Steele,

You answer my question with a question — which I'm told is a technique taught to Jewish boys and girls! And your question comes with an assumption which I question.

You understand that Hamas had nothing to do with the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers. How good is your understanding, given that Hamas is the ruler of the Gaza enclave?

You mention charities being 'stripped and trashed' — I know nothing of this. How good is your information?

Why is it necessary for Hamas to amass hundreds of rockets to fire into Israel? Since Hamas has as one of its chief aspirations the destruction of the Israeli state, would you not expect Israel to do its best to keep such missiles out of Gaza through a naval blockade?

I repeat that I do not have a 'side' in this conflict, and I do accept that Hamas thinks that its cause is just. But as another commenter said, everyone does in such a conflict.

Israel has show just what you can do in a desert if you act with intelligence and resolve — yet none of this example seems to be followed by its neighbours. I am one of many who would like peace in this area, which has only occasionally occurred over the past several thousand years. But that requires, at a minimum, that Hamas abandons its total objection to the very existence of Israel.

To Dane.

Of course Arabs are second class citizens in Israel. You can hardly make an enemy population that wants to exterminate you your equal, can you? Western nations may be stupid enough to do that. But the Wests Muslim problem is not as bad as Israel's yet so the westerners haven't started thinking straight. Although, there are a few encouraging signs that even the limp wristed Euros are beginning to grow a brain and realise that they rather stupidy invited their enemies into their own countries.

Funnily enough, it is the homosexuals in super tolerant Holland who are leading the way. Homosexuals are usually the leaders of the anti everything brigade that reflexively opposes everything the straight majority support. So the pooftas were initially very supportive of the Muslims because they considered them a fellow "oppressed" minority. But then the Muslim leaders started demanding Dutch Homosexuals should be put to death, just like Muslim apostates, and any western cartoonists, editors, authors, and film makers who insult Islam should be put to death. The pooftas suddenly grew a brain. They realisedt that whereas normal people will not let them marry, at least their straight enemies do not want to stone them to death. You see, the Muslims thimnk that homosexuals are not just second class citizens, they should be exterminated like the Jews, and anybody else who crosses them.

If Arabs in Israel are only second class citizens then they should count themselves lucky. They are a lot more fortunate than the Jewish inhabitants of every Muslim land who fled long ago to Israel because they did not want their throats cut by the Muslims. My premise has always been, that what we want here is equality.

You know Equality, don't you Dane? You trendies are obsessed with it. And I think that the Jews in Israel have an equal right to ethnically cleanse Muslims from Jewish lands, as Muslims have to ethnically cleanse Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians, Hindus, Sikhs and their own rival factions from their Muslim lands.

Fairs fair.

Dear Don,

Thank you for your reply.

You ask;

“You understand that Hamas had nothing to do with the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers. How good is your understanding, given that Hamas is the ruler of the Gaza enclave?”

You hopefully realise the kidnappings occurred in occupied West Bank not Gaza. This is a quote from the Jewish publication Forward;

“It was clear from the beginning that the kidnappers weren’t acting on orders from Hamas leadership in Gaza or Damascus. Hamas’ Hebron branch — more a crime family than a clandestine organization — had a history of acting without the leaders’ knowledge, sometimes against their interests. Yet Netanyahu repeatedly insisted Hamas was responsible for the crime and would pay for it.
http://forward.com/articles/201764/how-politics-and-lies-triggered-an-unintended-war/?p=all#ixzz39V4n3ClP

You also asked;

“You mention charities being 'stripped and trashed' — I know nothing of this. How good is your information?”

“Over the last couple of days, the army’s operations have extended into Bethlehem and Nablus – the heart of Area A (where the Palestinian Authority is in charge of both security and civil matters). The army arrested members of Hamas’ charity organization, as well as journalists affiliated with Hamas and the head of the Palestinian Legislative Council, who is a member of the party. A total of 200 people. Computers and weapons were also confiscated. And all this while the search after the teenagers is focused on the Hebron area, which is under closure. There is no doubt that many of these operations are unrelated to the teens, and that no one in the army thinks that charity workers, journalists or parliamentarians know where they are.”
http://972mag.com/west-bank-kidnapping-israels-crackdown-moves-beyond-hamas-militants/92162/

Of course the kidnapping and killing of the three Israeli teens was tragic but here are just three preceding incidents where Palestinian teenagers were slaughtered.

Cont...

Cont...

March 9 - Yousef al-Shawamrah, 14, was shot in the back and hip with live ammunition near his village of Deir al-Asal al-Fawqa

April 4 - Israeli soldiers shoot dead two Palestinian teenagers protesting in the Occupied West Bank.

May 15 - Muhammad Abu Thahr, 16, and Nadim Nuwara, 17, were shot dead by Israeli troops as they protested the ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands prompting Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa Director for Human Rights Watch to state the obvious; “The wilful killing of civilians by Israeli security forces as part of the occupation is a war crime”.

You make much of the mantra “Hamas has as one of its chief aspirations the destruction of the Israeli state” but that doesn't reflect the reality.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/hamas-softens-israel-stance-in-calls-for-palestinian-state-431624.html

You also asked;

“Why is it necessary for Hamas to amass hundreds of rockets to fire into Israel?”

Because without the means to hit back at Israel then the types of punitive land grabs, settler violence, teenage deaths, abductions and destruction of property that occurs so routinely in the West Bank would happen in Gaza. It has only through determined manufacturing of a crisis has Israel been able to strike at the Gazan people.

Just as the IDF sell themselves as being prepared to stand up for the rights of Israelis to live free from oppression so Hamas claims that position in Gaza which is why the last time the people of Gaza voted they so strongly endorsed Hamas.

For Don Aitken,

You are a 'contributor' to an "opinion" web site.

Perhaps, in this article - not unlike many of your other 'OLO contributions' that I've perused - you are wrong.

Just saying.

Steele,

Your reference to Hamas's position on Israel is dated 2007. Wikipedia's current summary makes clear that there are many who talk as though they can speak for Hamas, and a prevailing theme is that Israel is not to be tolerated.

I was writing about Gaza, not the West Bank, where there were no rockets, and Hamas is not the effective ruler. I see no evidence of Hamas charities being 'trashed' in what you provided as a link.

But in any case, I do not know the ins and outs off the current imbroglio, and accept that you see things differently. My feeling is that neither side will give up. For Hamas to place its rockets where people live, near schools and hospitals, knowing that retaliation will occur, is simply to countenance the death of its own people. I can't support that. I am sure that it provides sympathy — nothing is more telling than the sight of injured and dead children.

But to what end?