDF drops leaflets to warn them of bombings ahead of time--as if the people in Gaza have anywhere to go when they're trapped in a ghetto by the country that's about to bomb them.
One more thing, the people of Germany did in fact elect Hitler knowing full well what he stood for(read Hitler's Willing Executioners)--so you're historically ignorant as well as being an advocate of murdering innocent civilians. Well done.
Thanks for the straw man argument, but that isn't at all what I said.
Of course it is. There's simply no other reason to point out that Hamas murders with bus bombs because they lack a conventional army to murder with.
As a neutral third-party with no dog in the fight
Do you stay neutral at wife beatings, too?
I suppose your ridiculous argument might hold some water if you could prove that everyone in Gaza actually voted for Hamas and therefore deserves to die.
Fortunately for Gazans, we now have precision munitions that hopefully make such measures uneccessary.
Oh, but at least the IDF drops leaflets to warn them of bombings ahead of time--as if the people in Gaza have anywhere to go when they're trapped in a ghetto by the country that's about to bomb them.
That is not Israel's problem. That problem belongs 100 percent to Hamas.
so you're historically ignorant as well as being an advocate of murdering innocent civilians.
I'm not an advocate of murdering innocent civilians. Hamas is! It's in their charter. And anyone who ever voted for those cockroaches is also an advocate of the murder of innocent civilians, by extension. And they double down by deliberately hiding behind children and in schools, firing at the IDF. So they are murdering their own children, not just those of the Israelis.
It's not like Hamas had a track record. They murdered more than 480 noncombatants in a 10 year period prior to 2005 or so. (So take that "two Israelis a year" fatality figure you pulled out of your ass and shove it, Shor!)
Is the killing a problem? Hamas can stop the killing any time they wish. The blood is entirely on their hands.
Now get back to me when you learn what "murder" means.
In Dan and Jason Von Steenwyk we have two people who express a form of Israeli Nationalism which includes the right of Israel to kill ALL Palestinians. It is inconceivable that any commenter on these boards would claim the Palestinians have the right to kill ALL Israelis without being subject to mass condemnation.
I'm not so sure. I agree with those who say the correct number of Palestinians to kill is whatever number required to halt the rocket attacks on Israel. OTOH, if the only method of stopping Israel's bombardment of Gaza was for Palestinians to kill ALL Israelis, I'd agree that Hamas was not only entitled, but _obligated_ to try.
But the reality is, Hamas genuinely has other options. Hamas could have avoided the current violence entirely by refraining from rocket attacks on Israel. It could end the "blockade" of Gaza by halting violent attacks on border crossings, adhering to a cease fire and entering into peace process negotiations on the basis of a two state solution.
But Hamas' leadership has stated repeatedly that they are unwilling to accept any "solution" to the Palestinian problem short of the complete destruction of the state of Israel, has repeatedly violated their earlier cease fire agreement with Israel, and unilaterally terminated that agreement accompanied by an escalation to using larger, deadlier rockets. Hamas really has given Israel no other option but use of military force.
Even in a small state like Israel, a democratically elected government can probably survive a few bumps to its international reputation. It definitely can NOT survive a decision to enter into and adhere to a "cease-fire" during which a large fraction of voters spend a few hours a day in bomb shelters trying to avoid airborne death from above. While such forbearance might win Israel's government points with many readers of Atlantic magazine, it's not going to win them votes in Tel Aviv, let alone Sderot.
Just a general question, but civilian deaths be called collateral damage if you know in advance that your actions would cause those deaths?
Yes. The word "collateral" means "secondary" or "aside from the main subject", not "accidental". Hence, "collateral damage" -- "damage aside from that inflicted on the target".
Anyway, as to David Shor's argument that a person who kills a child while shooting at the terrorist hiding behind the child has still chosen to kill the child: yes, that much is correct. The point is that the moral and legal responsibility for the death lies with the terrorist.
It has to be that way.
