Never has an overused phrase been more deserved as in the case of the Israeli government and the Hamas group in the latest chapter in the long running sorry story of violence between Palestinians and Israelis. Both sides should be mortally ashamed of their actions. Both sides are more interested in political posturing than in concern over the people they supposedly represent.
It also demonstrates that governments at best are only interested in paying lip service to serving “the people” and will spend far more resources looking after their own interests – retaining power. It is just that you rarely see governments lusting after power quite this much.
What does Hamas think it is doing with those pathetic rocket attacks against Israel ? They seem to serve little purpose other than to annoy Israel, and provide an ego boost to the Hamas militants. It is not as if they are very effective at killing innocent civilians.
And as for the Israeli response, you have tried this same thing before … over and over again for around 60 years. You have not managed to stop Palestinians military or terrorist actions in the past with this (over the long term), so why do you think it will work this time? All this indiscriminate killing will achieve is further evidence that Israel does not give two hoots for international law or for the lives of innocent (in many cases) Palestinians.
It is interesting to note that Israel does not permit journalists to enter Gaza. Almost as if they know what they are doing is wrong and just do not care. And of course as their ground offensive has started, perhaps they are trying to hide something ?
Israeli actions will drive Palestinians into being more accepting of extremists and will in the long term increase the amount of violence against Israeli civilians. Does that mean Israel should not respond to Hamas missile attacks ? No of course not, but the response must be proportionate (to be legal), and must go out of the way to avoid “collateral damage”. It may well be right that Hamas uses civilians as a shield for military purposes, but Hamas will not be blamed for those collateral casualities no matter what Israel claims.
Personally I do not really believe that those who govern Israel are so stupid as to believe these miltary attacks will accomplish anything. They are pandering to the Israeli fanatics frothing at the mouth who insist that something must be done, and the only reason they are doing it is to keep popularity so that they keep power when the next elections occur.