(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
 . . . . . . . . . .



Israel/Hamas: Yes, Two Things Can Be True at Once [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-10-25  

As horrid as the news coming out of Tel Aviv and the Gaza Strip has been, choosing sides based on which atrocity is worst leaves no room for a negotiated outcome. President Joe Biden recognized this early in the conflict when he warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to make the same mistakes the U.S. made after 9/11. The thirst and urge to shoot first and ask questions later is entirely understandable. As quickly as the World Trade Center towers fell from the heinous attack by Al-Qaeda terrorists in New York in 2001, the temperature for revenge rose just as fast. Shock and Awe became Bomb and Oops for American soldiers and Iraqi civilians, mainly because the U.S. blamed and invaded the wrong country.

In the case of the pending Israeli ground war, Netanyahu has identified the right enemy—Hamas; his problem will be to justify thousands of dead Palestinians to achieve his objective. Get ready to hear the words collateral damage spun like a dreidel. For many Jews worldwide, as it was for Americans after September 11th, seeing an enemy pay the ultimate price with their lives is perceived as the only salve to heal the wound. Shooting first and sorting out the targets later—was and is—not exclusive to either conflict. A hero of liberal causes, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, ordered the internment of thousands of Japanese Americans after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The stories of women and children murdered in gruesome ways by Hamas in front of each other are surely justification for depriving water and food for the elderly and sick. What that takes is not only a blind eye but an indifference to suffering.

The reaction to and by young Americans on college campuses recognizing that suffering begets suffering and ends in more suffering has been both discouraging and hopeful. Sure, it is hard to think logically in the face of the horrific acts by bloodthirsty terrorists who would kill babies, kidnap and beat old ladies, and not want to lash out. Yet, something must be said for empathy for the Palestinian people. Just as Americans were rightfully enraged at the live pictures of New Yorkers—fellow Americans— dying in fear, it mobilized most of us to want to see the responsible parties with the same fear before death. The death of Osama bin Laden should have satisfied the lust, but by that time, as the signs in bric-à-brac shops read, you break it, you own it. As it turned out, the geopolitical mistake of disrupting and dismantling the regulating force of the Iraqi government was a mistake. The result was the rise of ISIS.

It is forgivable that the average American did not understand the Sunni-Shiite dynamics of Islam. Still, for the leaders of the world who joined the United States on the quest for vengeance, not understanding and contributing to the region's destabilization was unforgivable. Listening to people talk about the Israeli occupation of Gaza (which has not been true since 2005) and conflating that with the actual occupation of the West Bank is infuriating. A wholesale massacre of the Palestinians in Gaza would bring about direct involvement from Hezbollah and ramped-up support from Iran vis-a-vis Russia. Israel has already predicted collateral damage to not only the Gaza residents but also its citizens.

Now that the media is past the drama of Hamas killers paragliding into Israel, they focus on the innocent and harried Palestinians. With hospital care at a minimum in Gaza and grieving Palestinian mothers on TV every day touching the body bags of their loved ones and crying out for relief, Israel risks losing support and incurring more wrath from an anti-Zionist faction itching to blame the victims.

Vote Against Guns

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/25/2201572/-Israel-Hamas-Yes-Two-Things-Can-Be-True-at-Once?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/