Consider this thought experiment: I pack a room full of five-year-old kids and explosives. The explosives are linked by radio to a deadman switch carried by me. If I release a thumb button on the control, the explosives go off and lots of kids die. I then proceed to go around robbing banks, killing people, raping people, you name it.
Is it morally right to kill me or detain me, knowing that the explosives will still go off and kill those kids? Answer: yes. Because even though it means the deaths of innocents, it has to be done to prevent both my own activities and those of would-be copycats.
It is the same here. We can't say "don't shoot the enemy, they're hiding behind innocent people". To do so not only allows the enemy to attack you with impunity, but encourages EVERYONE to hide behind innocent people.
It is inconceivable that any commenter on these boards would claim the Palestinians have the right to kill ALL Israelis without being subject to mass condemnation.
I didn't say Israel had the right to kill all the Palestinians. I said there was no upper limit on the number of Palestinian noncombatant deaths due to collateral damage from legitimate military attacks. The only way this would involve "killing all the Palestinians" is if Hamas had the numbers and the ability to use every last Palestinian noncombatant as a human shield.
If Israel used its own noncombatants as human shields for its troops, and in fact used the entire population of its country that way, then yes, it would be legitimate to kill everyone in Israel, too. But Israel would never do that, so it isn't going to come up. Besides, since Hamas deliberately tries to kill as many Israeli noncombatants as it can, using them as human shields would actually help Hamas.
There's simply no other reason to point out that Hamas murders with bus bombs because they lack a conventional army to murder with.
Of course, you can't see it because you refuse to see it.
The relevant point is that the attacks are a symptom of the underlying problem. The specific form in which the attacks occur is a reflection of the asymmetry in the power relationship.
The conflict is derived from competing, incompatible agendas that clash because each side holds a position that neither will compromise. You are so emotionally engaged that you are unable to separate symptoms from problems.
Israel's problem is not with cheap rockets, but that they are in a situation that cannot be resolved strictly through negotiation. No one can fix what's broken until this reality is acknowledged.
Do you stay neutral at wife beatings, too?
If getting involved drags me into it, then it depends upon the circumstances.
The US gets little benefit and a lot of headaches by not being an honest broker. Since I am American, I am most concerned with American interests, more so than I am with the interests of other nations. If I was Israeli, I would feel differently, of course, but since I'm not, I don't.
The US should either stay the hell out of it, or else use international channels to manage it. Being a blatantly biased party isn't helping the US. Since I don't view the US military or State Department as an extension of a foreign government, I am unwilling to stick the US's neck into someone else's noose, particularly when there is little that the US can do.
ndm
I wonder, therefore, if Jason would share with us a number of Palestinians (between 1 and 6,000,000) at which even he would agree that too many Palestinians have been killed.
Dan
There is no upper limit. Israel has a moral responsibility not to target noncombatants. It does not have a moral responsibility to prevent noncombatants from being killed by legitimate attacks on military targets.
Dan
I said there was no upper limit on the number of Palestinian noncombatant deaths due to collateral damage from legitimate military attacks. (my emphasis)
Hitler's willing executioners no doubt rationalized their moral depravity just as Dan does. "No upper limit" on the number of Palestinians Israel can kill is equivalent to "kill them all." Never again didn't last long, did it. So I have no hesitation in repeating my implied criticism of Dan and Jason Van Steenwk:
Hitler's willing executioners no doubt rationalized their moral depravity just as Dan does.
No they didn't. They didn't have to rationalize their depravity at all. They had an explicit war aim to kill as many Jews as possible, for instance, for its own sake. Jews were not collateral damage, sustained as a second order effect in the pursuit of a legitimate war aim. The wholesale murder was an aim in itself.
This is a characteristic they share with Hamas.
"No upper limit" on the number of Palestinians Israel can kill is equivalent to "kill them all."
No, that's just stupid.
They are not at all the same thing. Hamas has the power to stop the killing. Once Hamas undertook an act of war against Israel (the first rocket or suicide bombing), Israel has the perfect right, both morally and under international law, to kill Hamas fighters, and continue to kill them until Hamas can no longer mount an effective resistance, nor pose an effective threat.
