In other venues, I have been reading about the concerns of those
taking up the issue of innocent civilians suffering in Israel's
current reprisals with respect to the ongoing rocket attacks Israel
has been enduring. The "innocent civilian" mantra is something the
liberal, western media crows about whenever Israel decides that its
people are worth defending. Of course, the media says nothing about
the human rights of the Israeli civilians that suffer from the
aforementioned rocket attacks. I would like to take some time and
address this issue.

This is what I see... A lot of selective morality, where the western
media and the international community is concerned. When Israel is
getting rockets rained down on them sometimes as many as 25 or 30 or
more in a single day, liberal outrage never finds its voice until
Israel's patience is exhausted and action has to be taken.

Israel and Hamas had a ceasefire, they have had multiple ceasefires,
yet still the rockets fall on Israel. We saw scores of "ceacefire"
qassams fall on Israel for the last three years. The world says
nothing, really. Most of the rockets attacks don't even make the
news. As long Israel is getting slammed with rockets, people talk
about the "ceasefire." If Israel responds to the rockets attacks,
THEN suddenly people complain that the "ceasefire" has been broken
by "renewed violence in the Middleeast." Again, where the liberal
media is concerned, you cannot kill enough Jews to be called a
terrorist and no amount of violence against Israel is enough to break
a ceasefire.

The media hides most of what the terrorists do to Israel. That way,
when Israel responds, their liberal lap dogs over here in the US fail
to understand the context of Israel's actions. It is easier to
condemn Israel's defensive countermeasures when you examine them
absent of the actions of her enemies, and create a vacuum bereft of
the true context. Here is the context:

"Israel withdrew completely from Gaza in 2005 in the hope that the
Palestinians could develop a prosperous, stable mini-state and build
momentum for further negotiations towards a two-state solution.
Tragically, Hamas turned Gaza into a front line military base in a
long-term Islamist confrontation with Israel. Hamas, coaxed by Iran,
has led Gaza into self-imposed international isolation. It has
brazenly flouted international law in its treatment of Gilad Shalit.
It has tried ceaselessly to sabotage two-state solution diplomacy,
while intimidating and torturing Palestinian opponents and raining
missiles and rockets indiscriminately into Israel. These missiles
have narrowly missed blowing up Israeli children in kindergartens and
giant fuel storage facilities in built-up areas of Southern Israel
(see Beyond Images Briefings 171 and 188). Israel's bombardment of
Hamas positions on Saturday 28 December was not the result of the
previous seven days of Palestinian rocket attacks. It was the
cumulative result of the previous seven years of rocket attacks, and
the ideology which fuels them. That is the context for these events."
(Retrieved from Beyond Images Website, www.beyondimages.com)

A former psychology professor who is a Palestinian told me just
three years ago that if Israel ever did cease to exist, the
Palestinians would just begin killing each other. He raised the point
to me that the world only cares about the plight of the Palestinians
when they can blame it on Israel. When the Palestinians are killing
and torturing each other, no one bats an eye, it never makes the news
unless it is especially bad like the recent Fatah and Hamas civil
clashes, but you don't see the protests, you don't see the UN
stepping up its rhetoric and you don't see any of the outrage that
you see when people think Israel is to blame. Suddenly, the "human
rights" activists and all of the paragons of human rights on the
left muster up enough strength "care" about the Palestinians.

The truth is most in the liberal community don't "care" about the Palestinians at all. Liberals only
care about the Palestinians to the extent that they can use them as platform to smear Israel. But when the Palestinians are murdering each other, the liberal community has nothing to say.

From 1948-1967, the Palestinians were under Arab rule in the West Bank
and Gaza, by Jordan and Egypt respectively. They had no sewage
treatment, no clean water, children were dying of preventable
childhood diseases, no healthcare, and the average life expectancy was
around 44 years of age. No one cared. The UN did nothing. That was
before there was ONE Jew in either the Gaza or the West Bank. The
world was content to sit and let the Palestinians rot in their
refugee camps.

After a stunning victory in the defensive, 6-Day war, Israel takes
control of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967, provides health care,
clean water modern sewers and sewage treatment, provides welfare and
social security, offers Palestinians jobs, builds 5 hospitals and a
school for blind children (which the Palestinians turned into an ammo
depot and armory), free education, even builds schools, caused the
average life expectancy among the Palestinians to increase to over 70
years of age due to better health and treatment, allows the Arab
citizens freedom of speech, freedom of religion and full access to
Israel's judicial system, yet Israel is still considered to be the
one to blame for the Palestinian's problems.

