War Handwavium

Israel’s apologist will often quote Hamas’s mission statement, which calls for the destruction of Israel, in an effort to demonize Hamas. You won’t find me defending Hamas or their mission statement, but if words condemn, then they condemn regardless of who said them.

In that regard, Israel has also called for not only the destruction of Hamas, but the desctruction of all of Gaza. Here are a few quotes from Israeli officials:

In summer of 2007, Israeli Deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai began preparing a plan on behalf of his boss, the Defence Minister Ehud Barak, to declare all of Gaza a “hostile entity” and dramatically reduce the essential services supplied by Israel — as long-time occupier — to its inhabitants, including electricity and fuel. The cuts were finally implemented late last year after the Israeli courts gave their blessing.

October 2007, Vilnai said of Gaza: “Because this (Gaza) is an entity that is hostile to us, there is no reason for us to supply them with electricity beyond the minimum required to prevent a crisis.”

January of 2008, Vilnai said that Israel should cut off “all responsibility” for Gaza, though, in line with the advice of Israel’s attorney general, he has been careful not to suggest that this would punish ordinary Gazans excessively.

Around this time, Vilnai also said “We want to stop supplying electricity to (Gaza), stop supplying them with water and medicine”

July 2008, Vilnai said that Gaza “will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves”. The media translated “shoah” to mean Holocaust. Israeli apologists played it down, saying that “shoah” should be translated to mean “disaster”. However, no one in Israel was fooled. “Shoah” — which literally means “burnt offering” — was long ago reserved for the Holocaust.

August 2008, Barak revealed that his officials were working on a way to make it lawful for the army to direct artillery fire and air strikes at civilian neighbourhoods of Gaza in response to rocket fire. They are already doing this covertly, of course, but now they want their hands freed by making it official policy, sanctioned by the international community.

At the same time Vilnai proposed a related idea, of declaring areas of Gaza “combat zones” in which the army would have free rein and from which residents would have little choice but to flee. In practice, this would allow Israel to expel civilians from wide areas of the Strip, herding them into ever smaller spaces, as has been happening in the West Bank for some time.

Vilnai and Barak’s ultimate goal appears to be related to Vilnai’s “shoah” comment: Gaza’s depopulation, with the Strip squeezed on three sides until the pressure forces Palestinians to break out again into Egypt. This time, it may be assumed, there will be no chance of return. And then Israel can take over the land.

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9387.shtml

“Palestinians are like cancer. There are all sorts of solutions to cancerous manifestations. For the time being, I am applying chemotherapy.”
Moshe Y’alon, Israeli Chief-of-Staff

“Eventually we will have to thin out the number of Palestinians living in the territories.”
Eitan Ben Eliahu, Israeli Air Force Commander

“I believe in liquidationists.” (Assassination brigades targeting Palestinian activists)
General Meir Dagan, Head of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service

http://www.newint.org/issue359/essay.htm/

Israel’s Minister of Public Security, Avi Dichter, believes punishment should be inflicted “irrespective of the cost to the Palestinians”;

Meir Sheetrit has urged that Israel should “decide on a neighborhood in Gaza and level it”

Deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai talks about bring about a palestinian holocaust in Gaza.

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/cook.php?articleid=13780

“it would be pointless for Israel to topple Hamas because the population [of Gaza] is Hamas.”

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1226404716066&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter

Major-General Gadi Eisenkot in the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth in October 2008:

“We will wield disproportionate power against every village from which shots are fired on Israel, and cause immense damage and destruction. From our perspective these [the villages] are military bases … This isn’t a suggestion. This is a plan that has already been authorised.”

http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/war_on_gaza/2009/01/2009110112723260741.html

So, if Hamas’s words condemn Hamas, then Israel’s words likewise condemn Israel. Israel is calling for all of Gaza to be declared a “hostile entity”, indistinguishable from Hamas, that all civilians are Hamas. And this is in direct violation of international law for how to conduct a war among a civilians population.

Israel has also called all Palestinians a “cancer” and military power is a “cure”, they’ve threatened to bring a holocaust upon all of Gaza, they have threatened to pick a neighborhood in Gaza and level it, that they should inflict damage irrespective of the civilian casualties, and have come out and confessed to bringing a disproportionate response, again all of which, are violations of the rules of war.

So, if Israel wants to condemn Hamas based on Hamas’s words, then Israel can equally be condemned for its words. If Israel wants to excuse its words and say it shouldn’t be condemned for what it said, then Hamas should equally be excused for its words and not be condemned solely on what it said.

As far as I can tell, morality is measured first in action, then in words. Actions speak louder than words is the saying. If someone says “I love you” as they try to strangle you, then you ignore the words and judge based on the strangualtion attempt.

If you want to judge someone based on their words, that’s fine too. However, there is no morality in hypocracy. So, if you judge someones words, you need to judge everyone’s words, and you need to judge equally, independent of who said something.

So, if the Israeli apologists want to quote Hamas’s mission statement, that’s fine. I’ll condemn Hamas for their mission statement. But then I must condemn Israel for what it says as well.

The problem is that Israeli apologists want it both ways. They want to condemn Hamas based on what Hamas says, but they want to justify some reason for ignoring everything that Israel says. And when you get down to it, that’s just basic human hypocracy. In a time of war, we call it propaganda.