As long as this is their war aim, and they are focusing reasonable firepower in pursuit of this war aim sufficient for its expedited success, then it is true, there is no upper limit imposed on the slaughter that Hamas bears the entire responsibility for.
But once those war aims are achieved, the killing must stop.
That is very much different than "kill them all," since "kill them all" has no condition specified for the cessation of violence. "Kill Hamas" does.
Deep down, I think you knew that, and you're trying to be obtuse.
The relevant point is that the attacks are a symptom of the underlying problem. The specific form in which the attacks occur is a reflection of the asymmetry in the power relationship.
That's true, but not in the sense that you mean it. The reason Hamas sets off a bomb to kill dozens of Israeli civilians is that they lack the military capability to set of a bomb that will kill thousands or millions. In that sense, their power is asymmetrical. If the Palestinians had nukes and fighter jets and the Israelis had nothing buy guerrilla tactics, the Israelis would already all be dead.
The stated goal of Hamas is the complete destruction of Israel and the slaughter of its Jewish inhabitants. Most Palestinians support both those goals. Israelis remain alive solely because Palestinians are far weaker than they.
"No upper limit" on the number of Palestinians Israel can kill is equivalent to "kill them all."
I think the intelligent and thoughtful readers here understood the distinction I made; Jason summed it up nicely. Sorry you didn't get it.
I do find your point of view funny, though. Let's say you set a hard limit of, oh, a thousand noncombatant deaths. Now all Hamas has to do when Israel attacks is shoot a thousand Palestinians and blame the Jews. Presto, war's over and they can get back to killing Israelis in "peace". :)
The reason Hamas sets off a bomb to kill dozens of Israeli civilians is that they lack the military capability to set of a bomb that will kill thousands or millions. In that sense, their power is asymmetrical. If the Palestinians had nukes and fighter jets and the Israelis had nothing buy guerrilla tactics, the Israelis would already all be dead.
The stated goal of Hamas is the complete destruction of Israel and the slaughter of its Jewish inhabitants. Most Palestinians support both those goals. Israelis remain alive solely because Palestinians are far weaker than they.
That's pretty much what I said above. They don't want Israel to exist. There is no way to negotiate a diplomatic compromise with staying power when that's the agenda.
Likewise, Israel wants to control specific pieces of real estate that is sure to continue to fan the flames. They aren't willing to give those up in the hope of changing hearts and minds.
If one side doesn't defeat the other or if outsiders don't take control over both of them, then they'll continue to hound each other until one either gives up (attrition) or until a major conflict leads to a decisive defeat of one of the sides (total war.) Either way, there isn't much that the US can do to change this.
"Consider this thought experiment: I pack a room full of five-year-old kids and explosives. The explosives are linked by radio to a deadman switch carried by me. If I release a thumb button on the control, the explosives go off and lots of kids die. I then proceed to go around robbing banks, killing people, raping people, you name it."
Well, yes, in that case, killing you satisfies the moral test I laid out: That the military strike prevents more damage then the strike itself created.
But, killing a 1000 Palestinians, roughly 100 of them children, in order to (maybe!) stop a stream of rocket attacks that only killed 2 or 3 people a year, does not pass that test.
If you lose around 20 Israeli soldiers in the task, then it's not only immoral, but crosses the realm into stupid.
I've noticed that Megan's posts routinely inspire demonstrations of exactly the point she was making, but this thread is a particularly hilarious example of it.
But, killing a 1000 Palestinians, roughly 100 of them children, in order to (maybe!) stop a stream of rocket attacks that only killed 2 or 3 people a year, does not pass that test.
Doesn't pass the test, eh? Show your work, please. 333 deaths to prevent one death a year is, according to you, morally wrong. What's the magic number at which it would be morally acceptable -- and what's your moral reasoning for arriving at that number?
If you lose around 20 Israeli soldiers in the task, then it's not only immoral, but crosses the realm into stupid.