The truth is that most if not all of the problems the Palestinians
face are self-inflicted. They are cast as innocent victims of Israel
aggression, but they voted for Hamas in 2006. In spite of having 7
different parties to vote for, they voted for the most ruthless,
bloodthirsty terrorist organization in the Middle East to be their
representative government, and Hamas won by a huge landslide victory.
They voted for the destruction of Israel and like it or not, they
have to be responsible for the choices and decisions they make.

When you vote for an organization that runs it campaign on a platform
taken straight from the pages of Mein Kampf, then you need to be
ready to face the consequences of backing such an organization. The
Palestinians are not as "innocent" as it would seem, and their
children are paying the price for their wickedness. "Civilian" does
not automatically equal "innocent" or noncombatant where this
conflict is concerned.

When the Palestinians stop screaming and foaming at the mouth every
Friday night calling for Israel's destruction in mosques that sit on
Israeli soil, when they stop teaching their children that Jews are
not even human and are descended from apes, when they stop teaching
their children that killing Jews on busses and shopping centers is
meritorious and dying in the process is a ticket to heaven, when
irrational hate and violence cease being their righteousness, then
they can come and talk to me about the "innocent" Palestinians.

The death of the truly innocent in war is a tragedy. But until we
start fighting our wars on Mars, that is the unintended misfortune of
war.

There is a difference though, when it comes to death of civilians in
terrorist attacks and Israel's responses. Israel is not targeting
the innocent. Israel is targeting Hamas. On the other hand you have
Hamas, Hezbollah and others who target exactly those kinds of people.
They pick soft targets, children on playgrounds, and people in a
supermarket, they choose the most vulnerable members of Israeli
society to attack. When Hamas sends its qassam rockets into Israel,
these acts of terrorism are indiscriminate. Civilian casualties are
exactly their aim.

The Israeli military does what it can to limit civilian casualties,
but the truth is that no one can fight a sanitary war. Again, no one
was worried about "civilian casualties" when it was just the Jews who
were on the receiving end, so it is really pointless for anyone to
start crowing about innocent civilians and human rights now when the
bullets start flying both ways.

Let me be clear: Israel needs to destroy Hamas. That was the mistake
Israel made with Hezbollah in 2006. Israel quit too soon, left too
many loose ends, left enough of Hezbollah's infrastructure intact
that they were able to rebuild. Israel needs to continue until Hamas
exists ONLY in history books and not on the world stage. And if there
is so much as peep from Hezbollah, they need to do the same thing to
them.

The only way to win the war against the terrorists is for Israel to
make the price for terrorism higher than the terrorists want to pay.
No mercy, no prisoners, no amnesty no stopping until all the members
of Hamas are dead; every last one of them.

There simply is no substitute for victory.

Quote from Shiloh: "There is a difference though. Israel is not targetting the innocent. Israel is targetting Hamas. On the other hand you have Hamas, Hezbollah and others who target exactly those kinds of people. They pick soft targets, children on a playgrounds, people in a supermarket, they choose the most vulnerable members of Israeli society to attack. When Hamas sends its qassam rockets into Israel, these acts of terrorism are indiscriminate. Civilian casualties are exactly their aim".

Maybe Israel needs to publicise this to the newsmedia. It would make a change to see a news item with pictures of Israeli civilian casualties, then maybe people could see things for what they really are.

It should happen but it is not going to happen ...the bible tells us that ::02:: ::02:: ::02:: ::02:: ::02:: ::321:: ::321:: ::321::

The media around the world realize what Hamas/Hezboloh/Terrorist and the rest are doing already..THEY DON'T CARE!

Absolutely right.

I saw some video the other day of an air raid on a "mosque". The Israelis used a 2000 pound bomb on it, but what many don't understand were the secondary explosions after the bomb went off. Those "secondaries" say one thing if you've got a military background. They say "Ammunition Dump". Since the terrorists like to store their weapons in places of worship, I have no problem with pancaking the place -- we did that in Iraq during the First Gulf War. You keep chasing the enemy until he has no place to hide, no supplies, and no transport to get any -- then maybe if he's not too stupid he'll surrender.

I hope Israel keeps pounding Hamas until they are as extinct as the dinosaurs.