Should The World Condemn Israel?
Less than 24 hours, Israeli ground troops launched it’s offensive into Gaza, where Hamas, a Palestinian faction is firing rockets into the Jewish territory.
Across the globe, rallies are held condemning Israel for the bloodshed, but is it proper to condemn the Jews for her actions?
I’ve been following the event with interest and here are the arguments and counter-arguments that I have find noteworthy:
Those against Hamas
- Hamas should be blamed for the latest violence because it consistently fired rockets to Israel, targeting civilians
- Hamas is a terror group, supported and trained by Syria and Iran and are committed to the destruction of Israel.
- During the ceasefire, Hamas built a tunnel thru Egypt where they consistently smuggle arms.
- Hamas is not interested in peace as they continuously reject international monitors to observe compliance to the brokered ceasefire.
- Hamas is even at odds with fellow Palestinian, Fatah, and rejected PLO’s ceasefire with Israel.
- Hamas is using the civilian as human shields
Those against Israel
- Israel is not interested in granting Palestinian self rule, base on it’s historical record as the occupying force of Gaza.
- Israel continued control on Palestinian air and water space.
- Israel’s continued blockade paralyzing economic activity.
- Disproportionate use of force in response to the rockets fired, and as an act of self defense.
There are interesting comments as well from moderate Arabs that are worth giving attention
- The latest violence will only weaken the Moderate Arabs and strengthen the Extremist.
- The question of who started the violence or who should stop first, is like a chicken and egg question.
- The way out of the deadlock is a political solution and not military action.
Israel’s arguments
- They are doing this in self defense- neutralizing the capabilities of Hamas tu hurt Israeli civilians.
- They are not at war with Palestinian people, but with a terror group.
- Their operation is surgical, avoiding civilian casualties, as much as they can.
- They are warning civilians to stay away on places with ammunition such as homes, mosques, etc.
I discussed in an earlier post that the anymosity started during the time of Abraham, the father of both the Arabs and the Jews. In my opinion, the contending parties in middle east are interested in peace, they just don’t trust the other party will keep it’s word.
I offer my prayer for the peace in Jerusalem, and for the Almighty to protect his people in this time of conflict.
12 Responses to “Should The World Condemn Israel?”
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[...] like the group blog Filipino Voices, and individuals like Caffeine Sparks, the Placeholder, and Sonnie’s Porch, are paying attention to the most recent offensive in the Middle East. Israel, fed up with the [...]
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Prophecy coming true…Israel getting it’s land back.
I watch this crisis with great interest also. I am not a Jew nor am I a Palestinian or Muslim, I’m an interested American with friends of both sides. The “PEOPLE” want peace, the 2 different sides share family ties in many cases. This isn’t about people, it’s about governments, it’s about religious factions.
The middle east continues to be a hot bed and people continue to loose their lives because their governments cannot settle on peace. The whole world has a stake in what’s happening.
ALL I CAN SAY IS A “BIG NO”.Not just because of “HOW ABOUT US”! It’s ISRAEL’s principle and legacy to defend themselves! The world map will not that good shape without ISRAEL.
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your article is good, do I have permit to translate it in Indonesia? off course I give the source link too. thank you very much. GBU
Hi Teky,
Sure, you can… Happy New Year.
In the context of using excessive force in its retaliation and its past actions on the Palestinians, it’s easy to condemn Israel.
But condemning one side or the other will not help in solving this crisis. If third parties are really interested in peace in the region, they should refrain from taking a side and instead work with both Israel and Hamas in coming up with a peace agreement.
Then again, third parties in this conflict has never been neutral so to speak. Right Uncle Sam?
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Great summary, Sonnie. You’ve managed to sum up all of the competing arguments, and demonstrated just what a difficult problem it is.
I do have some difficulty with the terminology used by most journalists and political commentators – disproportionate force.
Proportionate to what? The force used by Israel IS proportionate to its right to defend itself against terror. Certainly the numbers of Palestinians killed is most often higher than Israelis killed. Unfortunately there are innocent Palestinians killed in the line of fire when Israel moves to strike out the terrorists. That is extremely unfortunate and an horrific situation. But that fact doesn’t necessarily mean the force used is disproportionate to the terror inflicted on Israel.
The Palestinian people deserve peace as much as Israel deserves peace (after having to defend itself against numerous attacks over the 60 years of its existence), and peace is not going to be achieved by terrorists killing innocent Israelis, or by the terrorist groups’ objectives of wiping Israel off the map. Of course Israel will continue to defend itself against such terrorism, and unless the terrorists stop or are stopped, there is no end in sight.
@ Jhay– Long time no hear. You are correct, media are biased on their reporting. For example, Al Jazeera’s focus are the action of Israel causing civilian deaths, but do not refer to Hamas as terrorist who fire rackets to Israel. While Fox news is bias with Israel.
@ Brigitte– thanks for dropping by. Indeed it is a difficult situation. The Arab world looks at the Hamas as a resistance force who is fighting for the cause of the Palestinian people, and not as terrorist. This is also a battle of paradigm.
It is weird how the “world” (Arab world) condemns Israel. The truth is that Hamas has killed more than the casualty count of innocent Israeli citizens since 2001. No one said anything all the while it was happening. I frankly cannot understand the hypocrisy… I am sad that BOTH Israeli and Palestinian kids are being killed but let us be objective.There is no such thing as a “war” that leaves no collateral damage particularly if Hamas “uses” (devours) its own kids by making the human shields while having the gall to admit that they REALLY ARE DOING IT!
Also, if you were to count the kids dying everyday of cholera at Zimbabwe, it exceeds the 17 day casualty count “presented” by Al Jazeera. Why isn’t the world “upset” over the kids of Zimbabwe? At the same time also peope are dying in a war at Shrilanka but no one is upset.
The world should be “equally upset” about kids dying — after all a kid in Gaza is equal to a kid in Zimbabwe who simply suffers and dies because there is no International Aid like the Red Cross who is THERE.. maybe they should go there instead of Gaza!
I can see both sides of the disagreement,although Hamas I believe has instigated the situation.They could have avoided this by simply halting they’re rocket attacks.The real victims are the innocent people who are just trying to live day to day.
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