Hm. In World War Two the United States lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers against Germany, which in turn only killed a few thousand of our civilians -- and that's if you count the merchant marine, since the death toll for other American civilians killed by Germany was a few dozen. Apparently America was grossly stupid to wage war against Germany; we should have done everything we could to secure peace with them once they declared war on us. Of course, both the United States and the Israelis were smarter than you. They acted based not on the harm their enemy had done them to date, but on the harm their enemy wished to do them and had the potential to do to them.
Israel knows how many Israelis Hamas killed last year: seven (I don't know where you got "2 or 3" from). It knows how many Israelis Hamas and its Iranian backers would like to kill next year: five and a half million. It does not know how many people Hamas will *actually* kill over the next year, or five years, or fifty years. The Israelis have, presumably, made an educated guess to that effect and are acting based on it. They are not obligated to lowball that estimate for the sake of Palestinian civilians, particularly considering that the average Palestinian wants the Israelis dead, too.
Since 1967, Israel has been grossly incompetant at "Occupation".
Compare theirs with the US occupation and democratization of Iraq. Israelis, whose side I mostly support, have nevertheless been racistly uncaring about helping the Palestinians enjoy Human Rights and other Civilization benefits.
They should slice off about 10% of Gaza, near the border, and re-occupy it. Putting up cement car stops and fence in a new border, and sending the Palestinians into re-education work camps, where they are taught how to be productive capitalist workers from the carrot - no carrot approach. Do work and get paid; or don't and don't. But no free food.
Enforce free speech and free religion and thorough house searches of every house in the 10% re-occuptied. Promise to return that part to a Palestinian state that agrees to borders with Israel in a Peace Agreement. Claim that a Peace Agreement, not a ceasefire, is the goal.
Israel should be drafting Israeli Arabs for a big part of occupation force. They should also be setting up soccer and other sports for the boys, especially, along with English language schools for both boys and girls.
Compare theirs with the US occupation and democratization of Iraq.
The Iraqi people didn't consider Americans to be their hated enemies. Palestinians have considered Israel to be a hated enemy since the day Israel came into being.
So comparing the two doesn't tell you much, other than that it is easier to work amicably with people who didn't start off wanting you dead.
Reported earlier the on the IRA. Everyone knows Hamas and Al Queida. But what about the Irish Republican Army? You hear about the other terrorist groups becasue the attack people in the Middle East and that area is a hotspot. Everyone hears about the Middle East with Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan. You need to also look at the other groups that are dangerous. The groups that you dont hear about are the most dangerous because you are thinking of how Hamas will attack you with their tactics. The diffrent groups have diffrent tactics and you wont be ready for the ones you are not thinking will be used. People need to think of all groups because to get their name out they attack! We need to stop them from forming other groups that are like the RIRA and the CIRA. We need to stop them from attacking the British and killing innocent lives.
"Imagine, if you will, a blockbuster film being made about a plucky Arab terrorist leader finally winning freedom for his people by slaughtering large numbers of Israeli/British/French soldiers....."
Collins didn’t slaughter large numbers of anything. As colonial wars go,the Anglo-Irish War aka the War of Independence was not especially bloody. The most intense and deadly segment of the conflict was a matter of months. (And many of those killed were Irish police, not British soldiers.) The terror tactics were employed by the British as well as the I.R.A.
"To associate Michael Collins in any way with the provisional IRA is simply not historically accurate."
True - sort of. The I.R.A. was Collins' own baby and during his lifetime he was involved in gunrunning and fighting in the North before and after the signing of the treaty, and what evidence we have indicates that at the time of his death he wasn't prepared to accept partition lying down. The Provisionals grew out of a different political and cultural situation, but they are part of the same republican tradition as Collins and although he would not have liked some of their methods he would have recognized some of them. There are also significant differences, and there's no question that the violence of the Provisionals was on another level -- but that's another discussion.
"Nor does almost anyone in the United States put the IRA, or its cause in the same mental basket as that of the Northern Irish"
Er, "the Northern Irish"? Would that be the nationalists, the republicans, the unionists or the loyalists? Do you know anything at all about anything, or do you just make this stuff up as you go along and hope nobody notices?